Ornate Doors and Gates

That is the theme Pam chose for her book in the round robin happening in the Kindred Souls group.  The book itself is a masterpiece of creativity and paper engineering.  So much so, that each artist receiving it reported being at least a little intimidated.  Yep, me too.  We all wanted our pages to be as wonderful as the book Pam created.  So far, I think we've succeeded.  Just hope Pam agrees. :)

For this project, we are only doing one page, with our information and minor decoration on the back.
Here we go:

 

 

 

The image of the door comes from Graphics Fairy, a great site for free images, mostly vintage.  It was printed on plain copy paper, glued to cardboard, and enhanced with some ink, embossing powder, and a little metal on the top of the arch.  It is attached to the base with a combination of adhesive and brads, and it's a pretty strong connection.

 

 

 

The background is just a decorative napkin.  Some floral stamps were used to add some flowers from the background onto the door, and then a few very small Prima flowers with dots of stickles in the center finished that off.

 

 

 

The door does open.  I used one of those little photo tabs to hold it closed.

 

 

 

So, what lies beyond this garden door?  Why, a garden gate to a secret garden, that's what.

 

 

This door/gate is made of thin wood, but I covered it with micaceous iron oxide paint so it looks like old metal. I don't have the packaging it came in, so am not 100% sure of its origin, but I THINK I found it at Navel Jelly.   My apologies if I'm wrong.  So hard to keep track of all the supplies, you know.  The garden beyond is paint on deli paper;  the flowers were "painted" with both glaze and souffle pens.

 

Onto the back:

 

 

 

The background is some decorative paper from Stampin' Up that I've had for ages.  I stamped the LaBlanche garden gate stamp right over the text.  The little girl is another great image from Graphics Fairy, and I gave her some extra flowers to hold.  My personal information will go on this page.











Far Away Places

For the third May in a row I traveled to Connecticut for one of my favorite activities......taking a workshop with the fabulous Lynne Perrella.  This year was better than ever, for two reasons:  co-teaching with Lynne was Michelle Ward, and I was able to share the experience with three of my favorite peeps, Cheryl, Pat, and Teri.  Oh, I should have said there were three reaons this year was the best:  Cheryl drove, so we car-less city folk didn't have to do the Metro-North -(with a train change)-to-Wassaic-then-get-a-cab-to-the-hotel-with-two-tons-of-art-supplies routine.

The theme was Far Away Places, and we spent many hours in the weeks preceding the workshop deciding on our places, doing research, and gathering images and supplies. 

Of course I brought my camera; I even brought extra batteries.  Did I take any photos?  Not a one.  With my table full of materials and my hands full of paint and gesso, pulling out the camera was the last thing on my mind.  Luckily, Michelle posted a few nice snaps on her blog.  Check it out.  It also has pictures of both Lynne's and Michelle's sample pieces, a beautiful photo of Lynne and Michelle, and a group shot, which I have swiped here:

 

 

The workshop was held, as usual, at the lovely Interlaken Resort and Conference Center in Lakeville,  where they treat us very well, providing breakfast, lunch, day-long beverages and afternoon snacks.  Here are a few photos of the grounds taken at past workshops:





 

 

 

Actually, the grounds were even more beautiful and full of flowers this year.

 

I decided on Russia as my far away place.  My grandparents came from there, and though their experiences both pre and post revolution were not exactly a day at the beach, it is where they came from, and I wanted to include that in my work.

 

On day one we did a project with Michelle.  She showed us how to make cuts in folded paper to create windows and shapes that either pop out or recede.  I loved it!  Here is that piece (all photos taken at home):

When folded, it looks like a book, and this would be the cover:



 

 

The cover with the windows opened:

 

The back cover:

 





 

The piece opened and standing:

 

Opened and lying flat:

 

Details:

 

The back:

 

 



On the second day, we did a long banner with Lynne.  While Michelle largely uses paint as her color source, Lynne is all about the Portfolio water soluble oil pastels.  I love them too. 

