lara

I am continuing to explore layers of acrylic paints and gelli prints in my art journal. Each of these pages started out as a place to clean my brayer off of between Gelli Prints. When i thought it was good and layered i added some additional highlighting of areas and a quote that inspires me.
 

This guy used some Dylusions ink over the top. After i was done, the only word i could think of was Gratitude. The colors and the movement made me feel pretty elated and right now in my life i feel so much gratitude to so many people.
 

Exploring texture and dylusions inks some more. Can you believe i just started using these brilliant things?! Scraps of paper were glued to the background, some braile scraps too and then stencils were used with light molding paste. After it was all dry i kinda went spray crazy! I only used three colors - yellow, pink and blue, and i love the way they all combined to create other colors of the color wheel!
 

Finally, a more subdued page expressing emotions i've recently discovered i had. Lots of painty layers with stamps and ink over it!

Seth Apter over at The Altered Page challenged his readers to post photos of their workspace to show that artists get down and dirty - for me, that's where the magic is!

My art table is my old kitchen table because it's waist high - I like to stand when i work because i move around alot, whether it be dancing, lip synching or just reaching for the myraid of materials i have all around the room (not pictured). It's cool i don't have a kitchen table anymore...

I like taking photos of my workspace periodically to document the tools and materials i am obsessed with at the time. I suppose this one illustrates well my obsession with the Gelli Plate and my art journal - it's pretty much all i can do these days. Also love me some stamps, sprays (there's Glimmer Mists and Dylusions) and stencils.

But, yeah, i need to be in a pretty dirty space to create. When it's pristine and clean i don't know which way to go!

This month's gauche alchemy's mixed media challenge was sort of a shabby chic theme.



I've been wanting to explore more mixed media sewing - i.e. what kind of fabric and non-fabric materials can be sewn together and how, and while i'm still obviously quite the novice, this little piece i put together does make me feel fuzzy.

My lace collection has grown really out of control so i was curious what lace sewn together would look like, especially when put on top of other things since it would be somewhat transparent still. I also decided to use some punchinella as it is so much like lace, just made out of plastic not fabric. And it sews delightfully!

I think sewed the whole piece onto a printed shopping bad and cut it would into some hearts. The edges are lightly gesso'd and washi taped to make them a little more prominant. Then to put on the finishing touches to make it more like a mixed media quilt, I suppose.



I used staples and floss for highlights, buttons, a few little scraps of lace, then the letter beads to make it a little more meditative for me, and i have hung it up over my bed.

Gauche Alchemy is now having monthly challenges which I am taking part of! This month, our inspiration is Frida Kahlo.

I've got to admit, I've never actually really looked at her stuff with an artistic eye. For me it's just always been "ok portraits moving on..." (as i usually am attracted more to abstract).

However after looking at her paintings and reading quotes from her and about her life, well, i really love how strong and bold and unique and passionate she is. My art journal page just had to reflect that!




I decided to do some experimentation which worked out so incredibly well i cant wait to do more. I chose a page in my art journal that was started but completely undone and well just kinda crappy. I stenciled over it with glass bead gel from Golden. As you can see, the gel holds the stencil lines incredibly well! I then sprayed over it with three Dylusions sprays to make the beautiful mess it turned out to be: turquoise, yellow and pink. I also gave it a very very light sprtizing of bronze glimmer mist to make it shimmer a bit more.

It's so 3D and tactile, its such a joy to touch and reflect on.




I already knew what words i wanted to put on there. Words that not only described Ms Kahlo but incorporated a word i've been doing alot of thinking and art around - fear. And in this case fearless.

Every year the African Well Fund has a fundraiser in honor of Bono's Birthday. Anyone who donates may sign an online card and then i download all the messages and compile them into something handmade.



This year is a book of sorts - it ended up being about 4" x 6" and was stitched together using a coptic binding - my first time doing it!

The background is made with duct tape, stencils, masking fluid, acrylic paint and Luminarte Primary Element Pigments. The objects on it are things I found in my collection, i have no idea where they came from at this point but everything seemed to fit together rather perfectly!



To see some of the past cards, click here

To visit African Well Fund, click here

A 12" x 16" mixed media piece on canvas I made for a friend using a song lyric that was part of the soundtrack of our lives in the early 90's in college.



Lot's of yummy texture using all sorts of paints, mists, mediums, scraps and beads.



The bike gears were given to me by a friend and the grease that remains on them adds just the right amount of grunge! I also got myself a alpha punch kit for metal and this was the first time using it on copper. LOVE this and can't wait to do more!

