Gaia and the Earth for Louise

For Louise's theme, Gaia, I've created a highly textured mixed media artwork with a "few" left over yarns, wools, ribbons, strings! The ribbons and yarns were used to create the hair of Mother Nature while texture paste was used to create the Earth. Most layers seemed to take forever to dry... normally my forever is 10 minutes, but some (the hair) took a couple of days! Well worth the wait :) She's turned out much better than anticipated (phew!).

Starting out, I scribbled ideas and thoughts into my notebook and once I knew where I wanted to go, I sketched the idea onto a large sheet of Strathmore Watercolour Paper.

Above photo shows the sketched image with a few wooden embellishments. Normally I'd use a watercolour pencil to draw the outlines but as I needed face and hands to still be visible after the next few steps, I've used a 2B graphite pencil.
I worked on a loose sheet of paper as I didn't have the book yet :)

To create dimension on the Earth, use a spatula to spread the Tim Holt Distress Grit Paste (its a totally groovy sandy feeling, thick texture paste) for the land. This paste doesn't shrink so what you place down is what you get, whether raised for hills and mountains or smooth flat for the plains.

Left to dry... only for a short time while I gathered my ribbons.

Wools and ribbons are the best inspiration for hair!

I used Ranger's Tim Holtz Multi Matte Medium to adhere all the strands in place, crossing my fingers that it would even stick the plastic shiny ribbon... which it did!

In the photo above, you can see how I've twisted and woven the ribbons, string and yarn to give an illusion of wavy hair. I used the gel medium to glue down the wooden pieces as well.
Left to dry for a few days...!

I love texture... all the hair was covered completely with white gesso.

The above photo shows an overview of Mother Earth keeping an eye on the planet and her hair as it all dries. Took another day or 2... lucky I like to watch paint dry :) lol

Back to the Earth, added 4 or 5 drops of Finnabair's Liquid Acrylic Paint in Ultramarine (blue) to the whole area. Sprayed the blue paint with 2 or 3 splashes of water and encouraged it to spread using a flat wide paint brush.

While the blue paint was still wet, I added 7 drops of Finnabair's Liquid Acrylic Paint in Pure Yellow onto the raised areas of the page.
Finnabair's Pure Yellow looked slightly green in colour until water or medium was added, then it turned a gorgeous clean yellow. Its quite amazing!

More water was sprayed... I love watching paint blend.

The yellow got carried away so added more blue paint to the rivers and oceans.

Using Dina Wakley Scribble Sticks in the dark brown, I coloured the whole background and skin areas, added water and blended with a waterbrush. I added more dark brown paint into the shadow areas. Not quite enough so let it dry and started the hair.

The hair was painted using a paint brush with Finnabair Art Alchemy Liquid Acrylic Paint in Avocado Green. Even though all the strands were covered in gesso, they all took on different tones, some soaking in more paint than others.

I put on two coats of Finnabair's Avocado Green Liquid Acrylic Paint and it turned a beautiful dark green seaweed colour.

And because I'm so heavy handed with paint, it had to dry for an eon... not as long as the gesso or gel medium though! Only a few hours :)

Using the Dina Wakley Scribble Sticks, I coloured the background areas around the head and hands with dark pink and orange in the triangular areas.

Then with a waterbrush, wet all the pink and orange to dissolve the paint and make them blend.

Added more dark brown (Scribble Sticks) to the face and neck leaving the eyes white. I like making the shadows darker to create a more rounded look rather than flat.

Highlights on the hair were painted on using Finnabair Art Alchemy Sparks Acrylic Paint in Fairy Wings... a gorgeous shimmery pearlescent green paint.

The valley areas of the hair was painted sparingly with the Finnabair's Ultramarine Blue Liquid Acrylic.

The two little wooden birds in the hair were painted using Finnabair's Art Alchemy Metallique Acrylic Paint in Pearl White. Then I added a smoosh of blue...

Finished off the face with paint pens for the eyelashes, eye pupils and white highlights. Scribble Sticks were used for the green eyebrows and heart shaped lips.

I didn't do her nose very well but I figure its art, not a photo - and besides, Mother Nature isn't a human so can look however she wishes to look!

Leaving the page aside to dry completely, I stamped out a bird from Dyan Reaveley's rubber stamp set "Clockwork". Coloured him in with Dina Wakley's Scribble Sticks (pink and brown) using a waterbrush to blend the colours.

I cut out some leaves from watercolour paper using the Tim Holtz Thinlits "Skeleton Leaves" die templates (and die cutting machine), trying to keep some of the leaves intact and separated the inners from a few others.

Coloured all the leaves and spare pieces of watercolour paper with yellow and green Scribble Sticks.

