#25...simple spray paint art

I recently took a job helping a new mother accessorize her new baby's nursery. She wanted to add some color to her nursery palette of brown, light blue and light green. One of the projects I did for the nursery was to paint this bright orange airplane artwork. I did it with spray paint, and it was really simple to make the silhouette style piece.

I started with a white canvas from the art supply store. (This canvas was about 18" x 24") I opted for a canvas that was gallery wrapped around the edge, which means there are no staples showing and the canvas does not need framing.

Next, a perused google images looking for a "vintage airplane drawing" that would work for what I wanted to do. I found a tiny thumbnail picture of a plane in the position that I wanted, and I used my printer/copier to enlarge the plane to an appropriate size for my canvas. I then cut out the plane shape creating my template. I traced the plane template onto poster board, as I thought that copy paper may bleed through when I did the spraypainting. I drew the little plane puffs onto the poster board and cut them out as well.

With my three templates in hand, I laid them down onto my canvas and played around with the arrangement until I liked the composition. Next I used removable double sided tape and taped the three templates to the canvas, being certain that the edges of each shape laid down nice and flat.

I set up some newspaper in the yard, and using a Rustoleum Enamel Gloss spray paint from Home Depot, I started by spraying each edge of the canvas, trying not to get too much overspray on the face of the canvas. Once the sides dried, I laid the canvas down onto the paper and sprayed several thin layers of the bright orange paint over the canvas, being careful that I sprayed straight down onto the canvas and not from the side, (which may cause paint to leak under the templates.) Once I was satisfied with the orange coverage, I immediately used the tip of a knife to gently lift the plane and air puff templates off of the canvas, revealing the white silhouette. Once it was dry, I coated the entire surface with an acrylic matte varnish from the art supply store, to give it a more smooth surface and finished look.

The project took less than 2 hours, and cost less than $25 for the canvas, spray paint, poster board and varnish. I have done other silhouette artwork pieces in the past, and those required cutting the silhouette out of paper, and mounting it onto a background decoupage style. I like that this canvas is one smooth piece of art and does not have a collage effect like layered paper artwork has.
My camera's focus was off when I took these, so these shots are a bit fuzzy.

Don't worry it is not your eyes!