I got a wild hair about six months ago to make some salt dough and play around with it. Great fun! Totally non toxic and no worry about fumes as it cooks or any of that stuff that comes along with other clays. Plus, it cooks benignly in your kitchen oven, although the cooking time for ornaments is very long (around 10+ hours at a low temp) and not conducive to Florida in the summer. However, that is the only drawback I can see to it. This ornament was a thickish slab of clay, hand formed and then hand stamped with a deeply etched rubber stamp. After the baking and cooling, I glazed it with brown umber acrylic paint which I wiped off and left in the impression so it would show up against the neutral colored clay. I strung all my ornaments of various sizes onto a handmade bamboo branch armature, sort of abacus style, with the addition of only small commercially made ceramic beads. Very primitive.
Salt dough ornament
Posted: March 27, 2012 in New Mixed Media artTags: mixed media, new art work, ornaments, salt dough
Our Lady Guadalupe art journal page
Posted: March 26, 2012 in art journalTags: altered book, art journaling, guadalupe, new art work, painted canvas, stamp, styrofoam, tempera paint
This page doesn’t photograph all that great but if you look at the larger image by clicking on the smaller one you can see some detail better. There are three stampings of my styrofoam plate image of Guadalupe that I carved several months ago, all these stampings are in blue. And then there are three stampings in black of a rubber stamp that I have of Guadalupe. The background is tempera paint and the styrofoam plate stamps are tempera, too. Tempera is one of my favorite paints to use in art journaling. It dries matte which I like. It dries more quickly than acrylic, which I like. The paints mix well, which I like because the color range is somewhat limited. It’s non toxic and non stinky, which I like. In summation, I LIKE it. It’s inexpensive, too, which I REALLY like. Try it. My go to if I am not trying to prep a surface is white tempera which dries semi-opaque in one coat, opaque in two, much quicker than gesso and much more reasonably priced. Just about every page in my altered map journal begins with white tempera paint.
Spiritwalker necklace
Posted: March 23, 2012 in beadworkTags: jewelry, mixed media, necklace, new art work
The star of this necklace is the gorgeous hand cast bronze petroglyph pendant by Nancy Young which I purchased from her probably around 1995 or so. The large beads are charoite, the purple cylinder beads are lepidolite and the chips and buttons are ameythst. I do not know at the moment what the yellow-green faceted bead is but I hope to find out. The two charms were found earrings. I am a huge fan of Nancy Young’s work and wish I had bought more of her castings when she sold them to the public because I believe now she produces them only for her own use. They are gorgeous work.
Nightlife silhouette
Posted: March 22, 2012 in New Mixed Media artTags: found images, mixed media, new art work, painted canvas
The most recent in my silhouette series on 12″ canvas. Free spirit out for a night on the town. This was a fashion magazine ad originally, cut out with a craft knife, painted with black gesso and matte medium to place it on top of the acrylic and gesso background. There was also an edge of scrapbooking paper still showing on the left side. This canvas was repurposed from one of my previous paintings. If stuff is around here long enough and I no longer feel it I have no problem painting over it. Enjoy your day!
Sketchbook fountain pen fun
Posted: March 21, 2012 in art journalTags: art journaling, fountain pens, journaling, new art work, pen/ink drawing
I drew/doodled this page in one sitting most likely while watching something on TV. I was playing around with drawing with fountain pens, something I’ve not done unless you count doodling in high school during steno class. But now we are going into the waaaaayyyyy baaaaaccckkkk and I can hardly tell for sure WHAT happened in high school. I know steno is long gone. Anyway, I have several fountain pens, one that eeks out a little ink here and there so it makes a nice scratchy drawing (I believe most of the angel was done with that pen). The other real fountain pen delivers a very nice inking on demand and is likely responsible for lettering and text in this doodle. The color is some cheapy disposable fountain pens I bought a long time ago that – shock – still work. Every now and then I get in the mood to work like this. I’ll start off with one drawing and begin to turn the page and change the orientation as I go along. That way, the page has some interest. It’s a very stream of consciousness process and all kinds of bibs and bobs turn up in there. Try it one day while watching TV or when on the phone for a long time. Lots of times, I don’t even remember drawing most of the stuff. This page was rediscovered as I was sorting through some journals…I had forgotten I’d even drawn it.
Art journal cover
Posted: March 20, 2012 in photographyTags: altered book, art journaling, new art work, photography
I don’t believe I ever posted the cover of my altered map book journal. The cover is a heavy laminated cardstock. I attached this photo of a doorway in an alley in St. Pete, collaged with a different photo most likely inverted in Photoshop. I believe I used the polarize setting on the door photo to give it the shimmery blue/green color. I love to take and look at photos of doorways, doors and windows. It’s interesting to imagine what is on the other side.
Love in silhouette
Posted: March 19, 2012 in New Mixed Media artTags: art journaling, found images, journaling, mixed media, new art work, painted canvas, silhouettes
Graffiti inspired background with magazine cut out silhouettes and white gel pen journaling. It’s not easy finding magazine images with the proper bold character for these mixed media pieces. So far fashion magazines are the best yield. Guess what? After 70+ postings on this blog, nearly each day (except for Saturdays usually) since late December, I am running out of completed art. Don’t turn that dial yet, though, still have a few things up my sleeve and goodness knows I won’t run out of photos anytime soon, but I know you like variety, or at least I suspect you do. What’s a girl to do? Make more? Well, I guess I could, as evidenced by the last few days but we’ll have to see…
A new work on a foundation of patchwork collage composed of old letters and writing. I adhered the pieces of writing, then painted with acrylic paint, glazed with a metallic bronze and started the entire process again as I wasn’t satisfied with the first layer. The bottom corners are glazed with metallic pewter. The silhouettes are magazine cut outs painted black and adhered with matte medium. I wrote “the dance” over and over with white Signo pen down the left hand side to finish it. Probably graffiti inspired. This is a 12×12 stretched canvas.
Graffiti St. Pete
Posted: March 15, 2012 in photographyTags: graffiti, photography, public art, street art
Part of an multi-artist installation in St. Pete about 1-2 years ago. I love the juxtaposition of the checkboard with the free flowing lines in the figure. That figure is fierce…certainly a modern day warrior of some sort, with a touch of dia de los muertos thrown in for good measure. Not sure if the checkboard part belonged to the same artist as the figure part, they could have coexisted. I enjoy seeing this type of work and shoot it whenever possible because it often does not last very long, even if sanctioned by a store or local government. Sometimes they spray over just to change the installation before I have a chance to get there and document it. But the transitory nature of the media just enriches it.
Roly poly companion art journal page
Posted: March 14, 2012 in art journalTags: altered book, art journaling, mixed media, new art work, painting
The roly poly guy I drew in the upper right corner on black is in direct contrast to the long tall shadow dude featured in yesterdays entry. These are facing pages in my journal. The color scheme and background texture technique carried thru but the artwork is all handdrawn on a black surface. I like using postage stamps as a background. The little perferated edges produce a good texture when glued to the page and painted over. There are also office supplies on it and randomly cut shapes. Paint was applied with a credit card to get a streakiness I like. Won’t be any journaling added to this page because I like it the way it is and in combination with the facing page.
Crickyn 