Using Mosaic Chips in a Painting

Using mosaic chips in art definitely adds a different element to a painting.  Since my paintings tend to be grids of thousands of colors they appear very “mosaic” like when they are completed, so using real mosaic chips in conjunction with the paint seems to work ok. 

I completed this piece (Creek at Candlehurst Lane #2) in the summer of 2008.  It represents a stream that is just a short walk from my house.  The majority of this is painted with acryl gouache on a 48x60” piece of birch.  I isolated six different areas, where I would integrate mosaic chips.   Once I painted the wood panel, I searched for old plates that might have some colors or patterns that would somewhat correspond with the colors that were painted.  I knew the color matches would not be exact to matching that of the paint, but that was ok since it would ultimately help the mosaics stand out.  I tried to use similar colors when selecting the colors for the tile grout.

After all the mosaics were glued and the grout was polished this work came out really nice.  It has been over a year, since I did anything like this, but I will be starting a new project in the upcoming months.  The mosaic chips I used for this piece were from existing plates that already had patterns on them.  Acryl gouache is versatile enough that it can be used on a variety of surfaces, so I think I will make my own mosaic chips and incorporate them into another painting.  I look forward to getting started on this project soon.  Comments and questions are of course always welcomed.