Concrete Angel

I am still working on Round Robin Journals- this one is for Susan. Her theme is How Great Thou Art, and is to create a page that showcases our own personal style.

I actually found this a little challenging, because I am not sure that I have a particular style. I think I am kind of "all over the place" with my art, and am inspired by so many different artists and artistic styles.

I have been striving to increase my sketching skills lately, and I have not been very comfortable in sharing them, because I don't feel they are all that "good." Then I realized that I am not doing art to "impress" other people, but to "express" what is in me.

So here is what I created for Susan. It was inspired by the song Concrete Angel by Martina McBride. It is a very sad song about child abuse, and I am not sure what it is about the song that draws me to it, but it has such a powerful and deep message.

The girl is done with several layers of different weights of pencil. I used my fingers for blending- I am sure there are better techniques, but this is working for me at the moment.

(If you want to see her details-you can click on the picture to see her larger.)

The wings started as a white handmade paper with a silver swirl pattern. I used gesso, and several weights of charcoals, pencils, and lots and lots of blending, to achieve the worn look.

The background paper was also altered with gesso washes, stamped images, distress inks, more color wash and then another coat of distress inks. I printed the words from the song onto tracing paper. I have not done this before, but all the vellum I have, is really heavy weight and I wanted it to be really light, so the images would show through. I had to spray it with fixative, because I used an inkjet printer, but I love the transparentness that it has.

I think it exudes a sense of peace.

Here Kitty Kitty

These are the Tip-in Pages I made for Teri.

They are little quilties.

Her topic was anything with a cat or kitten on it somewhere, so I decided that I would design a pattern, and incorporate fabric into my pages. I ended up making the whole thing with fabric.

The cat and the mouse are quilted down, and then the "meow" is written in stitches. The mouse's tail is a little pink ribbon. The kitty's wiskers are made with threads, the eyes are jewels that I made to look like cat eyes.

I had this really strange bead, that looked like a ball of yarn, that has been "rolling" around my house for a year or more. When I got to thinking about making my pattern, I remembered that bead and wanted to incorporate it into the piece, so I made the cat batting at it.

I Love Pam's Class!!!

OK, it has only been one lesson, but it is so much fun. I love the way the class is going. I know many people go at a much faster rate, but I love that we get to play with the technique, and really get comfortable with it. I on the other hand, have been so swamped all week that I have not had a chance to play, so have only just begun. I can not believe how fun this process is, and the amazing results you get.

This is my very first attempt at the backgrounds technique. It is a little all over the place, but Pam assures us that if we are not in love with a particular background, then use those ones for collage, and save the best ones for drawing/painting faces, etc.

Well, I won't rattle on- I have more experimenting to do :0)

PS- sorry for my thumb in the picture :0)

Gypsy Women

Well, Finally I finished these Tip-In pages for Susan. I hope she will forgive me for my tardiness. She is such a lovely artist. With having been sick, and then the holidays, I just could not bring myself to throwing something together just to get it done. In all of this, every time I tried to do the transfers, they would not work out correctly. I can not count the number of times that I tried and failed, but I was determined to make this work.
There are times when the vision you have in your head is what is going to come out on paper no matter how you have to get it there. This was one of those times!

I have hand beaded the outfit on the gypsy on the right page, and added copper punchinella to the left side and red punchinella to the right side. The words are also transfers, and then painted with white pen. I have also added a plethora of luscious fibers. My favorite. The whole things is distressed with walnut stain- along with my hands, and clothes. (oops-perks of the job)

Art Journal January DAY 7&8

This is a combination of both day 7 and day 8.

Day 7 was the collage background, which consists of metallic gold tissue paper, red mulberry paper, some metallic gold and red paisley wrapping paper and a vintage looking background paper from I think Anna Griffin. Then I took a watered down gesso wash and brushed it over the pages. It made to metallic pages too milky, so I took a towel, and wiped a bit off here and there to let the metallic show through a bit. Most of the wrapping paper wiped rather clean, but the tissue soaked the gesso well, so where I wiped it off, it is just a slight slimmer when held at an angle. It is really quite interesting.

