Colour Alchemy

It is probably true to say that if I get tired of colour I would also be tired of life. I don't foresee that happening in my lifetime. And colour combined with a grid is even better. So for my first Stencilgirl Project this year I have used both. These two pages could just as well be two quilts and maybe one day they will become exactly that.

When I'm working as Guest Designer I very often start work on two separate pages. Because I need to do step by step photography and write up exactly what I'm doing, it's a kind of safeguard to have two pages on the go, just in case I hit a snag or have a small emergency on one of them. But nothing untoward happened so I decided to feature both pages.

As always you can find a step by step tutorial for this project (and all my other projects as monthly Guest Designer for Stencilgirl Products) on the Stencilgirl Talk website, which also lists the stencils I used. These particular pages filled me with joy when I had finished them and they may well serve as inspiration for future work too, which is an unexpected bonus. For now the pages (both sized 9 x 12") have found a home in my huge vintage ledger on a background of black gesso.

It's wonderful that Stencilgirl Products are having me back as a monthly Guest Designer in 2f018. I would like to say a big THANK YOU to them for giving me this opportunity to share my work and I look forward to using their gorgeous stencils for more projects in the future.

More Mandalas

Here are some more mandalas done from The Mandala Guidebook by Kathryn Costa as well as from her online class. I did them on separate 8" square watercolour paper and then cut them out and glued them to previously black gessoed pages in my large vintage ledger. 

I am having fun with them, and colouring them in is a very calming activity.

There is a storm raging outside and just when we were about to start our morning dog walk the skies opened and a rain storm passed over. Flora has a seriously issue with getting wet so for the moment we have returned inside to see if things will get better.

Listen to Your Inner Voice

Some time ago I started work on one of the lessons from the Fall 2015 21 Secrets series of classes (now no longer available but a new series of classes is coming up soon). It was the class by Robin Kalinich and I worked on it in my large vintage ledger art journal (size of a double spread = 16 x 22"). I had come to a bit of a stop with it when up popped the newest week 11 prompt for Colour Me Positive. It was: Intuition. And the art challenge was: use an animal somewhere on your page.

What I had done so far in my ledger already had several birds and butterflies on it and the words: "Listen to Your Inner Voice" rose up in my mind almost immediately I started thinking about finishing the spread for this week's Colour Me Positive.

This was a wonderful example of synchronicity and the spread came together beautifully after I geared to towards the prompt.

As this was a class I won't give you a lot of info about how I started off but I will say that the birds and butterflies all come from vintage books. I used stencils from Stencilgirl Products in the background as follows: the words come from the Mixed Media stencil (designed by Carolyn Dube) and I also used the Kilim stencil (by Cathy Nichols).

The title was stamped on using a metallic stamp pad. Then for no good reason other than that I happened to come across it while locating that metallic pad I finished off my pages with Special Effect Wax by Liberon, colour Verdigris. I had completely forgotten I had these waxes (and have no idea now how or why I obtained them) but I love the effect they had on these pages. The colour looks wonderful,  the wax has added a lovely smell to the pages and they are now completely smooth and don't stick together. The wax has sealed in the acrylic paint completely so it's fair to say I will be using these again.

You Imagine

This is a collage/art journal spread in my huge vintage ledger art journal. The size of the spread is 16 x 22" and just lifting the ledger is good exercise for your arm muscles! It's made following a lesson in the online Novel Approach class by Tammy Garcia so not much mention of techniques on this blog. If you are interested you can purchase this class for yourself here.

I had fun finding images that I really liked from a variety of sources and adding them to the page on that background of rich red/pink.  So delicious.

While collecting all the material I came across this yoga figure and somehow she seemed to want to be on the page, perhaps to keep the clown (see below) company.

Going around in Circles

I'm slowly continuing to work the lessons of the Novel Approach online class by Tammy Garcia in my large vintage ledger journal. As it's a class I won't mention much about how I made it. I love the class as all the lessons are there and you can work at your own pace, dipping into them randomly. If you're interested, join in!

 However it started life as a collage of text and magery.

And then got covered in paint apart from some selected areas. I used raw umber and two different blue paints.

I added the stick-on letters. The words Going around in Circles were also the title of the first quilt class I taught after my very first large quilt Water Rings won the Scottish Quilt Championships back in 1998. Circles have been an ongoing theme in my work ever since. The quilt doesn't get an outing often now that I no longer teach but it remains one of my own favourites even though, had I made it now, I would have added more quilting and beads. Here it is: