14-Ivana2
©2010 Craig Ashby
Mixed media on masonite.
7″ x 7″

This Ivana Trump is easily in the top five favorites of this whole series, if not my favorite. The reason it may be my favorite is that it almost ended up in the trash.

With each of these, the collage layers are easily built up. I had some problems with the MadgeLV series being over sanded. So there was some opportunity for struggle early in the piece, but in the end the top layer decides whether you achieve cohesion.

In this piece, the top layer was supposed to be a single color but the first three top layers didn’t allow for readability. It wasn’t until the fourth time I applied the top layer that the image just popped. That final layer was hot pink and it imparts an anaglyphic 3D look to the piece.

It isn’t anything I expected to happen. I struggled and won. It is that struggle that makes it one of my favorite successes within this series.

The successes are many. I love the hot pink, tangerine, lilac trifecta. It is clear to see the astronaut in the lower right corner. Sampled from a 1980’s issue of Legion of Super Heroes depicting an explosion in space.