The prompt for Day 8 was to create the "soulmate within" the description:

~ create an expressions of those parts within you that long to be whole unto itself.

Many of my very closest friends and family know what I have been going through since I was just a young wife, and it seems the older I get the worse things are, but I just struggle so much sometimes with finding the help I need to get through the bad days. I have not been feeling "whole" within myself, so I felt inspired to do this page.

It may not have any significance to any of you, and that is ok.

Art Journal January DAY 6

This is my art journal January Day 6 - Self Portrait.

Wow- This was at first a really intimidating prompt. But the more I thought about it the more excited I got about it. The prompt was just the "excuse" and kick in the butt I needed to push me to try to do a realistic face sketch. I feel like now I need to keep going. I am not saying it is great, but there are parts of this sketch that I am actually kind of proud of. The funny thing is, I took SuziBlu's class on Petite Dolls, and she taught us about eyes, and the part I think I did the worst job on was the eyes. Somehow they are not level, and not the same size....Well, I won't go into it, but the part I really like, which is crazy, is my chin and actually my double, double chin. I really have a chin like that, and I think I captured it quite realistically. I know that sounds really bizarre, but hey, we all have parts of us that are "real" and I am not going to hide the fact that I have a poochy chin, so I might as well be real about it- right?

Anyway, here I am in all my sketchiness :0)

Art Journal January DAY 5

Here is my journal entry for Art Journal January with Milliande.

It is my Zendala, for the Zen style prompt. I chose to do it in pencil, so the image is hard to see, but I wanted to try something new. I really like how it turned out in real life. It actually has a lot of dimension since you can achieve different weights with the amount of pressure you apply to the pencil.

There is a lot going on in my zendala. There is quite a bit of symbolism in my zendala. I will point out a few. The child's face in the flower. The footprint that signifies the "walk with me". There is a heart in hand, Eye for vision, flowers for growth, circles for unity, stars for alignment. I will let you look for more:0)

Art Journal January DAY 3

Art Journal January Day 3 is to decorate the cover of your journal. I am not at all finished with mine, but here is a start. I want to do some more dimensional elements, but for now, it is all I feel inspired to do. At least it is not naked.

Priceless Journal Assessment

EWain, a friend of mine as spent a ton of time working with art journals, and trying to determine which ones are the best for different applications.
She has posted this information on her blog for everyone to use. Isn't that wonderful? I know for me it is absolutely priceless!
I am always looking for the perfect art journal, that will hold up to the rigors of the abuse I dish out when I am art journaling.
Please feel free to check out this massive amount of amazing information!
Don't forget to tell EWain how much you appreciate her time and effort :0)
http://ewian.blogspot.com/2008/12/dream-journal.html

(EWian's photo)

Art Journal January DAY 1

Saying goodbye 2008-

HELLO 2009!

I loved this prompt, as it gave me a chance to think about what I needed to make closure with in my life, and what I needed to make decisions about for my life starting now.

I don't make "resolutions" so to speak.

I do think that the beginning of the year is a nice time to make a good start. It does have a sense of cleansing, but at any point in our lives we can make decisions to change our lives.

I chose at this time of year to write down some personal thoughts about my life and feelings that have weighed me down over the past year or longer, that I will be leaving behind.

Then I wrote down the things that I will be doing to change my life. How I will feel more centered and able to be a better me. I chose to write these things down behind the doors, because these are my personal thoughts. This will also help me to return to my thoughts later if I feel I am loosing myself.

Art Journal January

One of my main goals for the new year is to continue with my new found love of art journaling, and to take it to a new level.

So, when my friend Milliande told me about the Art Journal January program, I was very excited. Now, I am not much of a scheduler either, so we should be two of a kind - her and I.

I will probably not post every day, or share all of the things that I journal. Some days I will just doodle a little, or write some thoughts about my art exploration. I hope to share some things with you.

I will also be taking Pam's class soon, so that will be part of this mix.

If you would like to follow along with some of the prompts that Milliande has offered, you can catch them all on her website here at http://www.milliande.com/art-journal-january.html