More experimenting with encaustic – this painting has been in the works for a while, and has been subjected to other experimentation.

It is on board, and after preparing the board with gesso I did a loose drawing on it inspired by an enlarged photo I took of tiny Western Australian native orchids, in their natural habitat. Next, I took to the board with my Dremel (an electric tool that has small interchangeable heads for engraving, drilling and making other marks). I carved out some of the pencil lines and some texture, such as in the centre of the flower. As the board is quite hard, it was not easy to control the resultant marks so they became fairly random and not particularly smooth. The next step was applying some oil paint, before adding encaustic wax, then more scraping back, scratching and layering paint and wax.

I’m still not sure…