The fairy-like lady in the forest - acrylic painting from 2010

I don't know what I was inspired by when I painted this acrylic painting back in 2010. I had bought this massive canvas, and I just wanted to create a fantasy world - a little bit fairy-like. I wanted to achieve a contrast - gloomy and mysterious forest colours with that fiery red hair. Don't ask me why I painted a naked woman in the forest only wearing a necklace with a dragonfly, cause I honestly have no idea. I never in beforehand decide what I'm going to paint, but it just happens... (unless it's a portrait of someone I know) I know I had just read a book a few months earlier that mentioned a dragonfly necklace, so I guess I was influenced by that.
I am not very happy about the proportions in the painting - they look quite unnatural. But I do like the overall look of it - I really worked hard on the colours.
If I had the energy I would change a few bits in it, but after all this time I really can't be bothered. It might just make it worse!
What do you think?

Argggh!! (pirate noise) - A look back to 2007...

I really haven't been creative enough lately - lazy me! I intended to paint the other day on a massive canvas I bought a few weeks ago, but I didn't have any motivation whatsoever. All I did was; I took a good sized plate from the kitchen, laid it on the canvas and drew around it so that it formed a ring. So now I've got a completely white canvas, with a penciled ring on it. Brilliant.... hum. I have actually planned to paint something special on that canvas. I can see it all in my head! I just need to pull myself together and actually paint it.

Oh well, you can't always keep up with your creativity. I was more creative a few years ago when people actually came to me and asked me to paint for them. I was once asked to paint some children's paintings of pirates for a little boy who was about 3 years old. You can see the result below. These paintings are from 2007. They're really simple, and of typical "boys colours". What little boy wouldn't want a few paintings of pirates on his wall ;)

Another portrait

Another portrait. This one is of one of my best friends - Josefin.
This panting was (just as the other ones) made with acrylic paint, and I painted it in 2009.
I really enjoyed painting this portrait, since Josefin had a very special style back in the days. Quite extreme, with different coloured dreadlocks, and often very colourful Manga inspired clothes. As you can probably guess, this is not the first time I make a portrait of this pretty girl.

(I'm sorry about the bad quality of the photo. It was taken with my old camera phone)

Portraits - great presents

Once I started to get the hang of painting with acrylic colours I realised that paintings were great to give away to people as presents. I didn't have a great job at the time, and could therefore not afford really fancy presents. These are some of the paintings I've given to people for their birthdays. All the paintings are portraits. The first one is of my sister, the second one is of my ex boyfriend, and the third one is of my ex boyfriend's sister when she was about 5 years old. I must admit that the second one is my favourite, as I was working with contrasts only on this painting. (the quality of this picture isn't great though, since I photographed the painting with my old mobile camera)
What do you think?

Inspired by a Metallica t-shirt

Once I started getting into painting with acrylic paints I started giving myself challenges. I spent lots of time on little tiny details, and one single painting could take me days to finish!

My boyfriend at the time was a huge Metallica fan, and had all these band t-shirts with rock prints on them. I studied these t-shirts very carefully, and decided to paint a couple of them on big canvases.

One of them is this painting of a cracked hand holding a snake (or should I say the remains of a snake, thinking about the fact that you can see the snake's skull) that I painted in 2006.

This painting took me 10 hours, since I mostly used a teeny tiny brush for all the little details.

Again, please ignore the big "Maria Hagman" written all over the painting. This was done in photoshop after I decided to upload the picture on the internet.

My first ever acrylic painting from 2006

To get this blog started properly I thought I'd upload some of my old work. 

The first one in line is a painting of Marilyn Monroe made with acrylic paint. The story behind this painting is not very interesting, but I can tell you that this was my first ever painting with acrylic paint, that I made in 2006. 

I had tried oil before, but I just didn't like it. Acrylics are so easy to work with, as the paint dries in no time at all, which is a benefit when you need to change something in the painting.
 

Try to ignore the massive 'Maria Hagman' written all over the painting. When I first uploaded this painting to my Facebook page I was a bit paranoid about people copying the picture and taking credit for it. That's why...

I have developed my painting skills and I've changed my technique a lot since this painting was made, but I just thought it would be fun to show you all how it all started.