Another journal page using my new wooden block stamps – they work so well with the Dylusions paint. It’s just the right consistency to cover the stamp, stick to the page, and not squidge everywhere. Unfortunately it wasn’t quite the same when I used rubber stamps, which squeezed the paint away giving me the tramline outline that I then had to fill in with a paintbrush.
More block printing with my new wooden blocks – this time in Dylusions Crushed Grape and White Linen acrylic paints over a brown/pink/orange acrylic paint background. I’ve added shading with water-soluble graphite and Vintage Photo/Walnut Stain Distress Inks. The text is drawn freehand with Signo Broad white gel pen and embellished with the fine tip version.
The spacing of everything is unplanned when I start… it just so happened that four of the blocks fitted in the height of the page, and the fold breaks the pattern and fools the eye, so it’s not immediately obvious there’d have been an overlap if it had been on a flat sheet of A4. I printed the vertical white framing first, and then spaced the horizontal accordingly. How I manage to fit in the text whilst worrying (ha!) that I’m going to miss out a letter or misspell the word is beyond me, but I seemed to have managed it.
I’ve just taken delivery of a set of wooden fabric printing blocks, a commercial take on the carved versions typically seen in India/Indonesia. As well as printing onto fabric, of course they’re suited to printing onto paper as well, and what better way of using them than in an art journal? This page is in my Moleskine journal that has been somewhat unloved since starting art journaling in 2011. I already had a pink/purple background in place, and I augmented this with some dabs of Dylusions paint. The image transfer of some heuchera leaves was also already on the page, and I’ve blended the edges with some more paint as well as adding a smear of orange to colour. The block prints can be seen in purple and white at the borders. I was quite pleased with the right side especially, as the paint acted more as a glue, pulling off previous paint layers creating a serendipitous distress effect. The text is free-drawn in Signo white pigment pen and outlined with a fine black pigment pen, except for the final two words which I traced so that it was a little more ‘special’. For hand-drawn text, I found the book Hand Lettering: Simple, Creative Styles for Cards, Scrapbooks & More by Marci Donley and DeAnn Singh really useful as something to bounce off. We’ll be using the blocks in the Art Journaling Session on 3rd August, for which one place is still available to book here.
I was watching a film last night, and notice for the first time the motto above the roaring lion on the MGM titles: ‘ars gratia artis’ – art for art’s sake. What more apt saying could there be for an art journal page? This is part two of my bleeding tissue layouts – I stuck down the dried used up tissue strips using matte multi-medium over an acrylic paint background. I added more strips of Tim Holtz tissue wrap and tissue tape as well as some washi tape from Ikea. Finally, the text was printed using colour laser printer onto imitation rice paper to keep the tissue paper theme. The laser print has the benefit of not moving when using wet mediums over the top, unlike inkjet printed equivalents.
I’ve been a bit busy this last week getting things done in the garden (why did I have so much decking put in?), and getting samples made with the latest Craftwork Cards collections ready for the TV shows next week. Oh, and leading a workshop at The Studio yesterday at which there were some super mixed media art journal covers made.
And I got asked – what are we doing on Monday night? Referring, of course, to my monthly art journaling session. At the time, I couldn’t remember what I idea I’d had, but it came back to me today, and this is the result of my trying out the technique.
I’ve no idea why this idea popped into my head before I was fully awake this morning. Aside from, perhaps, art journaling being on my mind as I’m leading a workshop on Saturday… A quick dog walk and fitting some artificial turf helped my alertness level meet my creative muse and out came the paint and Sharpies. The background was pre-done and is a combination of distress paints. Over this I traced my hand, then painted over the rest of the page with Dylusions white paint on a make up sponge. The thin layer allows the background to show through, as well as sealing the page for the Sharpies. One of the unique selling points of the Dylusions paints is that it doesn’t clog nibs – and that is very true – the Sharpies drew perfectly with no annoying bleed or blocked nibs (a sharp contrast to, say, drawing on gesso). Further embellishment with my Signo broad white pigment gel pen and it is done.
The background for this art journal page was a little bit of a happy accident. I’d covered the page with swipes of dark acrylic paints with a hint of picked raspberry, and feeling it was too dark, I then used what was left on a blending tool I’d been used to apply Dylusions Squeezed Orange Paint to lighten it, and a superb rusty effect came into being. I embellished it with some Vintage Photo Distress Embossing Powder for the grid work, stamped a couple of times with the blueprint in archival inks and then added the text using a combination of archival inks on stamps, freehand drawing and painting, and my trusty pigment pens. As normal, took me as long to find the sentiment, but I love this quote – really does explain the rationale behind my art journaling!
I’m leading an art journaling workshop at the end of June, and thought I’d get a few more foregrounds on my many backgrounds in my various art journals. This spread already had the colour (distress inks over gesso with stencilled water bleaching) and the droplets (a Designs by Ryn rubber stamp). I searched in vain for a quote on water drops, but there was something about this phrase that sparked off the image of Pierrot, and the rest of the page came together.
The distress inks, being water reactive and dye based, reacted with the white pigment ink, white pigment pen and white acrylic paint I used, even after I tried to stabilise it with hairspray. I got round it using layers, and drying with a heat tool immediately after applying it. I added colour with Bombay India Inks, and coloured pencils. The harlequin tape is from Tim Holtz Idea-ology tissue tape range.
Tonight sees another of my art journaling sessions at The Studio, and we’ll be playing with the Dylusions Paints – blendable acrylics which are ideal for making backgrounds, and work well when used on rubber stamps as well. The text on this layout is stamped with Carnation Red Archival Ink and outlined with ultra fine tip Sharpie. The swirls are stamped with the Squeezed Orange before being dried and outlined and embellished with Signo white gel pen.
I’ve just got back from a couple of days holidaying near Cromer, and true to form, the English weather was not favourable – it was a bank holiday after all. It did, however, mean that I had chance to use my art journal travel kit to finish off this page which has been a work in progress for a couple of years. Each time I found a new font suitable for hand drawing, I added it to the borders. This weekend, I added the zentangled letters and the rest of the centre text.
Background is distress inks on gesso, text combination of black pigment markers/Sharpies/Signo white gel pen. Colour added using Caran d’Ache Neocolor II crayons with a waterbrush.