Glued the leaves with separated inners to the spare watercolour pieces using the iCraft Mixed Media Adhesive (just like gel medium). I then scribbled on some dark brown to the edges of each leaf while the glue is still wet and encouraged the brown paint blend into the outer edges with a waterbrush.

In the photo, the colours look a bit murky but the glue dries completely clear with a matte finish, allowing all the colours to show beautifully.

On the craft sheet I added some gold metallic watercolour paint and both dragged the side of the leaf across the gold paint as well as used a brush to paint it onto edges of the leaves.

In the above photo with the leaves, I've also applied gold watercolour paint to Sizzix Tim Holtz Thinlits "Adorned" shapes and have saved them for another day.

Once the leaves were completely dry, I trim off the excess using Tim's Mini Snips. My fave sharp and easy to use scissors for detailed fussy cutting. 

Using the dark brown Scribble Stick, I roughly coloured around all the cut edges of the leaves before glueing them and the bird to the page.

Using the black paint pen, I wrote some words, drew some leaves and added curly tendrils all around her head and hands. The hands also have dripping blue from when I took photos while the Earth was still wet :) Looks like water!

Thanks so much for reading and checking out my artwork. I do love creating with so much colour and texture. I hope it makes you smile!

Have a wonderful, happy creative day!
:)
Jenny

Gaia Mother Earth in Louise journal

Gaia - From the Greek word "yaia", a parallel form of y2 (ge) meaning earth.

In Greek mythology, Gaia was the mother goddess who presided over the earth.

Divine Mother, holy one.

Bless us with your grace.

The warmth of a summers day, life-giving rain. 

The winds of change, the perfection of a snowflake. 

Divine Mother, bless us with your grace. 

Swirly background created with acrylic paint and fingers. I love finger painting. 

Then she started to emerge, I had originally thought about creating her with collage, however, once I had the paints out I decided to keep going. 

Now the tricky part, what to do on the other side of the spread.

Went for a mandala, so I had something to write around. 

Added a few butterflies and all done. 

It was an absolute pleasure to work in Louise's journal. 
I hope you like it. 

Gaia - the Earth Mother

by Lisa for Louise

As usual, Louise has made a beautiful journal that is full of lovely imagery!

As usual, I forgot to take progress pics!

It took me a while to come up with something for this journal: I'm not very spiritual but I like the idea of it all.  So maybe I am a bit?  Anyway, I found lots of great inspiration on Pinterest which I have saved. 

So my idea was to paint my depiction of the Earth Mother.  I used Dylusions paints, some of which have seen better days and were either drying out or looked like... cottage cheese.  Gross.  But adding some matte gel medium to the paint helped with a more even coverage. 

Her hair is the greens and browns of trees, with collaged bits of flowers and greenery cut from magazines.  I also added some strips of National Geographic paper treated with Orange Power!  Then finished her off with a bit of aquarelle pencil to make her look a bit more grungy.

On the other side of the page, under the flap, I drew the Earth!  I quite like how it turned out, and that Australia is central to it all... 💚

For the other side of the flap, I extended her hair using watercolour that was then whitewashed, and added saying I found on Pinterest that I really liked.  I used a Tombow for the larger words, and despite spraying this page with a protective coating, twice, it still smeared when I sealed it with gel medium.  Not happy!  So I decided to go with the flow and smeared it more on purpose.  Yes, truly, it looks this way on purpose! 😄

Here's a close up of the words: 

For the inside flap, I found a lovely poem that I thought suited my Earth Mother.  I stamped with a cheap but good set of stamps I found at Kmart recently, then wrote in the rest.

And here's the fully opened spread!  Hope you like it Louise, it took me ages to put it together but I'm pleased with the end result!

Happy arting all!

Cheers, Lisa xx

My Spread in Louise's Gaia Journal

Open Pages

Closed Pages

Inside Flap with Gaia resting.

Outside Flap.

I really didn't know how to tackle this one so I got out some Goauche Paint that I was given recently. I basically spread it around and created some texture by closing the pages together. I had already chosen some stencils so I used them as masks and added the deep blue paint. The one in the middle didn't work very well. I left it for a few days and then came across some paper that matched really well. I cut out the Heart and the flowers and adhered them to the page. I then added the borders that were part of this paper collection. I added the white dots after trying black...it was looking a bit too dark.

I had decided to make a Gaia figure after seeing a video of someone making a Spirit Doll using Polymer clay for the face. I remembered that I had a mold and some clay so I made the face and eventually added some yarn for her hair and her body is made from a piece of finger knitted yarn that my youngest Grand-daughter had done a few years ago. I put her on the inside flap after adding some borders and flowers.

