Midsummer Night Captured

For the past 10 days or so, I've been working on this project.  I really loved the Pebeo Prisme paints on the butterflies that I did previously.  So, inspired by the Victorian love of collecting things, and the way butterflies  were displayed, and also my love of Shakespeare, particularly A Midsummer Night's Dream - this is Midsummer Night Captured.

Using a box frame, I painted, cracked, and textured it, (with modelling paste through a stencil), and then highlighted areas with Treasure Gold, a guilding wax.

The backboard consists of a painted torn page from a Byron book.  I have a collection of old books found in charity shops.  It is a good idea to get various textures and page weights, to use in different projects.

The butterflies are created using the Pebeo Prisme paint.  I found you don't fuss with this paint, just blob it on and leave it alone - it will develop over the next 20 minutes or so.

Each butterfly is named for a fairy in A Midsummer Night's Dream - of which there are 7, but Puck escaped!

Here are some close-ups.