Loved doing these splatter flowers. They were a bonus exercise by Tam.
Probably won’t be posting any more Life Book 2014 as the course is finished. I have my remaining exercises set aside and you never know — I might get round to completing them one day.
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.
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.
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.
Dug out my pages for Joanne Sharpe’s Letter Love course that I did.. oh, must be a couple of years ago. Hadn’t stuck them all together and thought it was time. There are still a few untouched backgrounds – they can wait until I am inspired to do something in the book.
Here’s my girl. I thought she’d be a nice ‘Daisy Diva’. I don’t like cupcakes and sweet stuff much (‘cept chocolate), so couldn’t bring myself to use sugar as an art theme.
The background was painted charcoal (white gesso mixed with black acrylic paint as I have no black gesso). Then a fuscia pink layer over that. Some fabric tape for a border, plus loads of Neocolor ls. More gesso, more paint – this time teal blue.
I collaged my girl, gave her a fabric dress, cut out some shapes vaguely resembling arms and legs. Coloured them with pen. Doodled on her dress and daisies all around. Some more Neocolors and that was it. Much fun, although I wouldn’t want to hang her on a wall – too scary!
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’.
Zentangle Zendoodle Delights
I love this doodle-y art form, despite all the controversy surrounding it. I have made tons of pages and content relating to them, but lately have been too busy to actually enjoy creating Zentangles for their own sake. What do you need to make them? Paper, pen, pencil and an eraser. What could be simpler. If you’d like to try for yourself, click the image.
Doodle Painting
After a long, long hiatus, I am back and ready to restart my 365 project.
I am really enjoying making these doodle paintings. I love the fact that the painting process is quick and easy but that I can spend hours (or not) playing with the doodling. There will be more of these, I’m sure.
Materials used: watercolor paint, watercolor paper or pad, black fine liner pen, whit gel pen. Click on the image or see “How to Paint a Doodle” for a step-by-step.
In Philosophical Mood
Another exercise from Joanne Sharpe’s lettering course. I love doing these. Plenty of mixed media happening too. The backgrounds for this, the last, and the next few pieces were ‘ready made’ by me. Stencil sprayed some acrylic inks, allowed to dry. Then attacked the paper with watercolour washes, some wet-in-wet, some dry. No rhyme or reason. I was careful not to make mud by mixing warm and cool colours. Eventually these will be made into a small journal.
On this page, I used a Sakura Pigma Micron to draw the flowers – just quick little doodles. Did the same for the lettering lines. Coloured in the flowers and stems with my Tombows. Did the lettering with Microns and a bullet-tipped marker – forget which one. Added a little Letraset marker here and there – inside the letters and hearts. Then highlighted and dotted with the trusty white Signo.
Words
A little brush doodling and extra colour added with Tombow dual brush pens. A little 10-minute jobbie, this one,
Paint Like a Little Child
I can’t believe it is only day 29! Only 337 to go (leap year).
Wanted to experiment using weird things to stamp acrylic paint on the page. I used packing peanuts, a door wedge, the lid of a cocoa tin and some kid’s alphabet stamps. Covered the page in a big mess and had to clean it up somehow so made a watery wash of yellow-green and sloshed it all over and let it dry. Added more paint doodles, marker doodles, correction pen doodles, words and Neocolor lls. Much fun was had and I don’t care what it looks like!