The words on the outside flap are done with die cut letters that I adhered to torn paper. I used copic markers to brighten the letters and colour the edges of the paper. I also coloured over all of the flowers in the spread so that they were a bit more vibrant. The foot prints are printed from the internet and mounted on paper.

I really enjoyed doing this and it was great to get out of my comfort zone!!

Hope you like it Louise.

Pam played in Louise's Gaia Art Journal.

As normal Louise has presented us with an awesomely beautiful art journal to contribute to. For some reason I have Autumn on my mind and so I chose that as the theme for my spread.  I had a good idea of what I wanted to do bit was not at all sure if I could pull it off.

Fist step was the background. With some autumnal colours and a brayer I spread a bit pf paint around.  Then I dug out some hand carved stamps and made a few images.

Then I proceded to gelli print, stencil, die cut and cut out my autumn leaves.  The difficult part was working out the placement. After I had everything stuck down I then wrote the Haiku I composed because it made me happy.

I hope you like it Louise.

Robyn's Gaia

These are my pages I did in Louise Kirby's Gaia Journal 

Hope you like it Louise xx

Gaia

I have created a journal to honour Gaia in round 7.

I am really feeling our earth is in trouble

 and fear we are running out of time.

My cover is recycled packaging 

and the pages are my favourite Stonehenge paper.

My title page above is at the front, along with my AAJS7 contract and mailing order and the image below is my sign in page at the back.

The page I did in my journal is called Heart of Gaia

 and it was part of Shimmer Sistars art trail

 My art piece is a page that has been created to travel in my Gaia art journal in round 7 of the Australian Art Journal Swap, I was going to go with a different theme but the extreme weather, heatwaves and bushfires and drought, has my heart aching for  Gaia our beautiful Mother Earth.

What is the answer? It can only be love, she loves us and we love Her we have too. We are Her, all one giant organism really, we come from Her and we return to Her. 

As I worked in my journal I intentionally added heart shaped leaves, every one of them is a prayer for the earth. For the oceans filled with plastic, for the whales and sharks starving in that sea of human trash, for the dammed rivers drying up and the poor dying and dead fish in the stagnant ponds, for the birds with stomachs full of rubbish, for the bushland and its creatures being ravaged by fire, for the precious earth being mined and fracked and poisoned, for the air we breathe that is filled with dust, for the people. My prayer for the people is that they reconnect with the heart of Gaia, they realise this amazing and beautiful planet we live on is home, we need to respect Her and open our hearts to protect Her and nourish Her as she does us. 

I offer you this beautiful

Invocation to Gaia, by John Seed.

We ask for the presence of the spirit of Gaia and pray that the breath of life continues to caress this planet home.

May we grow into true understanding - a deep understanding that inspires us to protect the tree on which we bloom, and the water, soil, and atmosphere without which we have no existence.

May we turn inwards and stumble upon our true roots in the intertwining biology of this exquisite planet. May nourishment and power pulse through these roots, and fierce determination to continue the billion-year dance.

May love well up and burst forth from our hearts.

May there be a new dispensation of pure and powerful consciousness and the charter to witness and facilitate the healing of the tattered biosphere.

We ask for the presence of the spirit of Gaia to be with us here. To reveal to us all that we need to see, for our own highest good and for the highest good of all.

We call upon the spirit of evolution, the miraculous force that inspires rock and dust to weave themselves into biology. You have stood by us for millions and billions of years- do not forsake us now. Empower us and awaken in us pure and dazzling creativity. You that can turn scales into feathers, seawater to blood, caterpillars to butterflies, metamorphose our species, awaken in us the powers that we need to survive the present crisis and evolve into more aeons on our solar journey. 

Awaken in us a sense of who we truly are: tiny ephemeral blossoms on the Tree of Life. Make the purposes and destiny of that tree our own purpose and destiny.

Fill each of us with love for our true Self, which includes all of the creatures and plants and landscapes of the world. Fill us with a powerful urge for the wellbeing and continual unfolding of this Self.

May we speak in all human councils on behalf of the animals and plants and landscapes of the Earth.

May we shine with a pure inner passion that will spread rapidly through these leaden times.

May we awaken to our true and only nature - none other than the nature of Gaia, this living planet.

We call upon the power which sustains the planets in their orbits, that wheels our Milky Way in its 200 million year spiral, to imbue our personalities and our relationships with harmony, endurance and joy. Fill us with a sense of immense time so that our brief, flickering lives may truly reflect the work of vast ages past and also the millions of years of evolution whose potential lies in our trembling hands.

O stars, lend us your burning passion.

O silence, give weight to our voice.

We ask for the presence of the spirit of Gaia.

John Seed in "Thinking like a Mountain: Towards a Council of All Beings"