How I used the acrylic skin

I love it (the acrylic skin)! You don't really see it, unless you are looking for it - it just melts into the collage. I found an old painting, cut it in half and used it as a base for my collage. The only remaining visible part is the heart. Everything else is a mixture of different papers I had on the desk.

I often sketch little birdies on anything available. They are quick, simple sketches, but I can't make myself throw them away. The above one was sketched on a napkin, the other one on sticky paper.

 I wanted a little journal with soft covers for a while now, and couldn't find anything "exactly" as I want it in store. Don't know why I didn't think of making it myself in the first place. My stitching is not the best (working in almost complete dark is my excuse)  but it is still good enough to make me happy.

Danielle wrote that acrylic skin looks like a wax painting, and I smiled when I read it because at that moment I was adding an encaustic layer on top of my collage. 

I love how the sketch done on a napkin disappears into the collage...

At the end - a quick answer to Heather (as I don't have her email address, and don't want to seem rude by not answering her question). The crackle I used on my angel is the same or similar crackle to the one you describe - the one you rub a darker color on when it is dry and cracks show up. You can find more information about different products I use in a post I wrote here. Hope this helps!

When life gives you paint spills...

When life gives you paint spills, you PAINT!

Do you see that big blob of white paint? It was one of three blobs that happened when an open jar of new titanium white paint fell on the floor. Actually, not floor, the carpet. The only place in our home that has a carpet is my studio... It was there when we purchased the house, and it stayed even though it makes no sense. This is not the first time that paint splattered on it.

 I keep some of my big journals on the floor, so - of course - the paint found them. What do you do? Use the paint and quickly make something. I am not in the best mood today. I slept very poorly, and I noticed that at my age even one bad night translates into a day of low energy and not the best attitude. 

 There was no way that any blending and shading were going to happen, so I just attacked the cover of the journal with bold paint strokes and messy lines. And I loved it! It might become a new standard for me.... the freer the better :-)

Or maybe not. Maybe if I get a good night of sleep, I might start feeling normal again :-) Until then, I hope you enjoy the expressiveness of this face as much as I enjoyed painting it.

Day 5

It's only day five and I almost didn't make it... but it wouldn't be a challenge if I gave up so quickly, so I made myself pick up some colored pencils and scribble something quickly. As always - even scribbling lifts my mood and makes the day better. Where did that rabbit-creature come from and why, I don't know... but I allowed him to stay :-)

Pastels after matte medium

The photo made it look much better than it really is. I actually think I prefer this to the original, but it's not like that. For some reason camera found some darks and lights and made it interesting. 

;This is scanned. Even the scanner brought more light to it than it actually has.

This was the original.

It's all good. I can easily add some patches of color and make it to my liking, but it's just a quick play-journal, so I'll take it as lesson #1 and probably leave as is. So - for your information - if you don't want your colors to change and be dark and dull - don't use acrylic mediums over pastels. They were not meant to work well together. Enough about the cover, it's time to open the journal and finish what I started.

New Journal - No Words Allowed

I woke up this morning with a strong urge to paint, but somehow none of my (many) journals was calling me. I didn't want to spend too much time making a new journal, so I made the same one that I show in my workshop, except that I decided on soft covers. I cut off a piece of rosin paper, and a couple of minutes later - I had a brand new place to play.

Last week I painted 23 paintings which I cannot show yet, so I wanted something different than acrylics. Soft pastels sounded good. I was happy to see that they work really well on rosin paper, holding on to it and smudging nicely. And then I made a stupid mistake. Because I had a bad experience with fixative (that dramatically changed the colors) I decided to seal it with Acrylic medium. Why did I think that would work? Everything turned a dull dark brown color.... all the softness was lost. I quickly left my studio before it dried (that's why there is no picture). Will it transform over night to it's previous stage? I hope, but somehow doubt it.
Would you like to see how bad it looks after the medium?

Feelings shown

I am enjoying my big journal very much!

So many things fit on a big page...  it's like all that space allows the story to unfold.

This page started with a tiny torn out piece of paper. I found that little scrap on a street at least two years ago (probably more) and it kept showing up on my desk. I decided it was time to use it.

I don't use faces from magazines, but sometimes I use other, unrecognizable parts for color or texture. The girl and boy were in my throw-away pile. Something about the way they were accidentally cropped (while I was tearing paper around them) made me like it, so I added that piece to my page. And the one above it too. 

After that it was easy to add found words from a book and form some kind of a story... 

Speaking of stories, two amazing story-tellers are sharing their knowledge - Katie Kendrick extended sign up for her online workshop, and Lynne Hoppe is generously sharing how she paints her magical people. So much inspiration...

Untroubled

I have a BIG new journal. So does she. It is really a beautiful journal, right now - my favorite. I love working in this big format (11.75x16.5"). This is the second page I did. I'll show the first one soon (as soon as I get photo of Sharon's page, so that we can all see how different they turned out).

I loved making up a story on this page, two girls thinking completely two different things.

Or it could be just one... conflicted about something.

Notice the word "But". When I was cutting it from a book I was obviously too impatient to be careful, so I cut it in half... Does that ever happen to you? Rather than looking for a new 'but' word, I decided to glue down both parts.

While the left girl is obviously worried, the other one has no care in the world...

SEEM + ED. Again a found word thing... Much easier to find word seem, than search forever for the correct tense. I do this often - cut a word and add 'ed', 'ing' or whatever is needed from a different word. Makes things easier.

Speaking of easy and untroubled - how easy is it to enjoy the long weekend? One more day!!! I hope you're having fun!

Four men

This is how I spent time on the airport - making 10 second sketches. You really can't stare at people without them looking back at you, so I found a spot where I could glance at people passing by, then quickly scribble something in my journal. They never noticed and it made my time go faster...

New art supply

Before the visit, I told Sharon that I am bringing an art supply that I never tried before and would like to explore with her. I also said that it's nothing special and that she probably worked with it before, but for me it was new... 

I brought out my new, unopened box of gouache paints. Sharon smiled, without even looking reached for a place in a drawer and pulled out another box of gouache. She said that she painted with them a long time ago and wanted to try them out again with me. Don't you love when things like that happen?

I enjoyed painting with them a lot. It was different, I think they made me paint slower, which was good because we chatted all along. We started with the same inspiration piece to look at, but finished with completely different results. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of Sharon's page, but hopefully she will post it on her blog soon. This is what I painted in my little moleskine watercolor journal.

Summer art camps

Look what I painted!!! A silly creature!

And another one: 

And more...

Actually, I painted dozens of "imaginary creatures" and can't wait to make more.  

 I also had fun quickly creating exactly 101 faces!!! Of course, they are not as small as shown here...

And although you might not think so (by looking at my scribbles), I learned several techniques that I know that I am going to incorporate in my journals, and probably on my canvases (not to mention that I found out that I love to draw bald guys and male profiles - funny!)

I've been having fun in Carla Sonheim's summer camps, and thought that someone else might enjoy them too, so I'm sharing the information. I had very limited time to play, but it fit just fine. I enjoyed every minute of both camps, couldn't wait to wake up and watch the daily videos. I am looking forward to the third one (starts tomorrow). Let me know if you join!

xoxo