The birdhouse project, which has had me quietly singing Birdhouse in Your Soul for the past few days, began with a decorative basswood birdhouse from Ye Olde Crafte Shoppe. Saint Paul Art Collective gave a lot of birdhouses to a lot of artists and asked us to make art out of them. The finished works will be auctioned during Saint Paul Art Crawl from April 22 to 24.
The first thing I did with my birdhouse was give it some legs. Then I needed to figure out what kind of bird it belonged to. I liked the shape of an owl's head with the feather tufts on top, but a Great Horned seemed too big and too serious.
So I chose a little Screech Owl instead. They are an interesting combination of adorable and eerie; the eerie part is when you hear them in the middle of the night and HOLY CRAP WHAT WAS THAT.
A tight deadline meant I had to use acrylics instead of my default oil paints. This needed to dry, and it needed to dry FAST.
All the twigs are attached like pegs. I drilled holes in the base and the roof, just large enough to wedge the branches in and then glue them.
And on the inside, a tiny nest I found fallen to the ground some time ago. It was a perfect fit.
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