Wanderlust 2022: Watercolours – weeks 29-35

Posted on 28th September 2022 by perfectly4med

I’ve procrastinated a bit on my homework for this section as I and watercolours often do not get on well together. The lessons have been great on Wanderlust 2022, with each of the tutors carefully and patiently explaining the techniques they use so that they are, in the main, replicable. Here are my results from weeks 29-35…

Various mixed media techniques on papers other than watercolour paper have generally worked ok. I still haven’t fallen in love with watercolours as a medium, but am glad I have tried them. Oh, and buying decent tube watercolours made such a difference to the vibrancy of the colours over the student quality hard pan collections I normally use.

Wanderlust 2022: Weeks 22-28

Posted on 4th August 2022 by perfectly4med

Update time on how I am getting on with the online Wanderlust 2022 mixed media course. The last seven weeks have been concentrating on using craft acrylics. We learnt they are generally cheaper and less pigmented acrylics and have a large premixed colour palette. Then we learned how to use them in various ways to make our art journal pages. I have fallen behind in the course due to holidays and that hot spell (which made the paint dry too quickly), but I’m catching back up. Here’re my takes on the seven lessons:

Wanderlust 2022: Weeks 8-14

Posted on 11th April 2022 by perfectly4med

For this section of the fabulous Wanderlust 2022 art journaling/mixed media online course, we’ve been looking at using modelling paste and image transfers. Each week we’ve been set a different theme with a guest teacher showing us their project ideas and techniques. My previous sessions are here. This section’s layouts are here:

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Wanderlust 2022: Weeks 1-7

Posted on 11th March 2022 by perfectly4med

It’s been several years since I last did the Wanderlust online course (2016). It has gone from strength to strength, and this time it offers a year of weekly prompts, lessons and inspiration for mixed media art journaling. Unfortunately, it’s too late to enrol for this year’s course, but it is worth watching out for the early bird offers for next year which are usually 50% off the regular price.

The themed sections start with an introductory week, outlining the studio supplies and techniques that are coming up in the next six weeks. Then follows a weekly tutorial from guest tutors furthering exploration of the theme and showing off their individual styles during their tutorial. This can be anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour and a half of teaching!

These are my pages from the first section of the course: gesso and gel mediums.

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Creative JumpStart 2021: Week 2

Posted on 17th January 2021 by perfectly4med

I set myself the challenge of trying all of the techniques in the 10th Creative JumpStart organized by Nathalie Kalbach. This week included Gelli printing with a homemade stencil, illustrations with watercolour, tonal painting with gouache, paper quilting two ways, using texture in watercolour and stitching a story. I almost didn’t do the watercolour ones, as I really don’t get along well with the medium… but I had a go and was rather happy with the results. I haven’t done the stitching one as I don’t have kids doing naive outline drawings! Each of the featured artists has recorded a 10-minute video tutorial, and they’re all super easy to follow. Here’s this week’s work:

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Art Journal: Despite the dark

Posted on 10th September 2017 by perfectly4med

I’m a subscriber to Art Journaling magazine from Stampington, and every now and then a featured article catches my eye. Reading the fine print revealed that this particular journal was based on a mixed media class available online from Donna Downey (Metamorphosis).

Between TV shows I can normally fit in a couple of weeks for my own projects, subject to other calls on my time. This time round I managed to take some quality art time for myself, signed up for the class and completed my journal.

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One Collage Challenge [Wanderlust 2016]

Posted on 7th December 2016 by perfectly4med

My Wanderlust journey has wandered off track recently… it has been a long time since I have checked in at each of the stops, and as the year draws to a close I thought I’d better check when I lost access to the class! Sigh of relief – I have a little longer to browse and save what I want to keep.

But in the meantime, I caught up with the One Collage Challenge. Every fortnight or so we were given a step, to take no more than 5 minutes, to build up a final collage. Prompts ranged from ‘add dots’, to ‘cover your page with a stamped image’, and the penultimate one – cover your whole page with gesso or acrylic paint.

Now collage isn’t really my thing – so the step by step was a good process. I didn’t really like what was developing, but that final unifying coat of gesso blended it all together into what turned out to be quite a pleasing piece of art.

Here’s a quick video showing each of the steps, and the impact they had on the building piece:

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THCC103: Day 6

Posted on 10th August 2016 by perfectly4med

It was wrap up day on Creative Chemistry 103 some time over the weekend, and I finally got to watch the final video from Tim Holtz. The challenge was to use some of the techniques we’d covered during the week on a different surface. I had bought some of the District Market French Burlap Panels in a sale some time ago, and decided these would be perfect to decorate up for the occasion.

So this is what happens after applying texture paste, embossing powder, Distress Crayons, Distress Stains, clear matte texture paste, stencils, water, baby wipes, gesso, matte multi medium, Distress Reinkers, Distress Glaze and a whole lot of patience and drying time! I love the texture play between the burlap and the scroll work, opacity versus transparency and still amazed at the versatility of the Distress Crayons.

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THCC103: Day 5

Posted on 8th August 2016 by perfectly4med

The last ‘proper’ day of the Creative Chemistry 103, and we were taught several techniques with alcohol inks on Yupo. For those not in the know, alcohol inks are dyes with, well, alcohol as the solvent – makes for fast drying heady crafting! And Yupo is a smooth plastic sheet of polypropylene suitable for all media, but particularly suited to media that play nicer when on non-porous surfaces. Lots of splatting, buffing, stamping, painting and puffing went into these. Great fun!

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THCC103: Day 4

Posted on 7th August 2016 by perfectly4med

I got sidetracked today… instead of getting on with my Creative Chemistry 103 Distress Crayon homework, I decided, like you do, to install a slow sand filter to deal with the Studio’s grey water. Admittedly, occasionally the grey water is more of a pinky purple, but you know what I mean. Up to now, I’ve had a caravan waste water carrier to catch artistic rinsings. Inevitably, I forget to empty it and an interesting smell announces that it is overflowing. I think a video popped up on my Facebook feed which sparked curiosity, then research, and then a quick trip to Wickes. £12 and couple of hours later, I have a passable way of dealing with my rinsings. They are filtered before draining into my irrigation reservoir, ready for watering the garden. A quick inoculation with ‘good’ pond bacteria followed, which should jump start the biofilm that apparently forms on the sand particles and keeps the nasty niffs down. No more hefting 40 litres of stinking sludge up the garden to the drain 🙂

Eventually I did get back into the Studio, and completed Day 4’s homework. More techniques with Distress Crayons which very artfully demonstrate why they are so, so different to other waxy water soluble crayons. And there’s more kits to come – three is not enough!