POP ART DIVA LAND: THE QUEEN OF TARTS Colored Pencil Art - A Foodie Twist on The Queen of Hearts

THE QUEEN OF TARTS

#2 in my Alice Through The Cooking Class Series

Off with their stems! The deliriously dangerous Pink Queen wields a sharp chef's knife and a fork as she slices into a cherry tart she made herself in the castle kitchen. Alongside the queen are all the ingredients for a ton of tasty treats to take to the Happy Hour Tea Party and tempt her fellow foodie residents of the Wonderland Cooking Class.

As I said yesterday on my MAD PLATTER post, this series is my little foodie twist on "Alice Through The Looking Glass", a childhood favorite of mine. Continuing my edible ode to the creative madness that is Tim Burton, I have taken The Queen of Hearts and put a knife in one hand, a fork in the other and showered here in all the baking ingredients required for a tasty tart or two.

The blue bowl is a little homage to my mother who had these two huge crockery mixing bowls that all sweet things in our house started out in. I can remember my mother using the edge of that bowl to sharpen a knife as well as for mixing up goodies and it is such an iconic kitchen image to me that I had to include it.

As for my technique, I do a multi-layering effect with my Prismacolors to achieve the colors and the depth of saturation that I want. It's a tedious process but one that gives colored pencils a "painterly" feel as opposed to having the look of a drawing. I also use a ton of white pencils for blending the colors - I buy the white pencils by the dozens!

The Queen of Tarts started out as a sketch for the Queen of Hearts, ending up with a pastry twist for this "Alice Through the Cooking Class Series". Here's the original ink sketch I did - notice how I was playing around with different eyes and mouths on the right and then defined the crown I wanted for her:

When I started my Food Art series for The Diva of Tiny Foods Shop I morphed my Queen into the kitchen and shoved a tart tin in front of her, lol:

Here's a couple of images of the Queen of Tarts original colored pencil illustration in progress:

I start out with the lighter colors on my colored pencil drawings first and I work with a tissue under my hands so I won't smear work already laid down. I also work with a completed sketch underneath my paper and use a light box to see the sketch instead of laying down a pencil sketch on my final piece. That way if I change my mind or screw up I have wiggle room to make corrections without the original sketch lines damaging the piece.

This gives you an idea of scale. I have to say I had a great time with the whisk and the measuring cup, lol - and, of course, I adore my slightly menacing, tiny waisted, big bazoomed Queen!

PRINTS AVAILABLE:
QUEEN OF TARTS COLORED PENCIL DRAWING
is available for sale here.
where you can read more about the original piece and get the specifics.