Okay, I know this is a rooster.

But I really liked my title. Anyway, awhile back, a friend “commissioned” a mosaic rooster for a tray she had. She paid me in stained glass, which if you ask me, is the way to go! Excited to make my first “commissioned” piece, I went online to look for rooster clipart, and then worked to enlarge it to fit the tray. The dime in the center is there for size perspective.

I thought I had lost my photos of this when it was in progress. Turns out I forgot I had already used them in “Why Mosaic? Part 2”, and apparently deleted them from my computer afterwards. But there they were, in my WordPress image gallery.

This was so fun to do because I had never done a rooster before. And being a whimsical rooster made it that much better. (A cardinal rule of the Debra Kay art process is that if you make your art whimsical, you don’t have to worry about it looking “real”. Just “real whimsical”.)

Above you can see the color printout of the clipart I used as a guide. Obviously I never intended to really recreate the exact design. That would have been A) impossible, and B) probably not ethical, since I’m not the one who drew it in the first place. But it provided something to go on.

The yellow beads lying sideways at the bottom of the tail kind of look like corn on the cob, but I figured, oh well. After all, corn on the cob is one of my artistic fortes. (That statement to be explained at the end of this post.) The green ones kind of look like peas, if you think about it.

Finally done! Time to add the background, which was going to be white to match my friend’s kitchen.

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Here’s look at some of the detail. I really like the pink heart-shaped beads. I got them at the craft store in the jewelry making section. Fortunately these are really that color, and have kind of a mother-of-pearl look to them. So when you grout over them, the color doesn’t rub off. We can see the result of not knowing some beads are painted as opposed to really being “that color”” in the photos below.

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This is what happened to my “signature tile” for the sea animals mosaic (which you can read about in “Sea Animals, Done!”). So now when I buy beads to use for mosaics, I rub one with grout before using it to see if it’s real or fake.

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Then came the job of making sure the mosaic was centered in the white tray.

After meeting with the approval of my trusty assistant, it was time for grout.

Before.

In progress.

Wiping off the grout.

Yay! All done and ready to go to its new home!

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A final thought: Not all poultry has to be made out of mosaic. I made these chickens years ago for my favorite Sunday school puppet song “The Holy Ghost Will Take the Chicken Out of You”. And yes, I made the “corn on the cobs” too! Any commission requests?