33 Day Challenge: Abstract

Abstract: Thought of apart from concrete realities, specific objects, or actual instances.

Well, that left the prompt for today on the 33 Day Challenge extremely open for interpretation. I had lots of ideas after I looked up the definition for this prompt on the dictionary. I knew what abstract meant and was aware of the heap of art/music/scientific models that are considered as such but there's something about looking up the meaning of the word to leave no doubt on the mind. I ended up going with one of my first ideas which was to recreate the abstract painting Blue Poles by Jackson Pollock. Or at least use the colour scheme and splatter the polish on my nails. 

There are a few reasons why I chose to base my manicure on this painting. Blue Poles resides in the National Gallery of Australia and was bought in 1973 for about $1.3 million, which at the time caused outrage. 

'How could you pay that much money for something that is not even art?' 

Source

I've been wanting to go to the NGA for a while but Canberra, the city where the gallery stands, doesn't have much else to offer me at the moment and there are other places I'm saving up to go to. I will go soon and look at this 2.12m x 4.89m beauty. I might even cry a little... from happiness of course. 

Another reason is the technique Jackson Pollock used to paint his canvas by laying them on the floor and dripping the paint with various instruments. This is said to reflect the realms of unconscious experience but also respond to contemporary life. I'm quoting him here, 'The modern painter cannot express this age, the airplane, the atom bomb, the radio, in the old forms of the Renaissance or of any past culture'. To me that's a way of looking forward, a point of view that acknowledges the past but recognises the need to move on. I'm guessing saying that while everyone criticises your 'art' either takes a lot of confidence... or arrogance. I find it all so inspiring either way. That's why I would cry from happiness when I stand in front of it. *shakes off the emotion a little*

Back to the nails, the last reason why I wanted to have a little Blue Poles in my nails is that I have never done a splatter manicure before. I have tried but using a straw never gave me any splatter, it only gave me blobs of paint onto paper not my nails. I came across this Spanish-speaking Mexican beauty Youtuber, Yuya, that did a splatter manicure with a bobby pin and it seemed a little more controlled. *Edit* I originally couldn't find the video where she showed the splatter manicure but thanks to Brethil from Druid Nails, I have searched high and low and found it. Click here to watch the video. The splatter manicure starts at about 2:30 and Yuya recommends blowing into the bobby pin as if you wanted to blow bubbles *Edit*.


I gave it a go with this manicure and I'm happy with the way they came out. Mind you, the paper I had underneath my nails ended up with more polish than I did. 

Have I mentioned what polishes I used? Started with a two coats of Sally Hansen in White On and the splattered the coloured polishes in the following order:

• Maybelline Color Show in Impeccable Greys
• Maybelline Color Show in Fierce N Tangy
• Ulta3 in Crazy
• Essence in Absolutely Blue

I finished it off with one last splat of Impeccable Greys to have a closer representation of the painting. I had a mess all over my hands so I grabbed a cotton round and cleaned them up with pure acetone. I managed to clean up around my cuticles with the cotton round and I'm thinking this was easier than sticky taping all my fingers and then trying to remove it. 

I smudged my middle finger and tried to patch it up with extra grey splatter but it's jut making look messy.

I'm happy with this splatter mani and I hope I have made some justice to the painting. Please check out the other ladies' abstract manicures.

33 Day Challenge: Tape Mani

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A tape mani was my introduction to nail art about 15 years ago and I haven't looked back since. They're easy, quick and the amount of designs that can be created is endless. I even created my first post for this blog with a tape mani. I know I've had to restrain myself from creating 33 different tape manis for this challenge and just sticking to it when absolutely necessary. Luckily for me, the third prompt called for a tape mani. Yay!

I wanted to create a skittlette manicure using Maybelline Color Show Sequins in, er, Sea-Quins as a base and Models Prefer in Midnight Madness. There's a bit of a story about Sea-Quins after the page break but I'll explain how I did the mani first. I started with two coats of Sea-Quins, topped it off with two coats of The Awesome Topcoat to make the glitter smooth, taped my middle and ring fingers and applied one medium coat of Midnight Madness. I took off the tape immediately after, let the two fingers dry and finished them with one coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri topcoat. 

For my short polish story and a matted version of this mani, click on the page break.

Maybelline Impeccable Greys and Ozotic 528

Super quick post tonight. 

A couple of weeks ago, I went to a shop. Yes, I am being vague but I do not remember where I went, so I can't say. I think it was the Chemist Warehouse and they were having a half price sale and I kept thinking, 'What polish colour don't I have that I can buy because this Maybelline Color Show bottles are really cheap?'. It was that moment that I realised that I had only one light grey that is not actually a grey, so I got Impeccable Greys for about $3. 

Impeccable Greys is a dark grey creme that is opaque with two coats and the formula is very manageable. When I applied the first coat I saw it was very sheer and that it would take a few coats to reach opacity but turns out the second made it dark and even throughout. I didn't take any photos of it by itself because I was impatient and wanted to do some nail art with it. I thought it'd be cool to create a glitter skittle with Ozotic 528  but the execution wasn't great as you can see below. Topped it all off with a coat of Seche Vite.

I know it's terrible but I love this Ozotic polish. Tasha did a small review of the polish here when she first started the blog and that's the main reason I ended up buying it. I thought I didn't really have much to add to it but then I took this photo.

Most swatches show the green/purple duochrome of the glitter but the flash of my camera ended up showing all the colours in the spectrum between the green and purple. This shift is visible in real life if you are paying heaps of attention and try to see the orange/red/blue colours that appear with some lights.

For some reason, I thought this polish had been discontinued from the piCture pOlish website but turns out you can still get here and, for overseas buyers, through their international network. I'm nowhere near done with my bottle but it's good to see that I'll be able to still get it when I run out.

Till next time, 

Laura