Name: Catherine Anne Duffy (nee Parr – after Henry VIII's sixth wife!)
Zodiac Sign: Capricorn
Lives: In a house inhabited by wildlife. But you probably meant where, so Earth! (The more sensible answer is Cooranbong, Australia.)
Known for: Owner of Paper & Stuff.
Blog, website or gallery: www.catherineduffy.typepad.com
Loves to: Read, watch movies, do tai chi, sew, draw, paint, make glass beads, eat, garden, run two businesses, talk to customers, clean the house (occasionally), talk to my cats, dream…
Loves to create: Anything and everything, I'd like to have tried a bit of everything by the time I check out.
Favourite Darkroom Door product: At the moment the robots collection, love the tin bras on the girlie one. (can I say that?) (yep!)
Have you ever been in a darkroom? Yes, when I was a junior in an advertising agency they used to give me all the bromides to shoot for the studio. Probably to get me out of their hair because I used to ask too many questions! Unfortunately for them I was quick at making bromides!
Let’s say you’re invited to come into our darkroom for a day. What would you bring with you? Ummm, my cat Slinky she's a black cat, in a black-room. Could be fun for a while. Then if we got scared, we'd have each other! Maybe a torch and a book, and a beanbag…
Are you afraid of the dark? Isn't everyone? I may be nearly 42, so close to knowing the meaning of life, but I cannot get into bed with the light off. The thing that lives under the bed might get me. Did I mention I live in a wildlife friendly house?
Cath has been busy with our new Robot Collection... here is her first creation, with more to follow over the next few days...
'Scan The Roses' Robot Canvas
Materials:
• 6x6 inch Renoir Deep Edge Canvas
• Darkroom Door Robot Photochips
• Darkroom Door Robot Wordstrips
• Darkroom Door Robot Filmstrips
• Darkroom Door Pink Roses A4 Paper
• Lumiere Paints, Citrine Green, Pearl Emerald Green and Magenta.
• Assorted Versacolour Ink Cubes
• Black Braid
• Blue Feather
• Bright Green Bazzill Bling
• Coloured Daisies
• Multicoloured Bugle Beads
• Judikins Diamond Glaze
• Kaiser Rhinestones
• Sense of Humour
Destructions…
(Please Note – Some of the photos are a little blurry – this is due to taking the photos one handed at 4.30am one Saturday morning, and being extremely excited about the wonderful robot stuff to play with!!) Don't worry Cath - they're just fine!!! :)
1. Take one 6x6 inch canvas, splodge citrine lumiere all over as a rough base coat. Use bubble wrap to give a uneven effect. Do the edges of the canvas as well.
2. Put some pearl emerald green lumiere onto bubblewrap and apply 'texture' wherever you feel it needs it. Wait for it to dry. (While waiting you could start the necklace, the card or sing the national anthem.)
3. Apply magenta lumiere the same way. Squint as you do it. (that's always fun, and maybe that's what I was doing when taking this pic as it's blurry!!) You may think that I am being smart with the squint hint, but really I find its a good way to get things to balance.
4. While waiting for the magenta to dry, cut individual letters out of the robot wordstrips. I have chosen to write… "Remember to stop and scan the roses" combining the pearlescent rose paper with the robot collection.
5. I was really getting into the robot theme by now and decided to use the three lumiere colours and multi layer dots into a crater like effect. This takes quite a while to dry, especially if you do really big ones!
6. After that was dry I applied three different colours of versacolour inks to flatten the colours back a bit, turquoise, pinecone and a touch of gold.
7. Then I cut out the photochip pic I wanted to use, and matted it onto the green bazzill bling cutting a freestyle scallop pattern at the top, then adding a film edge from a robot filmstrip to the bottom of the matted pic. I cut a random scallop from the pearlescent roses, following the shape of the roses to add under the matted pic. I roughly sanded all edged, and inked a little and set all these bits aside ready to apply. Stick a bit of black braid at the bottom of the canvas with double sided tape just to tack it in place.
8. Make your self a cup of tea at this stage if everything's getting too exciting!
9. Using the judikins diamond glaze (dimensional magic works well too) paint the whole front of the canvas, then layer up the roses, matted photochip and feather. Apply diamond glaze over the top of everything.
10. Stick your individual letters onto the sticky diamond glazed canvas using a bamboo skewer, and float into position. Then cover with more diamond glaze.
11. It's time to embellish and add all the little pieces – another filmstrip top right, bright daisies, bugle beads, mini seed beads, rhinestones – and covered everything with… yes, more diamond glaze.
…and here is the finished canvas… (click on images for a larger view)
Great work Cath!!! We love it!!
Drop by tomorrow for more of Cath's artwork and quirky humour! :)
