The Watercolor Boxes

I teach K-5 Art Education in a public school near our home. It's a great job...really stress free because it's not a certified position (even though I am certified in art k-12). So I get to come to school...play art with kids all day....and go home. Seriously, where else could I find a job where I get to do that right? In my classroom I am probably not the norm when it comes to the typical "art teacher". I like a very neat, clean and organized classroom. In fact I go through days of cleaning. Purging crayons, testing markers and throwing out stinky paint. Side note peeps, old paint is the worst smell on the planet. Hands down. No lie. Blerg. Anyhoo.....before the holiday break I always do a major paint station clean up. Because of said smells. I didn't want my room to smell like dead paint upon return in January. I was throwing watercolor pans out by the dozens because well, they don't make them like they used to. In the old days we art teachers could buy the individual pots of colors and replace the old ones. Especially colors used out quickly like blues. And poor yellow. He gets to be yellow for one student and then he becomes green or orange. Yellow doesn't stand a chance in an elementary art room. While throwing all these pans out I had a vision....first I started thinking they'd make cute pencil boxes for our upcoming Southern Circle Retreats. I'd wanted to make something special for the attendees from me to keep their supplies in we use and voila! They worked perfect. (can't show yet because I want them surprised)

And then I started to look at the larger containers closed up without the watercolors pans in them and found they were stunning on their own. The various paint colors splattered all over. Hmmmm....I wonder if paint would adhere to the inside so that when closed it becomes sorta a magical shadow box?

The answer to that question is yes. Yes. Yes!! Of course it took some trials on what to put first to get the paint to stick. Again, clear gesso came to the rescue. Superhero of my studio these days!

Now I did remove some paint in areas so you could see my images a tad better. Not much though. I just love these so much and am tickled to think my creative brain actually thought this up!

To stamp I decided on the outside was best so you could really read the words. Plus it gives the overall affect of 3-D better. Now, ding dong me just grabbed a stamp pad not looking for permanency. Urgh.....So then I had to spray a little clear on top to protect the words from smearing. Lost one in the process. Bummer. Oversprayed it and made it cloudy. Then the light went on in my head to look for my staz-on pad. What would I do without that sucker?

These too are headed to the Naked Art Gallery Microlove opening. Although I might make some more for my Etsy shop. I'll be sure to let you know if I do.