Art Journal Pages: Washi Tape

Next month’s art journal session’s theme is ‘Washi tape’. This versatile patterned translucent sticky tape is ideal for decorating pages, but can also be used as a masking tape. Here are two pages for your creative inspiration.

art journal page - stripes of distress inks art journal page - circles of colour Continue reading

Bible Journaling: rubber stamping

Our next Bible journaling session has ‘rubber stamping’ as its theme. It will be a departure from my normal style, and it took some time to find suitable stamps to match some verses and themes. When creating, I also chose to break my ‘rule’ of not working over the text areas of the page. I made sure, however, the work I did was transparent and the text still readable:

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Art Journal Page: Black and White

art journal page - black and whiteJuly’s theme for my art journaling session (spaces are available) is ‘black and white’. This is my example art journal page… I photocopied a magazine page and used it for an image transfer on the left side with an inked vignette effect using blended archival ink. The text is stamped in white picket fence distress ink using with the ‘colour’ cut from the original magazine page. There’s not much contrast between the coloured word and the black – I’m still not sure what to do about that as I’m not keen on outlining it and distracting from the colour itself.

Used in this layout

  • Daler Rowney A5 Graduate Sketchbook

Art Journal Page: #PASC0119

For the unfamiliar,  PASC stands for Pick-A-Stick Challenge. It has been a long while since I last participated in the challenge, and the format has changed slightly. The team now randomly draw words which it is left to us to interpret artistically. The only stipulation is that the order of the steps is followed. Everything else is artistic licence, and anything can happen before, during and after the steps to complete the page. There’s also a shorter ATC (Artist Trading Card) option. Here’s my January 2019 layout:

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Bible Journaling: Christmas 2018

The weather outside is frightful – the risk of freezing rain didn’t amount to much, but it’s cold, dark, blustery with heavy rain. As a result, I am in a toasty warm studio with pencils and pens out and doing some Bible journaling. I thought I’d take some of the less familiar scripture verses that are relevant to the Christmas story and develop some graphics to capture them in my margins.

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Art Journal Page: Whizz Bang Pop Fireworks

It’s time for my monthly art journal session on Monday evening, and it coincidently happens on 5th November – fireworks night. It seemed fitting, therefore, to have a suitably explosive theme ‘whizz, bang, pop’. There are spaces available, just let me know if you’d like to come.

Here’s my take on the theme:

fireworksUsed in this layout

  • [amazon_textlink asin=’B0027IPO9K’ text=’Daler Rowney A5 Graduate Sketchbook’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’themanicstamp-21′ marketplace=’UK’ link_id=’7a4aab6a-deb9-11e8-a7db-5beea6900017′]
  • [amazon_textlink asin=’B005IW0V5E’ text=’Pebeo India Ink’ template=’ProductLink’ store=’themanicstamp-21′ marketplace=’UK’ link_id=’53a18e8d-deba-11e8-b0cb-df05dd28237d’]
  • Ranger / Tim Holtz Distress Stains: Picket Fence/Candied Apple/Mermaid Lagoon/Mowed Grass/Mustard Seed
  • Ranger Stickles: Xmas Red/Tickled Pink, Yellow/Gold, Blue Bayou/True Blue, Green/Firefly

Art Journal: Board Books

It’s not often that I deliberately go into a cut-price bookstore with the sole intention of buying several copies of ‘My Little Pony’ children’s books. Well, this happened sometime in late winter, with the intention that I would be using them in a class. On Monday 1st October, attendees at my art journal session will be using the board books as a base for an art journal, included at no extra fee. Unfortunately, it does mean that my little ponies will be painted out. What a shame.

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Christmas 2018: A Clockwork Christmas

A Clockwork ChristmasI’ve been playing with resin this week and in these overlarge bottle caps (5.5cm diameter) I’ve added clock parts and snowflakes over a resinated book page. I love the layering that is achievable with resin, and the depth the layers create within the piece. I’ve completed seven different pieces designed to be used as Christmas tree decorations, perhaps with a steampunk theme? Resin isn’t cheap so each of these will be £7.50 each. 

A Clockwork ChristmasUnfortunately, due to the gloss reflections, the photographs don’t do them justice! The snowflakes are more translucent white than opaque grey and layer well within the resin.

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Bible Journaling: Deuteronomy 6:5

It’s not one of my go-to books, but this verse from Deuteronomy was one of the readings I delivered last Sunday in church. We are perhaps more familiar with the New Testament context of Jesus’ parable about the Good Samaritan (Luke 10:27) and then His response to the question ‘which commandment is the greatest in the Law?’ (Matt 22:37).

Deuteronomy 6:5  Continue reading

Art Journal Page: Collaged Chrysanthemum

It seems that for the last few days my corner of blog land has been out of service due to a duff plugin. Apologies! Here’s another art journal spread to make up for the absence (not that anyone noticed and let me know!). I experimented with collaging papers for the background and unifying the whole layout with a blanket stencil design. Masking off the area intended for the stamp and covering with gesso helped take the busyness away behind the ‘mum. It’s the first outing for my new Dusty Concord Distress Oxide ink pad. I’m not sure if it’s all a bit much, but experimentation is the name of the game in my journal.

art journal page chrysanthemum Continue reading