Tag Archives: Art Journal

Life Book 2014 exercises

Life Book 2014 Week 10

I made three attempts at this one. Blimmin’ awful! We had to use magazine photos of faces and paint over them. The back grounds are paint, collage and gesso. I spattered and dripped, splodged and crayoned but I could not get them to look  how I saw them in my imagination. The premise of the exercise was ‘Life Connections’. Obvs I focused on my family and home. Why the little house on the right looks like it’s on fire, I have no idea! Anyway – crap!

Life Book 2014 Week 11

Week 11 was a short bonus lesson based on ‘The Tree of Life’ Tam’s demonstration was a lovely whimsical girl on a swing and her ‘cohort’, Gracie, gave us a lovely video of a more abstract tree. I’m not  alover of drawing figures, so I sort of combined the two demos for the image on the left. The one on the right was just me playing with some ideas in my journal – nothing to do with Life Book.

Life Book 2014 Week 14

You might notice I skipped a couple of weeks. That’s because the exercises for the missing weeks didn’t really appeal & I didn’t have the necessary materials for them. I can always go back to them if I feel the urge later on.

This was Week 14, a bonus lesson by Dyan Reavely. Much fun. Quick and easy. Dyan’s flowers were three dimensional but I made mine flat as I am working in a journal, rather than on loose sheets of paper. I cheated even more – the flowers, leaves and tree were created out of  four large sticky labels. I journaled on them – freewriting all sorts of crazy stuff. The flowers, etc., were doodled, painted (Tombow markers) and cut out. Of course, they simply stuck down without me having to bother with glue or gel medium. I like the effect so it’s a technique I will use again.

The background was created by spraying diluted Brusho (powder) watercolour paints. Sorry, Dyan, but I can’t afford Dylusions right now. Brushos work just the same, last for an eternity and you can do lots of different effects with them. There are several videos on YouTube which demonstrate how to use them.

Readers in the US can buy Brusho paints here.

Life Book 2014 Week 15

Week 15 was so much fun. I loved making these Quirky Animals! This was a lesson presented by Tam… I dreaded trying to do these, but the way she explained and showed us made it super-simple. Again I used my trusty Brushos for the background, spraying them through stencils.

The creatures are made with simple shapes with added quirk. Some are painted with acrylics and some are watercolour and/or watercolour pencil.

I added white pen all around, and some gold dimensional paint on the background.

I’d love to do more of these and frame them for imminent grandbaby.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Life Book 2014 Traci Bautista's lesson

Week 16 was one I’ve been looking forward to. I’ve been a great fan of Traci Bautista for a few years now. I just which I could create art so… well, so artfully as she does. Her’s always seems unforced and easy, whereas when I try the same thing it looks like a dog’s breakfast! Think I’ll give this one another go,

Life Book 2014 Week 19

Missed a couple more weeks – this is Week 19. Week 18 was an interview with Carla Sonheim.

This lesson was presented by Danielle Danielle. I quite enjoyed it, even if I can’t get the hang of crossed legs. Pretend she’s wearing great baggy yoga pants, please! The background was created with lots of collage, hence the very textured nature. There is a torn piece of collage that runs right though the girl’s face – argh!

Acrylics, gesso, collage, crayon & pen.

And I am all caught up – yay!

Journal of Simplicity

Hand made journal

Here’s an old journal I made. It’s only partially filled, but it’s the one I turn too when a bit bored. The pre-prepared backgrounds make it easy to get started. The journal was made by laying down a full size Imperial sheet of Fabriano Artistico, then spraying with diluted inks through stencils. When the first side was dry, I turned it over and sprayed again. Drips and runs very much appreciated.Sprayed ink journal

I used a straight edge to tear the paper into… mm… 8″ x 16″ pieces. I folded them in half and sewed them at the spine.

Journal of Simplicity 2

Sprayed ink journa

Handmade journal

I love that the background suggests images to me – do you see faces in your bathroom flooring too? So when I want to do some art but am not particularly inspired, I can open this journal and ‘see’ something – all I have to do is let it out.

Hand made art journal

Life Book 2014 Week 7 Jane Davenport

I have to admit it… I was very resistant to doing last week’s lesson. I love Jane Davenport’s style, her energy and verve. However, I thought that the lesson, which involved making a sort of folder with pop-ups inside was more suited to card making than an art journal page. After huffing and puffing a bit, I decided that I was indeed resisting, and there was no earthly reason why I shouldn’t try it. Of course, my underlying problem is that I thought I *couldn’t do it*.

