New Scope of Work – Going Big with ‘Mauve Summer Night’

Mauve Summer Night, acrylic on board, 47.5″”x59.5″ (framed), 2024 ~Available https://www.kasiapolkowskashop.com/product/mauve-summer-night-47-5-x-59-5-framed/

This painting is inspired by a clear Summer night in the Rocky Mountains of Colorado where the milkyway is visible above a wildflower meadow.

The painting has a smooth texture and is varnished in satin. It has a hanging wire on the back as well as a signed certificate ofauthenticity. It is custom framed in a gallery style floating frame made of hardwood and stained in walnut and finished in satin.

This is a new scope of work vs. older, smaller scale. Every-once-in-a-while, I make a decision to discontinue small size art for a variety of reasons but mainly my goal is to only create large art.
Here you can see the current WIP which is 5ft by 4ft, compared to the lovely smaller painting which is 1ft by 2ft. My goal is to clear out the smaller works from my studio before my next Art Festival in September and to help me accomplish this, all small works are on a super sweet special  https://www.kasiapolkowskashop.com/product-category/paintings-drawings/

During the WIP phase of the painting, there were definitely a lot of steps I didn’t photograph – that’s the time the painting was in its ‘ugly state’ before it finally began to come together after many, many layers. I find myself thinking that my paintings are sometimes full of ugly phases intertwined with fun discoveries. This is one of the reasons I don’t take many progress photos as it’s not a step by step type of technique but rather a colorful, sometimes messy journey.

The biggie eventually started coming along! At 5ft by 4ft it is one of my largest paintings to day. I’ve only pained one other this size a couple years ago. 

I estimate that this painting has about 40-50 layers of translucent acrylic wash. I did a lot of searching with this one but it was so worth it to finally see it start to emerge as what I hoped it would become.

I worked on this piece to be the centerpiece of my art booth during the upcoming Durango Autumn
Art Festival. Below are a couple shots of the completed painting as well as it being custom framed.