Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds

My interpretation of my song, Lucy in the Sky with Diamond, is that it is centered around a girl named Lucy. This girl is in the sky and is wearing diamonds. Around Lucy, there is beautiful, imaginary scenery. This scenery includes a boat on a river, tangerine trees, marmalade skies, tall yellow and green flowers, and a bridge by a fountain. The song is describing a fantasy world that Lucy lives in.

Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds had a lot of influence on my painting. I painted most of the beautiful, imaginary scenery. Like the song, I also centered Lucy in my artwork, by making Lucy the only drawn image (drew her in pencil crayon). Adding to the imagery from the song, I also incorporated the mood of the song, which was happy and calm, by using longer brush strokes and warm colours. 

I found that many things were helpful through the process. I found the wet-brush-technique to be very helpful, especially when I was painting the grass. I also found the sandpaper technique to be of use because it added texture to my painting. I used the dry brush technique when I merged the grass and the sky at the horizon. I discovered that I had to listen to my song repeatedly to comprehend the lyrics and understand the mood. I also had to listen carefully to extract the key images from the song.

I learned a couple skills while doing this project. One skill that I learned was how to transfer a drawing onto a wood painting. I learned this skill when I added Lucy to my painting. I also learned the skill of using tape to help you paint shapes on your painting. For this skill, you have to follow a particular process. The process is taping over the part you want to paint on, cutting up the shapes, painting the cut-out shape and then removing the tape. I learned this skill when I added diamond to the sides of my painting.  

The area that I felt that I improved my skills the most was painting a landscape (specifically a river, grass and the sky). I felt that I improved the details of the landscape. I learned more about showing the texture of land, using the sandpaper technique. I also improved how I paint a horizon (between both water and sky and land and sky).

Side view of the painting:

 By: Jory Birbrager