I bought my first moleskine journal to try art journalling in. For years I've seen others use these and wondered what the hoopla was about. I have always made my own art journals and had no problem but i still wanted to see what a hard binded journal would hold up to.



I've been using this primarily, so far, as a receptacle for the acrylic paint i roll of my brayer after using my current obsession, the Gelli Plate. I've also been cleaning off stencils and stamps, and adhering stencils i cut out of paper - all used with the gelli plate on these pages.



This last page is not in the moleskine journal, and it's a Gelli Print

This is now one of my favorite pieces.
I've been saying that alot recently, huh :)



I designed it for Gauche Alchemy using much of their products in addition to some Prima and my own junk drawer. I call it Shine Canvas because it is partly inspired by a Beastie Boys lyric from "Something's Got to Give". It's 18" x 18" - the largest piece i've made yet!



If you go to the link the technical techniques are there, but mostly this was inspired by two artists i've done online and offline workshops with - Finnabair and Andy Skinner.

I've started to explore paper quilting. This piece i recently created for gauche alchemy using their Curious Curio Kit.



I also got to use this glass negative i got in a garage sale years ago and never knew what to do with it! It works super well.



The quote is from Muse. of course it is! :)



Looking forward to doing more paper sewing!

Hands down my favorite time of year in Atlanta. Not that it ever gets so cold you're praying for the spring, but the fresh smell in the year, the annual flowers popping up, the warm sun... just love love love the season.



I visited the Atlanta Botanical Gardens and walked amongst thousands of tulips, daffodils and petunia's.





I just adore these colors together! Mother Nature's palette...



This is pretty cool - taken downtown on a lunch walk:



From my photobooth app:



Also went to northern georgia and went on the wine highway spring tour. Some vines before the grapes start to grow:

This page came about after i started to lose my way, my confidence, my self worth... i just kept repeating the word "refocus" over and over in my head, without really thinking about it...



To tag onto that earlier thought ... the photo i took after a particularly rewarding and liberating boxing session at the gym. I wanted to capture the sweat and the attitude. The Gelli Print behind it was one that had actually gone pretty south - i just did too many layers, yet i didn't want to throw it away. The chaos of it works well with the sentiment!



Well, if these pages don't tell a story of how a week in my life went ... this background is actually a piece of paper i used to clean my brayer, stamps and stencils off between prints. These papers are almost more interesting to me than the Gelli Prints!



And, yes, to end on the optimistic note... i love this sentiment. We are a sum of our experiences, postive and negative - both are needed to feel the other.

As i had known, i've ended up with stacks of Gelli prints! And what better way to use them is to make some art journal pages!

I'm trying something new with the art journal - making the pages and then binding them together at a later date. This is so i can more easily use the Gelli Prints. Question is, how to bind them... but i'm sure i'll figure that out at some point!

So... i got me a Gelli plate a couple of weeks ago and I'm finally starting to figure out how to get results that make me go all squishy inside! And it's true ... now i have like a couple of dozen sheets of prints just waiting for me to do something with them ... but what? It's almost worse than blank white page syndrome...

But this "Believe" print is the first i've done where i'm just completely enamoured with the results and i have no idea how i even got them other than lots of layers, addition and subtraction.



This is one of the very first ones i did. It's pretty cool too - i used too much paint but that made for cool texture (if you see it in person). I put some washi tape on it, mostly to have somewhere to put the quote. This has been my greatest challenge so far - the gelli prints are all so detailed and covered, i can't figure out how to bring them to the next stage of art journalling or canvas art. But, no fear, i will!

And now for something completely different...



This was inspired by the LifeBook2014 workshop I'm taking - using white space. Laughing my ass off here, cause anyone who knows me knows i'm not really adept at using white space. It's not that i fear it, it's just that i tend to cover the hell out of everything i do with paint and texture. So this was done with some sprays, very simple, and the U2 quote from "Love is Blindness" fits the sentiment perfectly! But when can't i find the perfect U2 quote? Hahahaha.

It appears to happen every three years or so - Atlanta gets snow and ice for one or two days before the temperature rises back into the 50s and it all melts.



This is my backyard all magical looking around 8:15am. I am so happy i woke up early that morning so I could see this! By 10am it had all melted away.



Those are bamboo trees in the back which usually stand so tall the obscure the building behind them. The weight of the ice bent them over into bushes.



During the summer when all the trees are full of leaves and the kudzu has grown over everything it's a different kind of magical. Especially in June and July when the fireflies are out and the whole area literally looks like a christmas tree full of sparkling lights.



One of my giant metal sunflowers...



And another flower...