New in colorful art: Fancy Spitaki, part of the Athens series
Friends the globe over!
Good morning from sunny Houston, Texas, where I am jazzed to announce the debut of my art page here on LFB Color. This has been many years in the making, and each week I’d like to showcase a new work of art for you to see. You are here on this creative journey with me as I continue coloring my way across the globe.
To some of you who have followed my architectural color consulting career, this transition to art creation might come as a surprise. Hopefully it is a pleasant type of surprise, and one in which you, too, will delight!
Today’s featured art is something I created back in late 2021, and it is based on photography I captured while on a trip to Athens, Greece in February 2020, days before the country closed its borders due to the pandemic. What you see below is a hand embellished reproduction of the original work, which sold within 24 hours of my creating it!
This pen sketch is from my Athens series and is entitled, “Fancy Spitaki.” Spitaki is a take on the Greek word ‘spiti,’ or house, and it means small or cute house. It is the diminutive form of the word house. As I was walking through smaller neighborhoods of Athens one day with my friend Liana, I kept noticing beautifully colored doors on every house. This green was so subtle yet made a statement, so of course I took a snap. From there I drew inspiration for the artwork.
See the video below for some close up details.
Fancy Spitaki above is a hand embellished reproduction in 11” x 14” size and printed on art canvas textured fine paper. To create the original work, I used permanent black ink, water soluble oil pastels used essentially as watercolor, colored pencils and gold paint. I hand embellished the print using all of the aforementioned art media.
All of my reproductions are hand embellished in some way, making them unique pieces in and of themselves. They are embellished to look like originals. You will see from the video and some of these photos that there is a pearlized sheen to the color rendering.
I use a special brand of pearlescent pastels by a brand called MUNGYO. The water soluble oil pastels come in 24 colors and can be applied dry or watered down as I did for watercolor use. This is my go-to product for rendering most of my pieces.
This is the only piece of its kind and yes, it is for sale on my website at: Fancy Spitaki artwork.
Stay tuned for a new masterpiece next week, friends. I have so many beautiful pieces to share with you. This is just the beginning.
Your colorful friend always,
Lauren
