This winter, I’ve been awestruck by the glittering frost that God has gifted us with. This inspired my creation of the above 15″ x 30″ acrylic work, “Moonlit Ponies.
The sky has plain silver glitter; the foreground has holographic (rainbow) silver glitter. The tree line is made of translucent 3D crystal mortar with gold glass glitter embedded in it. The different silver glitter types do not show in the pix, but are dazzling in the sunlight and especially when viewed in person. The mountains are formed using brush strokes of iridescent silver acrylic paint.
I made the glittery resin horses using molds. They are each 1.5″ high and .5” deep. I then painted their undersides with various colors of glow-in-the dark paint before gluing them onto the canvas. I also made the moon glow in the dark using this special paint that is almost invisible in daylight. When these elements are charged by sunlight or a UV flashlight, they will glow for 6 hours, as shown below.
Unfortunately, the sparkle and glow-in-the-dark effects don’t show up as well as I’d like for the photos, especially the one above, taken in semi-darkness. However, you get the idea of what is lit up in the dark. The resin horses look cool when the daylight shines from the side, as their half-inch-high transparent shapes cast horse shadows on the snow.
I started my experiment with a much smaller prototype, shown below. Its horse had too many inclusions that blocked much of its glow. This picture shows some of the holographic rainbow effect of the foreground glitter. The tree line was way too messy, though.
I then experimented on another small canvas with the same (non-holographic) glitter top and bottom, iridescent blue/silver mountains, and the crystal mortar for the tree line. I pressed gold glass glitter into the left side of the tree line and silver glass glitter into its right side.
I chose gold glass glitter in the tree line for the larger work, but I’ve been wondering if that makes the tree line stand out too much. Maybe the silver is better? I will experiment more with the glass mortar before adding it to my next work. I may try some different media mixed with the mortar and see what looks best.
I have learned a lot during this process! I plan to apply that knowledge to a similar work on a larger canvas. I have already made another herd of horses for that one, and since it will be much larger, I may expand this little herd with eight more horses.
What do you think?? I would love to receive comments on these techniques and works.
