Encaustic

Hello!

Last week, I decided to go and visit my granda, because I study in the centre of Glasgow and my granda lives just outside Glasgow. Also, it was his 72nd birthday!

So I boarded the train at glasgow central station - it was so busy and so slow! I'm pretty sure I nearly fell asleep on it, how do you all cope!? Anyway, I'm getting sidetracked.

So when I arrived, we had a naan bread pizza, and I showed him videos of budgies on YouTube, which I think he really liked, and then he decided to show me this new art project he's started.

My granda is really good at art, I know he said he doesn't think he is, but honestly he is!

Anyway, here we go!

So, this is called Encaustic art, and what it involves is heating up wax, and using that to create images. It's wax painting. Let's get started.

So here is the cardboard all set up. You'll see an iron, it's a bit like a travel iron and this is the instrument used to heat up the wax.

What you do next, it take one of the blocks of wax and melt it on the iron - because of the heat it melts relly quickly and its very liquid-like. Then you put the iron to the page.

What you want to to is cover the page totally. No cardboard showing at all. You should try and pull the iron in different directions (so generic I know, but HEY it's your art!! I can't tell you what to create!)

You might want to use a bit of kitchen roll or something of the sort to wipe off excess wax.

I started doing this, but eventually there was just too much, so I got another bit of card instead.

When you're happy with what you've created, you get another little bit of wax, go over the whole design, heat it up a little and then you have a final product!

There were my final designs! The one on the left was what I initially created, I really liked the accidental leaf I made, so I created more!!

The one on the right was the one I wiped my excess wax onto. My granda took the iron and made waves, and eventually this design happened. 

CAN YOU SEE THE FACE ON THE PICTURE??  COMMENT BELOW!!

So... That was encaustic art, it was really fun to do, and I hope that you give it a go! There are loads of videos on youtube about it too, so make sure to have a look to see the whole process a bit better!

Thank you for reading!

Until next time, be excellent to each other.