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

Louise in Wonderland

Alice blew into Grafton is a whirlwind of crazy activity, I had a vague idea of what I wanted to do so I gessoed my spread in black and Debs gorgeous little journal sat patiently waiting for me to find the time to play day after day and suddenly- its the end of the month!

Deadlines are great motivators, I had a day off today and besides the other million things, I needed to do I made sure to put some time aside to play- and play I did!

I wanted a grungy background with the iconic image of Alice stripped back to a silhouette and the harlequin diamond pattern distinctive but grungy. Where to next? I was lost and then I remembered the quirky wrapping paper I picked up at IKEA recently so cut out some collage pieces to add.

The flower faces and the mushrooms were rather Alice-ish and as it's my wonderland the funny little woodland creatures came along too. 

Destination Egypt

Egypt!
What an mind boggling place, it conjures up so many images and thoughts and is one of our most documented and most studied ancient places- so many ideas were present for Annabelle's amazing travelling art journal. 

We are a homeschooling family and when my lads were little my eldest was obsessed with ancient civilisations, especially Egypt. We had some dear friends spend time there and we followed their journey from home and they bought us home a stack of goodies on their return. I raided some of these for the center of this spread, all of those wonderful places to visit.

One needs hieroglyphs for Egypt  and they are great graphic journal fodder too :) I have no idea what I was talking about up there but I like the way they look.

I also had the lyrics of this old song from Mental as Anything that insisted on being included so I squeezed them in too and my page came together. It is a really fun journal and Annabelle I am sure you will enjoy your journey through it on its return. 

Egypt

Mental As Anything

Egypt, I saw you 

On the television

I saw your name 

Written on a wall

I saw your picture

In a magazine

Egypt, can I ask you 

To lend me your blue sky

And your dreamy

Virginal tenderness

I don't know you very well

But I really like you

Egypt, I'm a gonna 

A, see you soon

Said I'm a gonna walk on 

Your foreshore

Egypt, won't you hold me

Like I held a map of you

I learned your location 

From a travel brochure

Egypt, I need your 

Sophisticated silence

Egypt I'm a gonna

See you soon

I'm a gonna walk on 

Your foreshore

Songwriters: Chris O'doherty

Robyn's gypsy has a tambourine

This is my page in Louise Kirby's Gypsy Journal 

I painted background made an image of Louise in a caravan also made a tambourine from a jam lid buttons and sari silk hope you like it Louise I tried to make the picture bigger but could not get it to work

Life is a (Vintage) Circus

Some times I think my life is a circus,

 there are certainly enough dare devil occurrences

and no shortage of clowns.  

This month has been very circus focused

 as I live near the show ground 

and the Rio circus from Brazil 

has been there performing 

so I have had their lights and tent viewed from my window

 and some folks from work also attended and enjoyed it. 

However aside from my own very dramatic family circus 

I have had the pleasure of playing in 

Sharon Rogers's lovely Vintage Circus

 travelling art journal from round 6 of 

the Australian Art Journal Swap. 

I have been super busy but had my vintage circus radar peculating in the back of my mind and nothing was grabbing me. I was in a shop though and there was a notice up from an old news paper story about a long ago flood that had a circus stranded in town and Samson the strongman was assisting in the rescue efforts and also put on a benefit show to support the town. 

He must have loved our dear Grafton as he then stayed on and became a shop keeper or maybe it was a publican. 

We almost had a strongman theme  but unfortunately I didn't make the Vintage Circus connection at the time so went on my merry way and can not remember the shop or all the details beyond my curiosity in that moment and googling gave me no answers either, meanwhile time was ticking so I went back to good old google and started looking at Vintage Circus images for inspiration. While looking I didn't want to use any animals and I don't think animals in circuses are a good idea even though they could have been a great page and of course once I go going I just had fun and played and I think they fit the theme ok. 

Gypsy by Pam.

Another month, another beautiful Art Journal delivered to my home.  In September I received the amazing and imaginative Gypsy Journal by Louise.  Loaded with brilliant art by my fellow artists.  And so, another panic attack by me.  What should I do?, will it be good enough? I hope so.

Finally an image in a magazine prompted an inspiration for me to follow.  My spread would be a Gypsy camp. And so it began:

To begin, some background.  I stuck down some tissue for texture and painted the  sky and foreground. Then I did some stencils and stamping to add some forest types to background.

Next I drew the campfire and coloured it with Neocolor11, water colour crayons. added some highlights to the flames with glitter gel pen. I painted some paper and punched out some rocks to surround the fire and glued it all down.

Next I had a frantic search for my inspirational image, which was the caravan.  After turning the house upside down, I finally found it on the kitchen table?? I thought it was in another title. I copied the image and cut it out and stuck it down as well.

