Who Needs Trees?

This talented scratchboard artist always tries to spend some time just observing a piece of her work before deciding it is complete.

- Renee Treml

Claybord is made up of a hard panel that has been coated with a fine layer of smooth clay. When I work on white Claybord, I like to combine painting, drawing and scratching to create a piece with a unique style and texture. I created this piece ‘Who Needs Trees?’ for an environmental art exhibit and it exemplifies why I love this technique … I can create very realistic looking animals and place them in highly unlikely settings, and yet they still look believable.

STEP ONE

I trace the completed drawing onto a piece of tracing paper and transfer it to the Clayboard. For this example, I put a piece of graphite paper (shown here) under the tracing paper and lightly traced over my lines with a ballpoint pen. I am careful not to press too hard because it will indent the clay.

When I do not have graphite paper available, I lightly shade over the lines on the back side of the tracing paper using a soft 2B pencil. I then put the tracing paper right side up on the Claybord and lightly trace with a ballpoint pen or hard pencil.

STEP TWO