This week’s blog posts are all by Crystal Neubauer. Last week saw Amanda Jolley and starting us off was Michelle Belto introducing our collaborative series; this week Crystal! Enjoy and savor the uniqueness of each~

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Seven blank white canvases lay in a neat row on a counter in my studio. I’ve circled around them, taken many a lunch break across the room from them, and otherwise ignored them while packing supplies for workshops and creating collages for other shows.

The time has come. I’ve decided on a color pallet and a style direction. This is where the proverbial rubber meets the road. Or the brush meets the canvas, as it were.

One last trip to Home Depot to purchase a sample size of each color and I have to stop at the wall of paint cards to make my final selection. I was determined to choose the most saturated version of each hue, but I wind up selecting a version of the green that reminds me of vintage papers I’ve collected, so I follow that tone through with the other colors.

Operating under my long standing mantra “Action Creates Motivation” I decide to get the process started by painting several vintage book pages of each color. And I gotta admit, I am not in love with this pallet.

I’m not sure if I brought home samples of paint or every flavor of sherbert available at the supermarket.

Before I get discouraged, I start pulling out every bit of collage material compatible with my selected color pallet.

Now this, I think I love.

I ponder the merits of creating traditional collages on paper with glue before a top coat of encaustic, or using the wax as the adhesive to attach the elements to the panels.

This decision will wait another day.