My mother and I have a tradition of making gifts for each other. For my birthday she made me a beautiful, felted pin. I decided to make her a mixed media piece for the holidays. This is a combination of painting on board, photography, collage and encaustic. Even though this isn’t the usual abstract art that I do, any creation is a great chance to explore new techniques.

I photographed this beautiful pink rose that grows in front of my studio. Then I printed two pictures out on vellum paper. I cut out the first rose as a whole piece. I cut out the second rose into petals and sections.

After painting the board a cameo blue, I applied a couple layers of clear encaustic paint onto the board and applied the first rose image. Then I took the second rose and applied the petals between multiple layers of clear and white encaustic.

Finally, I took an x-acto knife and cut into the wax to create the green tendrils. Wearing gloves and a mask, I applied Aglaia green powdered pigment with my fingers into the grooves, wiping and scraping away excess powder. Then I covered with more layers of clear encaustic. I love how the layers lend an alabaster or marble effect to the piece. I will definitely play more with embedding powdered pigments into my abstract work!