This is actually the finished spread and you can see I have added a lot more greenery with leafy die cuts.  A little pen work added a quote...."In winter I plot and plan. In spring I move."

Here is a close up of the camp fire.

I hope it lives up to Louise's expectations.  It was a real pleasure to add to her lovely Art Journal.

Gypsy in a Sunflower Garden

An art journal page for Louise in her book "Gypsy"

Life of a gypsy has always appealed to me... living in a gorgeous wagon drawn by a huge, friendly Clydesdale horse, with beautiful surroundings and a peaceful lifestyle - nothing but painting, drawing, crochet, embroidery, colouring and reading. A world of happy, friendly animals and wildlife. Of course my cats wouldn't hurt a fly so they're able to hang out with me in the sunflower garden (birds, frogs and lizards feeling totally safe of course! lol).

I started the page by painting a Dylusional Rainbow. I used a Ranger Ink Blending Tool and at first, painted strips of colour across the page but got quickly tired of the long lines. Dabbing made the colours appear to blend (they just overlap) and was easier to fix when I went overboard.
Amazingly enough, I didn't make a huge mess on the backs of the pages (phew!).

The pic to the right is just to show what the ink blending tools look like. They're wooden handles with Velcro to hold the found pieces of dense foam. Washable and reusable :)
I use them just like I use sea sponges - dabbing, smooshing, blending, spotting, dusting, swirling, whatever the hand and paint want to do. I used to also use those house painter's foam rectangles till I discovered the world of Ranger! They were more furry than foam... meant for fast, drip free wall painting.

I used a variety of stencils... most of the designs were lace, flourish and flower related.

Its usually recommended that less is more when using paint with stencils. Too much paint and it can leak underneath the plastic, giving you a less than perfect design.

Above shows how heavy handed I am with paint! lol :) If you saw a closeup of someone else's artwork, you'd see even coats of paint without those edges, borders, bumps and messes.

An overview of the background as its drying. See? Much nicer than my spotty rainbow :) Love the colours!

Inbetween the different layers of the background were drying, I stamped, coloured and cut out my collage pieces. I was itching to use Dyan Reaveley's gorgeous new stamp set of me with my fave flower, I mean of "Sunshine Girl".

I've never felt so attached to someone else's design before :D She's just like me! lol :) I wear shift dresses over leggings and long sleeved shirts, short boots (always wanted red ones), have a beanie that is just like that hat (Mum made it years ago - she called it my Wee Willie Winkie Hat) and I have purple hair (used to be curly and have always loved ringlets). Naturally purple of course :)

So anyway, as usual these days, I reached for those Mermaid Markers of Jane Davenport's. My greens and yellows are running out too! Lucky I know where I can get more :)

The gorgeous dark brown in the centre of the flower is made up of yellow, green, brown and black.
With white spots made using a paint pen.
The petals are the two yellows with a hint of pink and brown for the shadows.
I cut the flower out with scissors and inked the edges with the lime green marker after gluing it together.

I used Google for help on how a wagon should look, making my own a mix of all I saw that had wooden spoked wheels and fillagrees. I like wooden wheels. Many modern wagons I found had car tyres that while practical, are simply not beautiful.

Sometimes things look so much better after they're cut out...
Do you ever find it can take ages to finally decide where everything should sit?

Ink now, worry later! lol :) I find if I fluff about too much with pencil before I put the ink down, I have too many eraser marks on the artwork.
I practiced in my Dyary first (its such nice drawing paper), then used a bit of scrap with the quote scribbled down, as a guide for the size and keeping it straight (ish). Sorry about the 'O' Louise, if I tried to fix it, I would have totally wrecked the whole thing!

The lettering is from an old book I've had since I was in high school "The Lettering Book" by Noelene Morris (top right, its a bit tired). I flicked through a few and settled on an old favourite Noelene called "Mod Ombre".

"She dances to the songs in her head 

and the rhythm of her heart."

The actual quote I found said "She dances to the songs in her head, speaks with the rhythm of her heart, and loves from the depth of her soul." By the time I got to "head", it was clear I was going to run out of space.

Above is my finished page... best viewed large :) The cats seem right at home and my gypsy looks pretty relaxed.
Looking at it now (everyone's a critic), I feel it could do with some tiny flowers, leaves and fallen petals all along the ground, maybe a mouse, bird, lizard, frog, bug... it goes on doesn't it? Those ideas in the head just don't stop. Its up to you now Louise, as its already left here :)

I'm happy with how it turned out and thoroughly enjoyed the whole process, from looking up variations of gypsy wagons to washing my stencils and stamps. Every part of creating an artwork is a wonderful thing... how it turns out is such a fabulous bonus!

Thanks so much for reading about my page for Louise. I hope it made you smile!

Have a happy creative day!
:)
Jenny