Look inside

Seemingly bright

I made another journal page with the same technique I used in the video I posted yesterday.

With more layers you get to play even more. 

Can you see the texture? It's a lot of fun to scratch through the layers and get to the bottom color.

I used the brightest colors I have, and still she turned out sad. What an interesting contrast...

Sometimes everything can be right and bright but the sparkle can be missing deep inside.
I'll find the sparkle....

Quick journal page video

Hello! Happy Tuesday!

Two months ago I wrote THIS post and said that I would be making a video of the technique I use to make quick journal pages. This is it. It might be too quick... I think I needed a bit more than 30 minutes to make a journal page to my liking, but this will do for now.

Let me know if you have any questions or if you try it. xo

The magic of self-expression

I sat down with a white piece of paper ready to express what was bothering me. Because of my recent very bold and completely unplanned life-decision I felt an empty, hollow space right in the middle of my chest and wanted to allow it to show in my art. But before going to the "dark side", I decided to play with some free-form background. I started by making random marks with colored pencils, then spotted some concentrated watercolors that were sitting on my table. I smooshed some of those, then added gesso to tone down the colors. Next I pasted collage papers that were at hand's reach, splashed more color over the stencil and painted a sad girl with the dark space in the middle of her chest. 

What happened is pure magic. I realized is that just by playing with paint and brushes my mood changed. Suddenly I wasn't feeling that bad at all, so I glued the words that spoke to me at the moment.
I could definitely feel hope.

And then I decided that I don't like her face. I painted over it, added more color, changed the features and tried a ton of things, but it just wasn't working for me. Finally, without much thought I cut out a piece from a collage sheet I used to sell and glued it right over her face. For a second I panicked because it looked completely weird. And then the best thing happened... I stopped thinking and started playing. If the piece was "ruined" already I couldn't possibly mess it up more. It has been a long time since I allowed myself to just be silly and add weird shapes and colors. It felt SO GOOD. I was smiling and loving the process.
And at the end - I even loved my weird result.

How interesting - I went from feeling pretty depressed to feeling light and happy through the magic of self-expression. What a feeling of freedom! I'm sure you know what I'm talking about and I'm sure that it happens to you too. I can't believe that I allowed my soul to go without this feeling for so long. I can't wait to do it all over again tomorrow. Join me if you wish and play :-)

Hidden strength

At first I felt lost, sad, tired, scared.... so I painted her like this:

Then I had this weird pull to paint a lioness... and I resisted it because I don't know how to paint a lioness... Finally I decided not to fight and just put some paint on the brush and go for it. I'm not sure if she looks like a girl lion or a kitten, but even if she doesn't have her full power now, I know that the potencial is there and will show up eventually.

After that, I knew which words I had to add. My friend Sharon says that you can find all words in one book, so I followed her advice and spent some time with a nice book.

The words showed up:

So, there it is. You are so much stronger than you think.

So am I. I Just need to find a way to wake up the lioness.

Happy Autumn!

Desire

While everyone is talking about autumn, it seems that summer just decided to show up in our area. This is what greeted me when I returned from work on Sunday: 

I adore my husband, he always knows what will help me relax. We sat outside, enjoyed the sun, food and each other's company. I just had to put the picture here so that I will get back the feeling of that lovely afternoon whenever I look through my blog. By the way - tomatoes are from my little garden...  you would not believe how sad the tomato plants look (yellow, dead-ish, small), but the tomatoes are sweet and amazing nevertheless :-) I hope you enjoyed the long weekend too!

Simplify

Saturated with miracles

Kate asked: "When you start a painting do you have an idea that you are trying to convey or is it all just spontaneity?" What a great question! In my previous post it was obvious that I wanted to paint something that looked like my daughter. Didn't work out too well. Very often I need to paint out an emotion... and I sit without any big plans, just a need... The painting in this post is a perfect example of that. I didn't have an idea or color scheme, just a feeling I needed to get out.

Hope that you like it!