Guess Who’s Back (With Actual Paint)?

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Guess Who’s Back? Plus a Peek at My New Art Technique

Abstract painting with vivid, fluid streaks of color blending across the paper. Prominent hues include bright yellow, turquoise, cobalt blue, peach, and purple, interspersed with black and white. The colors appear to be dragged or poured, creating feathered, wave-like textures. The upper corners feature heavier black and grey areas, adding contrast. In the bottom right corner, the artwork is signed “T Cowley” with the caption “Art & Design by Teresa Cowley.”
A closeup of one of my original acrylic paintings on paper showing the beautiful movement of this technique.

I’m back and ready to return to regular blog posts! I needed to step away for a bit. The break started when a team of techies took a look under the hood to squash some bugs. Then I extended it—because honestly, it just felt good to take a break after plugging away at my blog so consistently for so long.

Sometimes, you have to do what’s right for you instead of working so hard to supply your website with fresh content just to please search engines. That said, I’m very, very grateful for the people who have been reading and enjoying my posts!

Reflecting on the Direction of My Blog

During my time away, I’ve been thinking about the direction of my blog. A lot of what I’ve shared has been educational or simply things I found interesting—and that’s absolutely valid content. I’ll definitely keep posting that kind of material.

But I’ve realized that I’ve gotten a little lost in the mix. I haven’t posted much about what I’m doing or shared much about my own journey as an artist and designer. I’d really like to change that.

Experimenting with Traditional Art Again

With that said, let me emerge from the shadows a bit—because I’ve started going back to traditional art techniques, and I’m loving it! To be clear, I still plan to continue with my digital art and design work. Getting back to traditional art has simply been on my mind, and it felt like something I needed to do for myself. Plus, I’m starting to see some real potential for unique combinations of traditional and digital techniques—an artistic hybrid!

I remembered a technique from a kid’s art book I had growing up. It involved lotion and food colouring: you coat two pieces of paper with lotion, drop some food colouring down, press the papers together, and then pull them apart to reveal beautiful patterns and blended colours. I barely remember exactly what mine looked like, but the process definitely made an impression on me.

Swapping Food Colouring for Paint

Abstract artwork featuring fluid, organic streaks and blends of vibrant colors including yellow, turquoise, green, black, and white. The paint appears to be poured or swiped, creating layered, petal-like forms with a sense of motion. Some areas have marbled or veined patterns, particularly where green and black meet. The signature “T Cowley” and the text “Art & Design By Teresa Cowley” are visible in the bottom right corner.
A closeup of another of my original acrylic paintings on paper. This one shows some of the incredible patterns I get with this technique.

Naturally, I wondered—would it work with paint instead of food colouring? I’m excited to report that it does! The results are much more dramatic than the food colouring version I remember.

Using lotion with liquid acrylic paint reminds me a lot of acrylic pouring techniques, which I’ve always loved. But unlike traditional acrylic pours, this method doesn’t come with as much paint loss. And because you’re not stretching the paint to cover an entire canvas, the natural flow of the colours stays intact.

Sure, I may not get those wild “cells” that pouring techniques are known for, but what I do get are stunning colour blends, unique patterns, and a lovely sense of movement. I have a reel on Instagram that gives a clear example of my lotion and paint technique.

More to Come!

I’m also getting back into traditional collage, but this post is already pretty long—so I’ll save that for another day.

Thanks for reading, and I’m excited to share more updates soon. Stay tuned!

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Digital artist and graphic designer, Teresa Cowley

My name is Teresa Cowley, and I'm a digital artist and graphic designer from Vancouver Island, Canada. I focus on abstract and fantasy art as well as digital collage, and like to utilize AI art tools as part of my design process to create new, innovative pieces of art. I strive to create new, unique designs that tell imaginative stories, and I am eager to push the boundaries of what can be expressed with art and technology.

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