Beginning of flower painting on mixed media surface

I remember when I made the background of this painting. My husband and I lived in Vancouver in a tiny basement-level apartment on a grand, tree-lined street near Commercial Drive. I was working full-time, as I am still, in Fort Langley and taking painting classes at Emily Carr on Granville Island whenever I could. This was before the days of having children, but I remember my brother and his family and my niece visited us there.

I had done another painting on doorskin with this same texture, and had so much left I carried it over to this piece of illustration board. It was a concoction of gesso, coffee grinds, acrylic medium and drywall fill. I spread it around with a painting knife and a comb. After it dried, I painted it the silvery blue colour.

Now I’ve added more white to it again and started defining the composition of some flowers. We’ll see where this one goes.

I love finding these sorts of things laying around. It gives me an interesting place to start, rather than a blank canvas.