Into the Bliss!

I’ve just realised how long it is since I posted anything online. I’ve been busy keeping up with Julie’s Mandala Magic classes, I just haven’t got round to posting anything online. So here’s the first instalment – moving on from the Void to the Bliss…

… I created this page of symbols that are important in my life right now.

I found the bliss quite a difficult stage to be in, and had trouble with the shaving foam technique that Julie recommended. After struggling for a while, I gave up and decided to use a mixture of other watery techniques to create the mandalas on this next image.

I quite enjoyed making this page which has a background made from patterned tissue paper covered in water activated neocolour crayons. The free birth chart I used comes from the website astro.com. To complete the spread, I handwrote the poem ‘For A New Beginning’ by John O’Donohue.

Slightly apart from making mandalas, I’ve been playing with paint in a very free way and have taken a few of those images and created this blended mandala. Keep watching for the next instalment!

I just couldn’t resist…

I just couldn’t resist! There I was closing down my computer for the night, when I had this thought, “I wonder what the Swirls image would look like as a mandala?” And, being me, I couldn’t wait till tomorrow to try it out – so here are the results!

This is the first one…

…and this is the second one after a bit of digital blending. Do you like them?

And now I really am going to shut the computer down and go to bed!

The Great Round of Mandala

Mandala Magic, Julie Gibbons year long Mandala course started this week, so I’ve been busy creating mandalas for the first round. The course is based on exploring the twelve archetypal stages of the great round of mandala developed by Joan Kellogg and written about by Susanne F Fincher in her book called The Mandala Workbook: A Creative Guide for Self-Exploration, Balance, and Well-Being. I had already bought the book before I signed up for Julie’s course but you really don’t need it as Julie provides an amazing wealth of information and the group members are a constant source of inspiration and encouragement.

These are two of the mandalas I made for this stage of the journey. The mandala on the left represents the Void – a place to rest in the darkness. The mandala on the right draws on traditional wisdom drawn from many sources in which the spiders web is used to represent the darkness and safety of the womb.

This next image is a blend of acrylic prints digitally altered to create a 3D effect.

And this final image, created with acrylic paint using various palette knives, reminds me of an ancient battle scene. I can see lots of fighting figures in it – can you?

Playing with Mandalas

Thinking about mandalas, I created this hand drawn one in my small journal the other day.

But as usual, I couldn’t just leave it at that. I had to play with it once I’d scanned it. I started off by adding some ‘twirl’, then blended the two together to come up with the final version.

Once in the blending mode, I find it’s difficult to stop! This image is a blend of two paintings to which I added the Maslow quotation.

Creativity Rocks!

Creativity rocks! I’ve been so busy writing my dissertation that I haven’t had time to do anything else. But I took a couple of days off last week and did a bit of catching up!

A couple of weeks ago we had our dissertation tutorials and as part of the tutorial, our group were asked to create an image to represent our finished dissertation. I knew I had to create a doll, but as we didn’t have much time for the art work I knew she had to be simple. So I made a wrapped pipe cleaner doll and called her “All wrapped up with a feather in her cap!” Do you like her?

This image started out as a photograph of the kitchen sink with splashes of water all over it. Then I blended a painting into it – et voilá!

This one is a blend of two paintings created during a recent painting workshop.

I’ve been fascinated by mandalas for a long time as any of you who have followed my blog or flickr stream will know. So when I saw Julie Gibbons was running a five day free course, I just had to sign up and play along. I must say, the course is one of the most comprehensive mandala courses I have ever seen and I am learning so much. Thank you Julie. This is my first mandala created on day two using a pencil drawn grid, neocolour crayons and watercolour pencils.

And I just couldn’t resist playing digital with the mandala after I scanned it!

Old Photo Rummaging!

The other day, while rummaging through my photo files looking for an old remembered image, I came across three images which caught my attention: a bag of grapes, a string sculpture, and some old seed heads.

They looked like they might work well together…

…so I just had to try them out with some digital blending! I love the 3D effect of this one…

…and the mosaic effect on this one. But as usual I can’t decide which one I like the best. How about you?

Finally – I just couldn’t resist playing with this flower!

No blending on this one, just a few digital adjustment layers, some grunge brushes and a layer mask. What do you think?

Reflections and Light

It all started with a piece of white paper and four bottles of ready mix poster paint in blue, yellow, purple and fuscia pink…

…I squirted the paint into the paper, folded it in half, and squigged it everywhere! This photo was taken when it was all gleaming and wet. As soon as it was uploaded to the computer, I just couldn’t resist playing…

…and this was the first result created using the Snapseed app. I think it makes it look like a piece of beaten up metal. What do you think?

Next came the serious photoshop stuff…

…and this is what evolved! I called it “Looking for the Light”. You’ll have to look at the large image to see the light at the end of the tunnel which reflects the meaning of this image.

Which one do you like best?

Two More Pages!

Two more pages to add to the steadily growing collection! Another painted postcard for journalling on…

…created using acrylic paint, a stencil and acrylic ink. The black blots remind me of seahorses or maybe glow-worms. What do you think?

And another page in my recycled journal. This started out as a collage with acrylic paint. I added the scanned person doodle and blended her in, then chose and added the Nelson Mandala quotation using digital text.

Digital Magic!

Todays first image started out as an acrylic painted background in my handmade journal, which I transformed with a bit of digital magic!

When I first created this, I called it ‘Christmas Background’ because I thought the colours looked very festive…

…then I played digital – adding a digital image of Molly doll and a digital caption to explain why she’s there!

Image two started out as a simple oil pastel drawing.

It too fell prey to the digital magic that was in the air and it ended up looking like this!

Filling the Journal!

I’m slowly filling my recycled journal! If you look closely you can see the fabric strips down the centre of the page marking the end of one signature and the beginning of another.

I created the background using acrylic paint in layers and used an old credit card to scrape the final layer on which gave it a more textured look. Some of you may recognise the quirky bird on the right. I originally painted it some time last year, but thought it would look good on this page so I added it digitally and blended it in a bit. Lastly I added the quotation using digital text. I love how the coffee creamer lid shape from the previous page makes a perfect frame for the quotation!