Wooden Geode in Blue

 

 Wooden Geode in Blue

Acrylic paints on wood with mica chips and salt

  

This time around I'm still painting but on an entirely different surface. A few weeks ago, Frank started on Turkey Hollow, and in the process of establishing a level base of the carving, Frank sawed off a angled bit of the billet. I saw it discarded on the saw table, and got an idea. I asked him to smooth off the bottom and sides and a top surface.

I had seen some actual gemstone geodes recently at a nature preserve gift shop, and fell in love with the glow of the colours. I had also seen some highly abstracted wooden ones on Pinterest. When I saw the discarded piece of wood on the saw table, everything came together and I decided to try making my very own wooden geode.

I brought the wooden piece inside and poured on a lotta acrylic gel medium, and actually squeegeed off the excess with a small hand held squeegee. After letting it dry for a coupla days I laid in the first of many coats of gel medium mixed with varying intensity of all the different tubes of blue acrylic paints I had on hand. On the top, I finished off with some pale blue and white for a graduated effect

 

While I was at it, I found an old sample that had come with a paint order, of mica chips suspended in acrylic medium. I also found some small salt crystals in an old plastic “salt grinder”. Both things found their way onto my wooden geode. I continued to cover the salt and mica chips with layers of clear acrylic medium, and the blue parts of the geode with thin layers of multiple shades of blue. As a finish Frank put some tung oil on the still exposed wood sides and bottom of the piece. It's his usual finish for his sculptures.

  

I finished this piece when it's sheen matched what I'd seen of the “real” rock geodes. I guess you could call this project a real “mixed media” piece......both cellulose and crystalline in it's making.