fun with new stencils

So I spent most of the day Saturday making new masks and stencils, and yesterday trying them out on the gelli-plate and with spray paints.

So here is a photo-heavy post of my hours of play :)

Sometimes it is the clean off that makes the best prints. This print above is from cleaning the stencil once I've peeled it off the gelli-plate - using it like a stamp, really. There are several layers here and I really love the different colours and how they work with each other. I'll probably just put a quote on it in black.

This stencil will tessellate nicely although the pattern is already quite large. Perhaps I'll cut a smaller stencil, or maybe a stamp...

Here is the spray through a stencil with the 'stamp' effect of cleaning it off.

Paint Party Friday

I recently picked up a stack of magazines from the library for 20c each. I don't buy women's magazines generally, and certainly not the expensive fashion ones. However, sometimes its good to have faces and silhouettes to use on pages, so I took advantage of the sale.

This is a left-handed drawing of a model from one of the magazines. I worked with permanent pens straight on to the page - no going back! Plus I don't usually do open mouths. Somehow teeth can end up looking really creepy!

I don't often post to Paint Party Friday, mostly because I don't think of myself as a painter and there are so many fantastic artists who link up there who so definitely are. But I have been doing a few faces lately, especially after the 29 Faces challenge last year which boosted my confidence a bit.

It's Paint Party Friday's 4th birthday this week and there is an optional challenge of doing a self-portrait. As I hate having my photo taken and don't use pictures of myself in my art, I thought this would be a good challenge. But, because I'm not that confident in capturing the likeness in a portrait, I did the drawing with my non-dominant hand. Yes, I know - a challenge and a slight cop out. It's a start, and I didn't rub things out but just went with the lines I put down.

So here is me not looking at all like me :)

Playing with Golden fluid acrylics

For quite a while now I have felt quite flat. It has taken me some time to realise that I have finished a recent (and long) climb and am now on a plateau. The plateau is a respite. It gives me the chance to reap the fruit of the growth that happened in the climb.

It gives me time to gather my thoughts…

think things through…

process.

And I am discovering that there may be more to process than I first thought.

Maybe this plateau will be a long one, but I am determined to reap as much benefit from it as I can.

Don't fight the flat spots - use them to gather insight from the past climb and resources for the next.

I bought some Golden fluid acrylics - a starter pack - with some gift money. I usually buy cheap and cheerful on my low budget, looking for a larger range of colours rather than one or two of the more expensive ones. But as this was extra money I decided to splash out.

The spots, lines, and general marks on this page are done with the Goldens dabbed on to a small gelli-plate and then stamped on. I love the effect they give - so different from just applying the paint directly to the page. I look forward to experimenting some more...

bits and bobs

The tag swap for March over at the Mixed Media Google+ Community has the theme of International Women's Day, so I used the colours of the suffragettes - green, purple, and white. I'm feeling a little off my game at the moment and am not that happy with the tag, but I've worked on it for long enough and it needs to be posted. Sometimes you just have to say that it's done and let it go.

Continuing with my exploration of my word for the year, flourish, here is a quick double-page spread with acrylic paint applied with a palette knife, and pigment ink dabbed through some sequin waste to make the grapes.

Forward in faith

She set her face towards the future with hope and faith.

Learn from the past, live in the present, face towards the future.

Peering over the parapet

I had no idea where this page was going until I stuck the gelli-printed scrap on at the bottom right. It was turquoise with yellow/green eye shapes. They just wanted to be eyes!

But that makes it a strange place to put a face on the page. When I finished the face it looked as if it was peering over a wall. It made me think about how, some days, it feels as if we are peering over the parapet and dodging bullets. Some days you would just rather be in bed.

Walking the plateau

It can feel exhilarating to reach the peak after a period of growth.

But the plateau afterwards can feel almost like a trough, as if nothing is happening.

But the thing is, you need to walk the whole length of the plateau to reach the next lot of foothills. There is nothing else for it. If you want to continue to grow, you can't just stop because it feels like nothing is happening. To climb another peak, you have to walk the plain.

A constant climb is tiring.

We should embrace the plain, enjoy the rest, prepare for the next peak.

Circle journal - Beverley's journal

My second round in the round robin/circle journal is Beverley's journal. Her theme is light shines in darkness.

My immediate thought on reading those words is and the darkness has not overcome it as it says in John 1:5. However, Beverley has already used that one (darn!) So I had to come at the subject from a different direction.

My first page (which is actually the one below, not the one above) didn't come out at all as I imagined. I couldn't seem to make it go in the direction I wanted it to. The pattern on the tissue paper with the wording that I wanted to use ('illuminated living') was too dark. I ended up covering up the pattern. Then I put the dimensional star on it and felt that I then had to work around it. My thought was that the star over Bethlehem was a guiding light and what do we use to guide us?  I'm not that happy with the page, but there you go.

The second page (the one above) I was much more happy with. I did the candle and the rays with masking fluid. The halo around the flame was made with gesso. A smear of water-soluble pastel around the edge and a little bit of stencilling, and done. I feel that the image and the words go well together.

 Beverley put tags in for each person to label their page. Here's mine:

Beverley's journal is richly textured front and back and put together with hinged rings:

I like the hinged rings as it meant that I could take my page out and work on it without fear that I might accidentally contaminate someone else's work. Also, it allows for dimensional work, as can be seen by the other pages that have already been done. Here are Susan's pages which she has blogged about here:

And these are Beverley's pages:

And the title page:

This is my tag at an angle so you can see the shiny sticker:

Beverley's journal will be on its way to Kim soon and I shall wait (im)patiently for the next one :)

Sequin waste, lace tape, and a toilet roll tube...

This is one of those pages where I was having fun just laying down colour and pattern, and now I look at it and wish that I had taken some progress photos! Never mind.

I had no thought as to what this would look like when it was finished. Just started with a layer of gesso and then went at it with sequin waste and spray inks to start with.

I also stuck on a piece of hand-made paper with a rose stencilled on it that was sitting on my desk - a leftover from some try-outs my daughter was doing. If you're looking hard to see it, it isn't there anymore. It was one of those pieces that I placed and then wished I'd left until the end. I loved the way it looked, but it just wasn't working when other layers were added. It started to disintegrate. In the end I peeled it off and put the tag in its place.

I'm not really one for lace, but I found this lace tape in a dollar store - 3 different widths - and I felt it calling to me, so on it went. I think I did the orange glaze next - a mix of Chromacryl clear gel medium and orange watercolour. This filled all the white that was left after spraying through and printing with the sequin waste. 

Then I went back in with the sequin waste but used some acrylic paint applied with my finger (hey, it was the nearest thing to use!). Paint went underneath, but that left some lovely dark-rimmed circles. Bonus! This was about the point at which the hand-made paper came off and the tag went on.

I wanted another layer, so this is the point at which the burgundy leaf shapes went on. They looked a bit stark, so I pushed them into the background a bit more with some white outlining. Much better. A bit of drippy spray helped, too.

A handy toilet roll tube stamped on to an ink pad made the black circles in which I journalled some thoughts, and the page was done.