If you’ve been following along here for a while, you’ll know that everything in this shop is watercolour. That’s my medium. I know how it behaves, I know its rhythms, I know exactly what I can and can’t do with it.
Which is exactly why I decided to pick up acrylics in July. Obviously.
I wrote about starting out over on my other blog, including what kit I actually recommend and what I’ve been learning, but the short version is this: acrylic is completely different from watercolour. You paint dark over light instead of light over dark. You can correct your mistakes. You can layer and blend in a way that watercolour simply won’t let you. It’s been a bit humbling starting from scratch at something new, and also, genuinely, really enjoyable.
My first couple of paintings were practice pieces, mostly me getting used to how the paint moves. I’m pretty pleased with them. I also fully expect to look back in six months and see everything that’s wrong with them, which is how you know you’re learning.
But then I painted these two.
Hush in Hydrangea and Hush in Rose
I’ve named them as a pair, because that’s what they are. The same soft teal background, the same dusky pink palette, the same quiet, still quality. They can hang separately — each one works on its own — but they were painted to sit together, and I think they’re best as a pair.
They feel different to the practice pieces. More like something I meant to make rather than something I made to learn. When I finished them and still liked them a week later, that’s when I thought: right, these can go in the shop.
Hush in Hydrangea
A stone-coloured vase holding five dusky pink hydrangeas against a soft teal background. Muted, still, a bit dreamy. This was the first one I painted that made me feel like I was actually getting somewhere with acrylics.
Painted on canvas, signed on the front, 40cm x 40cm. See it in the shop here.
Hush in Rose
Dusky pink roses with touches of purple and a little delicate leaf detail, same soft teal background as its companion. A bit warmer than the hydrangea. Just as quiet.
Painted on board, signed on the front, 40cm x 40cm. See it in the shop here.
A note on the price
They’re £250 each. I don’t have enormous expectations of shifting them quickly. Original art is a tough sell, and I’m someone who’s is unknown as an artist.
But they’re original pieces — one-of-a-kind, not prints, not reproductions — and they took real time and care to make. I didn’t want to undervalue that just because I’m new to the medium. So I priced them honestly, put them out there, and we’ll see what happens.
If you’d like both, message me on Etsy and we can talk about a price for the pair.
What’s next
More painting. I’m genuinely hooked on it now, and I’ve got ideas for more pieces I want to make. Whether any of them end up in the shop depends on whether I still like them a week later, which is the bar I’m working to.
I’ll keep sharing them over on Instagram as I go. And if you want to read more about how I got started — what supplies I’d actually recommend, what I’ve been learning — I wrote it all up over on Skinnedcartree.
It feels a bit vulnerable, putting original paintings out there when you’re this new to a medium. But the only way to find out if anyone else connects with what you make is to actually show them.
So. Here we are.