My ‘creation’ is based on my home and family – it’s where I feel good with the people I love. I used spray inks, fabric tape, watercolours, acrylics, pen, a bit of collage and I made the bunting with watercolour diamonds and a bit of yarn.

Jane Davenport lesson

Life Book 2014

Jane Davenport Lesson pop-ups

They make my heart sing

 

Life Book 2014 Week 6 Pt 2

As promised, here is my version of the main exercise for week 6. My first attempt was a disaster but I gessoed over the mess and started again – being too mean to discard the Fabriano paper. The Brusho paint worked really well over the gesso and I got some really good streaks going. Loved how they mixed – even yellow and purple – together and didn’t make mud.

We had to make a list of our positive attributes before we started but I preferred to do mine on the fly. I wrote them in the third person as I couldn’t bear to write I, I, I, me, me, me, all over my art.

Life Book 2014 positive qualities

 

 

 

Life Book 2014 Week 6

Week six was another couple of exercises from Tam – she’s always fun. This week we were dripping and flowing ink. She used Dylusions; I haven’t got any so I used my diluted Brusho paints. Brusho is a powdered watercolour/dye that can be used in many ways on paper and fabric. It can be diluted and kept in spray bottles – you only need to use a little, or you can sprinkle it onto wet paper for some lovely effects. We had two projects; here is the first.

Wk 6 inksplash sml

I used homemade tape, fabric tape, rubber stamps and my Brusho paint. I’ll post the second piece as soon as it’s done.

Divas

Last week our Life Book 2014 lesson was given by the delightful Marieke Blokland She introduced us to her quirky divas – cute fantasy portraits with exaggerated features. They are great fun to create. Lots of layers of acrylic paint, pencil and a little doodling with a Sigma. Here’s mine…

Sugar Diva

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She is going to be collaged onto a background – Marieke’s is a sugar diva but I don’t like sugar much, so I think my girl will be a flower diva.

More Life Book 2014

Had lots of fun with these exercises…

Mickie Wild was our Week 2 artist and she gave us a short bonus lesson. The journal page focused on making an affirmation – what we want more of in 2014. At first I thought I would hate to work with a grey background… I mean, who’d want to. I decided to go with it and as I did, the paint seemed to have a life of its own. Instead of the neat, matte background I’d envisaged, I began to let the paint drizzle and drip until it looked like some crazed, dystopian landscape. I turned it upside down and it was obvious to me that balloons were required. It ain’t pretty, but it wasn’t meant to be.

Abstract drippy paint journal page

The third week was Carla Sonheim (she’s so cute!) and her blobs, non-dominant hand doodles and crazy collage creatures…

Accidental creatures

For the fourth week, we were introduced to Kelly Hoernig. I love Kelly’s stuff because she works in a lovely, deliberate controlled way – the opposite to me. I am the sort to slap paint, glue and collage down where it wants to go. Kelly is a planner. Her collage was simple and stunning.  We had to choose collage pieces to represent things we love. I chose an Alice in Wonderland tag, some black and white scraps and diamonds (not that I own one single diamond!).

Kelly Hoener's Life Book Lesson

There’s lots of texture and layers built up with gesso. I  made it a bit more 3D by outlining with charcoal.

 

 

 

 

 

 

LifeBook 2014

I’m really pleased to be part of Willowing Art‘s (Tamara LaPorte) latest LifeBook offering. A year log course featuring 23 fantabulous mixed media teachers.

The first lesson was posted this week and there’s a whole year of fun, learning and delicious, messy mixed-media delight ahead. Get yourself over there now and sign up.

This week we had a warm-up exercise followed by a portrait of our guardian angel to complete. The warm up used several techniques, such as applying Neocolor ll, collage, spattering, dripping paint and these were then carried through to the main event – our guardian angel portrait. Tam even posted a guided meditation to help us discover who our guardian is, though I allowed mine to emerge on the actual piece.

We were encouraged to do some journaling on the warm-up to get rid of negative thoughts and feelings about our worthiness as artists and human-beings. My biggest problem in this regard right now is feeling scattered and directionless. So I chose to add positive thoughts about being focused. We also had to ask our guardian for a word to carry us through the next year… mine is ‘release’.

LifeBook 2014 Warm-up

My wk 1 lesson