Tuesday, November 29, 2016

Sketchbook Play

Just some sketchbook play time with handmade foam stencils, accidental ink angel shapes, gelli prints, and other doodling practice! FUN!






Journal Pages with Found Poetry


Practice cutting and using my own stencils on a book page and other papers in a handmade journal! Plain prints with spray ink, using the cut out stencil as a mask and a cut out...


After some spray ink and pen work...


Close up of found poetry...


A couple more pages in the same journal, using my own stencils. The left side is a wrapping paper page. Don't remember what the other page is. I covered it in writing with a Pitt pen.

Not perfect pages, but they aren't meant to be! I'm feeding my soul with something I love!

Happy Creating!

Gellis and Ink Angels

I recently noticed that some of my blog drafts already had all the pictures added, but I had never added the text, so some of the following posts have actually been started for a while, from projects I was doing a year ago. I am publishing three of them now, and there will be others mixed among my current projects.

A couple of gelli plate prints on colored card stock, using acrylics and my own foam plate stamps and mark making tools...





This one was an accidental acrylic inky angel on an acrylic background in a sketchbook, and I gelli printed over it, thus the gauzy effect, which I love!

Happy accidents are the best!

Sunday, November 27, 2016

Paint Your Town: Updated Journal Pages

A couple of pages that I've shared before in the early stages, that have been added to and called done!


Mixed media on brown paper bag page, which I first shared...


I thought it needed something, so I added this little paper owl that I made from a circle punch...


Then I got carried away with the pens, markers, and pencils! I like it much better! People in my town have a lot of faith!...


Original mixed media page with a b/w photo transfer onto a rust transferred cloth page of our old theatre...


Added some color and pencil marking, aged and collaged a ticket, and wrote some info...


Added more pencil, brightened up the name, and sealed! I like this version, but I think I like the first version, with its ghostly quality, better, actually!

When I was very little, Daddy loved to go the movies to watch the double feature westerns on Saturday nights. Bluegrass artists, Lester Flatt and Earl Scruggs, once played here. The theatre was closed before I became a teenager and was torn down in the seventies, I think. 

Our town was a thriving, bustling, riverside town when I was growing up in the fifties and sixties. Now it's dying a slow death, as many small towns are. I miss so many of the old buildings/houses that have been torn down in the name of progress.  ðŸ˜¢

I still love her and the people are awesome!

Sunday, November 20, 2016

Quirky Doodle (and other) Sketches

Often when I'm blocked, I can still do these quirky doodle sketches, and they eventually help me to resume my class work and other projects. Most of this year I have suffered from depression and from my muse going on hiatus, but I kept this journal by my bed and managed to bring these characters out while drinking my coffee some mornings.

Some are rough sketches, but most are quirky doodles, which means I close my eyes and lightly make  random marks and shapes on the page with a pencil, most of the time while listening to music, then I open my eyes and see what images I can pull out of the marks. It's kind of like a meditation for me. Sometimes the image jumps out right away; sometimes it takes a while, but there's always an image just waiting to come forth for me.

These are all made with Stablio, water-soluble pencils, and gone over with a water pen after the image shows up. I may, or may not, do something else to them at a later point in time. For now, I like them as they are!

Sketch from imagination...

Quirky Doodle...

Quirky...

Sketch of a styrofoam head wearing a wig...

Quirky...

Quirky...

Quirky...

Quirky...

Quirky...

Quirky...

Quirky...LOVE this lady!

Quirky...

Quirky...

Rough sketch from an old photo that I really liked!

These are fun to do and keep me in practice when my muse disappears on me! I've  just learned a new way to do contour drawings, which I will be integrating in with these in the future, I'm sure! :)

Keep Sketching, even if it's for only 10 minutes a day! I'll try to do the same! Our art will thank us for it! :)

Mini Mojo: Textures, Marks, Color/Oils and cold wax

I forgot that I had finished this painting inspired by Tracy Verdugo's class on textures (see sidebar link). I've had the pictures loaded on here for a while, but forgot to post them. I have lots of interruptions and Senior moments anymore! Ha!


I think this is on an 8"x 8" wooden cradled panel, and it's mixed media...Collage,


Paint,


Marks and Text, plus oil paint and cold wax,


Finished! LOTS of texture and marks! The upper text says, "My heart has taught me", and the lower text says, "My scars were my face".
I am still relatively new to mixed median and not very good at it, but I am loving the learning process!

Wednesday, November 9, 2016

Paint Your Town: Charcoal Contour Sketches

Practicing quick contour sketches in the Paint Your Town classes! Good for sketching people and other things out in public in a hurry. The three human faces were all sketched from the same photograph, NOT trying to get a likeness. The first two are in my 4" x 6" town journal, and may be layered over. The other two are in my Moleskine journal, which is larger. Too bad I didn't start in the Moleskine and end in the little journal. I think I was getting more confident toward the end!


#1  Charcoal pencil on a journal page made from the inside of an envelope...


#2  Tried one in watercolor pencil on a collaged page, then went over it with water; forgot that I had sealed the page :/...


#3  Charcoal pencil on Moleskine journal page...I need LOTS MORE practice!


Mr. Moose! Stuffed animal, quick sketched with charcoal pencil on Moleskine journal, from life...I like him! :)

I like that I can quick sketch in the moment, then go back and add to them later if I want to, or cover them up. Fun stuff! :)

Next project is quick contour sketching with ink! Can't wait to try that!

Saturday, November 5, 2016

Paint Your Town: Pages Updated and A New Page

Still from Jeanne Oliver's class "Paint Your Town: Mixed Media Urban Landscape" (see sidebar for link.


Glenkirk Landing and Towhead Island value sketch in Paynes Grey acrylic on a light tan paper. I used a reversed photo, so, in reality, the bluff is to the right. This is a scene within a short walking distance to my home.


Rabbit Hop School House from the turn of the 20th century (around 1900), where my grandpa Stricklin and several of his siblings went to school. It was located a couple of houses over from where I live, in the Rabbit Hop community, but gone way before I was born. I did a photo transfer on a red paint sample. Why, I don't know, but this is just the beginning. We'll see where it goes from here!


I did a little bit more to the pages I shared in the previous post. The left page on this spread is dull, due to weak photography (mine). The colors are much brighter than this! See the previous posts...


I also added a little owl, made from a paper punched circle, to this page, which, I think, helped it...


I added some writing, an aged ticket, and some pencil and paint markings to this photo transfer to rust transferred fabric...LOVED this old theatre from my childhood! It's been torn down for many years now...

Doing a journal using my home town and surrounding areas is fun! I've always wanted to do this, but didn't quite know how to go about it. Jeanne Oliver is showing me unique ways to do it, and I'm learning so much. My pages may not be professional looking, but I'm learning while I'm having fun, and that's the important part!

Keep doing what you love! It feeds your soul! :)