Queen of Wands

Today I had a conversation with Erica from Blu Jay Studio over email. Erica and I agreed at the beginning of the summer to paint each other and swap. I’ve been struggling all summer with this, looking for inspiration. I didn’t just want to copy a picture of her, I wanted it to be a bit more. So, after our last email…it hit me, and I’ve been busy on her piece all night. I would have loved to done something super cool and set up the video camera, but I didn’t want to lose my momentum for this piece while fidgeting with technology. So instead Hansel took a few photos to document the process.

Here I am in the studio beginning the drawing for Erica’s painting.

Here is the pencil drawing on watercolor paper.

Here I am creating an outline with India Ink.

Now I’ve started applying the watercolor.

Here’s the final piece. It’s 1AM, and I apologize for the poor photo. I know it kind of looks like I made Erica into a character from the Wizard of Oz, but trust me, that’s not the case. Instead, I took the narrative for this painting from the story that goes along with the Queen of Wands card in the tarot set. The story is about a woman who starts out with black hair and a black panther as her companion. As she goes through her journey in life she starts to become more self aware and strong. To reflect her new self-awareness her black hair starts to turn brown, and the panther begins to grow spots. Further into her journey the woman becomes fully connected with her spirit and her hair turns fiery red. When this occurs she quickly pinches the leopard to prevent him from turning into a lion, so that the spots will always remind her of her journey. I made Erica that woman with fiery red hair!!! Hope you like it. Now email me your address sista!

Peace & Love.

PS Renee–your painting is next!