Peachtober Unleashed: A Collage Painting Adventure
It’s that time of year again! Or I guess I should say, it was that time of year again. Another October has come and gone and with it, so has the annual Peachtober drawing event. If you would like to read more about Peachtober (and view my illustrations from 2019) please read one of my previous blog posts. I go into more detail about what Peachtober is and how it looks to create an illustration every day for 31 days.
This year, I wanted to do something different. Instead of drawing 31 individual illustrations, I aimed to create one large painting combining all 31 prompts. I wanted to do this for two reasons: I was highly unmotivated to draw 31 full illustrations, and I wanted to create something that would showcase my painting skills. I knew that if I forced myself to try to come up with 31 different drawings, I would burn out quickly. I also recently decided to transition my business into larger paintings and/or murals, so that was the main factor for painting a collage instead of illustrating.
But as Sha’an says every year, there are no rules to Peachtober so… let’s get into it! For reference, here is the prompt list for 2021, including all 31 concepts I attempted to portray in the collage painting.
In this blog post, I’m going to break down the process for how I created this piece, from initial concept to final details. I will also have a breakdown list for each prompt and where I incorporated them into the final painting. I did not include 31 sections in my piece, so some concepts are combined and others appear more than once.
Before starting a project, I like to look for inspiration. It did not take long to find this wonderful creation by Viet Huynh and Nick Slater for Slack. The limited color palette, clean linework, and use of negative space are all elements that inspired me, and I used this as my main source of influence. After finding my inspo, the next thing I did was open Procreate on my iPad to start sketching out ideas. I then divided my canvas into various squares and began sorting out which prompt I would do in each spot. This process involved a lot of push and pull, as I combined a few elements and represented others multiple times.
There were a few prompts that were difficult to ideate for, and I ultimately decided not to sketch out an idea for honey before moving on to the preparation of my canvas. So, before starting my painting, this is the digital sketch that I came up with. At this point, I was not sure if the painting would include line work, but I included it in the mockup so I could see how it looked.
To start my canvas, I measured and drew on my grid. I used some mixed gesso and acrylic to prime the whole thing. Some of the pencil marks did smudge, but I primed with a light hand so that I could still see them when the paint was dry. I then used my projector to trace most of the main elements onto the canvas. Once I saw all the designs together, I went in and drew additional features and sketched out a scene for the “honey” prompt. And before painting, I took my mixed colors from my guitar project and altered them slightly to create this new color palette.
To paint the colored boxes, I taped off sections one at a time to establish a clean line. I did this several times all over the canvas until all of the boxes were colored in. As with most tape, there was some bleeding of colors, so I did have to go back with each color and clean up the lines, which was very tedious.
The next stage of painting was like all the rest, putting blobs of paint onto the canvas until it slowly started to come together. There’s no specific way I tackle this stage, but I tend to bounce around between colors and sections at random. I sort of zone out and work on whichever part I feel like at the time. Once things start to form finer details, this process becomes more strenuous and I start to get a little restless. It’s at this point that I can see the finish line, but I’m also tired of painting the same thing over and over.
Luckily I’ve found the cure for this process is taking lots of breaks to pet my cats, eat a snack, or watch TikToks (guilty). I’ll also usually put on whole albums that I can zone out to or binge listen to podcasts while I paint the details. Somehow it makes the time go by faster!
As I said at the beginning of this post, I wasn’t sure if I wanted to outline everything on this canvas. In the end, I decided not to do so. There are some places where I did add lines, to create separation and detail, but I refrained from doing so on the whole thing because I didn’t think it was necessary. I was also using a small brush to create these lines (instead of a pen) which meant that if I did want to outline everything, it would take quite a bit of time and I wouldn’t be able to sustain a consistent line width. So, with that decision made, I found a spot to hide my initials and prepared the canvas for priming.
After a light dusting, I took some Varnish and spread a thin layer over the whole canvas. After an hour or so, I went back and added another layer in the opposite direction. The next day I took some photos and posted the final piece to Instagram! The best part of Peachtober is sharing the final product and seeing how other artists interpreted similar concepts. Overall, I’m very happy with this piece as it was equally challenging and rewarding. As always, now I look forward to next year! Thank you for reading and I wish you a happy 2022!
Below is a picture of my painting with the words that prompted each little square.