 



 

 

Day three was a project with Lynne and Michelle.  First they each demonstrated the way they approach making a grid design, and then we set out to do our own version.  My grid was made up of two inch squares of various papers, many left over from the previous days.  Although much of the grid wound up being covered by the focal image and stenciling, enough of it is evident and makes an interesting base for what came afterwards.

 

 

 

We were told that Lynne and Michelle are already talking about what they want to do next year.  Sign me up!



 

 



 

 

 

 

 

Heading East

Last weekend, with a to-do list longer than my arm, I abandoned everything I was supposed to do in favor of what I wanted to do.  I recently signed up for an ATC swap at Little Bird Creations, something I haven't done in years.  I literally have hundreds of these little works of art from years ago swaps, but have rarely done any since I've gotten into art journaling and collage.  Anyway, the theme is Japanese/geisha, and since I have a ton of related supplies, I decided to go for it.  They're not due until June, but you know how it goes with me and my stubborn muse....strike while she is hot or she will run away and hide.

I began by covering a sheet of 8 1/2 x 11" cardstock with some Japanese text.  I remembered a trick I'd read for getting 10 ATC from one such piece of paper, and cut them out.  Here's this handy tip:

1. Cut two lengthwise strips 2 1/2" wide, leaving one strip 3 1/2" wide.

2. Cut the strips crosswise: the 2 1/2" strips will be 3 1/2" wide, and the 3 1/2" strips will be 2 1/2" wide.

Then I added some texture with this embossing folder (I was able to do two ATCs at a time):

 

 

And then some transluscent color with these paints:

 





So much for the background; now onto the main image, which I got from this:

The above is 8 1/2 x 11", so I only used the head and shoulders, and that pretty much filled up the ATC.

All of this resulted in:

 

 

To color the images, I used my favorite cheap-o art supply:

 

 

 

And to decorate the colored kimonos, I used some of my favorite pens.  Because the Portfolios have a waxy surface, not every pen will write well over them.  I've ruined many a good pen learning this, but my Sharpie poster paint pens, Molotow acrylic pens, and Sakura glaze and souffle pens glide over the Portfolios with no problem.

 

 

 

Although the design is identical, the decoration changes from ATC to ATC.  And though it wasn't my intention,  even the faces all look different.  The face on the original image was very faint, so I had to go over the lines with a pen.  Even the slightest difference in my drawing changed the expression.  I'm not complaining, just explaining.  And of course I totally enjoyed coloring and doodling on the clothing, using varying colors and patterns on each.

 

 

 



 

 

 

I used very narrow red German scrap for the hair accessories.  The flowers are tiny Primas over small Stampin' Up blooms, with a dot of platinum stickles in the center.













Resin!

Last weekend I took a resin workshop with Isolina Perez at Michele's studio.  In addition to learning about and using three different kinds of resins, I got to spend a day with so many of my artsy friends.  What a treat!



Isolina provided everything we needed, and we started out using Ice Resin, since it has the longest setting/curing time.



 

 

I had to wait three days for this resin to cure, and then I was able to add some findings to create wearable art.  To turn the little charms containing Van Gogh's irises into earrings required some metal surgery, which I'm happy to say was successful.

 

 



Klay Resin is very cool stuff.  We used it to embed an image, which would later be part of a larger piece.  But you have to work very fast....curing time is about 7 minutes!  For the base the embedded image would sit on, we used copper, which we cut, filed, embossed, and patinaed. 

 

 

I really do love working with metal.  Here is my finished piece.

 

 

 

Crystal Clay is similar to Klay Resin in that it is also a two part clay that comes in colors.  However, it doesn't set for about an hour or so.  We created pendants using this resin with charms and bezels, stamped on it, and embedded crystals into it.  I made two pieces and when I got home, decided to combine them into one.

 

 

 

A few students had already left when this group photo was taken, but you can see how happy we all are.

 

 

 

I'm looking forward to Isolina's next class, and hope it is scheduled soon.   Make sure to check out all the offerings coming up at Michele's; there's bound to be something on the calendar you'll love.