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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Art Journal: Annus Covidis

Posted on 10th December 2020 by perfectly4med

Back in January I joined Mixed Up Creative Academy’s free art journal course which offered a theme and a technique video each month. I chose to work in a larger size than normal – a portrait A4 page – per month. I made my own journal from thick greyboard so that I could chuck all sorts of media at it without it buckling. Unfortunately, towards the end of the year, the course was pulled due to lack of tutors, so the last three months became my own. Over the months, I found myself moving toward Bible verses and each page became an example of how Bible journaling can move off the Bible page. I present my Annus Covidis journal:

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Card Making: Distress Oxide Collage

Posted on 30th October 2019 by perfectly4med

It’s been a long time since I regularly made greetings cards, back in the heady days of peel offs and basic rubber stamping. My style and media choices have changed significantly since, and last night I had a few moments to have a play during my Come & Craft Session: mixed media collage cards.

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Art Journal Page: Beautiful Art

Posted on 1st April 2017 by perfectly4med

The first Monday of the month sees my monthly art journal evening at the Studio, and next week the theme is ‘never been used’. I’ve asked studio guests to bring something from their crafty stash that they have never used, and we’ll be incorporating them into our beautiful art journal pages.

In prepping my sample for the session, I came across an embarrassment of unused kit deep in folders, drawers and baskets. I think I will need to do more of these! I know I’m not alone, so what do you think – anyone fancy a ‘never been used’ challenge blog?

Here’s my show page, worked in my very first art journal from 2011 on a background that I’d not yet used:

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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 3

Posted on 5th August 2016 by perfectly4med

Ok, I’m still not caught up… but this is Day 3’s exercises for Creative Chemistry 103 (CC103) led by The Professor (Tim Holtz). This particular class was centred on getting texture using the various collage mediums and texture pastes recently introduced to the Distress product line. I don’t have most of these, so substituted various DecoArt products instead and I reckon they do just as good a job!

It’s the first time I have used Distress Crayons, and I have to say I am impressed. Slightly softer than a gelato, the crayon blends beautifully under fingers and into other colours, and the reactivity with water is superb. Glad my spending overruled my scepticism and they were there to use!

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Art Journal Page: Not As Obvious As You’d Think [Pick-A-Stick Challenge]

Posted on 19th July 2016 by perfectly4med

I’m having a go at catching up with some of my art journal online challenges and classes I’ve been neglecting for a few weeks (actually probably months). I’ve caught up with the Wanderlust One Collage Challenge, but part of the deal with that is that I can’t show you it until the last stage at the end of the year. But I have been taking pictures of each stage, so it’ll be worth waiting for!

Then I moved onto May’s Pick A Stick Challenge – ten prompts drawn at random and completed in order. I pulled out the very first journal I started way back in 2011 and found a background to work on – oh how my art journaling has developed! Continue reading →

Art Journal Page: Pick A Stick Challenge (June)

Posted on 1st July 2016 by perfectly4med

I’ve snuck this creation in between finishing a commissioned art journal, and making the samples for tomorrow’s fabric printing/painting workshop. The Pick A Stick Challenge for the uninitiated is ten techniques or journal prompts pulled at random by one of the four coordinators of the challenge, and you must then create your page using those steps in the order in which they were pulled. This is what I came up with for June’s ten sticks 🙂

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New Year’s Day Project: Card Collage

Posted on 1st January 2016 by perfectly4med

It’s the annual Christmas Party for my studio regulars tomorrow, and traditionally we do a project that upcycles the now defunct Christmas cards and wrapping paper. This time I thought we’d do a little home decor piece ready to pack away with the decorations to bring out again next Christmas. Here’s my example, created in a Tando Creative Mini Printer Tray (laser cut greybeard).

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Art Journal Page: One Voice

Posted on 21st July 2015 by perfectly4med

I promise this is the last page (for now) with the wooden block prints – just in case you’re getting bored… I’ve got enough done now to demonstrate what can be done with them at my Art Journal Session at the beginning of August. This one is a little more of a creative statement highlighting the quotation – I love how the Walnut Stain Distress Ink rubbed over the collaged speech bubbles has made them look grubby as well as making them recede into the background. Enough said, I think.