Playing with Layers

I really enjoyed all the mixed media work I’ve been doing recently, so I decided to do some more playing with layers, both physical and digital.

This first image started out as a collage using a mixture of old papers, book pages, old paint stained tissues, and magazine clippings. This was followed by a liberal application of acrylic paint, stencilling, homemade stamps, washi tape, and more collage. The quotation made me smile, as it’s the kind of thing I say all the time!

This second image was inspired by some work I did at the weekend on the Person Centred Expressive Arts workshop that I attended run by Dinah Brown and Nuala Eden. It began life as a geometric abstract created using watercolour pencils. Although it was quite colourful, it looked a bit flat, so I gave it the mixed media treatment. I added acrylic paint, stencils, homemade stamps, paint markers and indian ink, then finished it off with some letter stamps and collaged letters.

Its been a while since I played with any digital layers, so this last image is a digital blend of two journal pages – a series of swirls drawn with watercolour pencils, and a page created to use up some leftover paint.

Only five days left before the start of 21 Secrets Fall 2015 – I’m really looking forward to working and learning with all the amazing teachers Connie has gathered together.

Time Flies!

Doesn’t the time just fly by! I can’t believe it’s a week since I last posted here. In between a very special birthday, the celebration of which got delayed by snow over the entire country, followed by a nasty tummy bug which laid me out for a day, I’m only just catching up with myself now!

It all began when I had some leftover paint from creating cards for this week’s Life Book lesson. As usual I painted a page in my notebook with what was left of the paint. Then the postman brought me some very special paint that I’ve been coveting for a very long time – some Golden fluid acrylic paint! Well – I just had to try that out didn’t I? Isn’t it lush!

With two pages of abstract paint marks scanned I just had to play digital! So much fun and such beautiful colours!

Today I finally finished my game cards, the first part of Kelly Hoernig’s Lesson from Life Book this week.

I created my own playing card size cards using glossy white card, then painted them using acrylic paint (the old paint!). I used collages of stamped images coloured using watercolour pencils to decorate the front of the cards, and luggage tags coloured using distress ink pads to write my goals on the back. I obscured the titles of a couple of them as I am not ready to share them at the moment.

So now I’d better get back to completing the rest of Kelly’s Lesson! I hope to be able to post it in the next day or so.

Leftover Paint!

Whenever I have any leftover paint on my pallet at the end of a project, I brush and /or apply it randomly to a page in my notebook then scan it into the computer.

Today I started off with a scan of some leftover acrylic paint then added the Socrates quotation using digital text. A nice easy day after yesterdays mammoth effort!

Digital Hocus Pocus!

Today I discovered some photographs on my phone that I had forgotten about and felt in the mood for a little digital hocus pocus.

I started out with the photo I took of the rusty seat bracket, duplicated it, inverted the duplicate then blended the two together. Then I added the leftover paint splurge scan and got creative.

I really like the way that turned out especially the ‘eye’ on the right hand side, but I wanted to add a quotation. After some more digital wizardry…

…I finished up with this. What do you think?

Making a Mess!

Making a mess and not trying too hard always seems to produce the best artwork!

Today’s piece of work started as a way of using up some leftover paint. I added some gel medium transfers to it, but they went wrong and came out as grey squares. Finally I thought I’d try out a paper stencil I made using a border punch – the footprints. As you can see the stencil wasn’t a brilliant success – the paper was far too flimsy and let too much paint through! But taken overall, I think my catalogue of disasters looks quite good. I may add some words to it later.

Make a Mess ….

‘Make a mess, clean it up’. That was the instruction on this page …

… and I know it doesn’t look very much like a mess, but if you saw how I made it you would have have to agree that I followed the instructions!!

I had been working on the Kelly Rae inspired journal that I’m currently making and had various surfaces covered in leftover paint lying over my desk. I should have taken some pictures … but it was the early hours of the morning and I was more concerned with getting cleared up and into bed. But I hate just throwing things away! Then I remembered this page in the ‘wreck my journal’ and I knew what to do!! I used a very wet paintbrush to loosen all the dried paint and plonked the journal into the wet paint. I did this several time until all the paint was used up … et voila!! … one completed jounal page and nice clean surfaces … mission accomplished 🙂

The scan of this next page really doesn’t do it justice.

The page instruction said to ‘Draw lines using abnormal writing utensils dipped in ink or paint’. I went for the paint option and dipped into it a paper clip, a hair grip, a make-up brush/comb, a cardboard tube, a plastic covered wire tie, a lolly stick, a bottle top, a button, and a staple remover. It looked Ok … but I wasn’t finished! I added a thick layer of glossy gel medium and used a small comb to make lots of ridges in it. Then I left it to dry. I love the way it turned out … it has a really great texture … the only problem is that the gel medium sticks to itself when the book is closed and it is quite difficult to prise the pages apart … but it make a wonderful noise when you’re doing it!!