Paint Party Friday Night: Gratitude Journal

I'm arriving at Paint Party Friday a little late - you can see the other participants at this link. But I'm really happy to have done this page because it finishes up my Gratitude Journal, which I started way back in June, 2010!  The journal is very rustic - the pages are made out of plaster, and this page has also been collaged with an assortment of patterned papers.  The Journal is called "Pieces of Me," and each page describes something for which I am grateful.  Here's a sampling of some of the other pages:

I am so glad to have this journal finally completed!  And it makes me interested in pulling out some more plaster to work with (although it's easiest to work with that medium when the weather is hot and dry, so I may have to wait).  It reminds me of a friend in Southern California who only knits in the winter because her hands get too hat in the summer. Are there certain media that are "season-dependent" for you? 
Thanks for stopping by!

Out of the Journal Canvas Challenge: Week #2

Dina Wakley is running a challenge this month to get art journalers to work on canvas or other surfaces (anything outside your art journal). The goal is to workon two canvases each week.  I started two canvases last week and thought I had left an autopost with them, but it didn't work out. So, a little late, here are my two canvases. The one up top is actually two canvases - a 12x12 painted black, with red and yellow circles (plus drips), and a small yellow canvas that I will attach to the front. I definitely got that idea after taking Tim Holtz' Creative Block class. I plan to add a few more yellow splatters and some teal stars to the background.

And this is my second "canvas." It's actually plaster. I added lots of texture and acrylic paint, plus some grunge board and a photograph I took of a butterfly. I was going to call it done, but then I saw this fabulous creation at the Altered Bits blog, and have now decided I want to add A LOT more stuff.
So, sorry these are late. Hopefully they'll still go into the challenge drawing. I've got my next canvas started and an idea for another this week.

Canvas #2: A Good Start

I'm working on Dina Wakley's "Work Outside Your Journal" challenge, designed to get art journalers to work on canvas or other backgrounds outside their journals.  The goal is to do two a week during the month of August. Here's my second canvas for the first week of August. It's a 12x12 canvas, on which I have created a patchwork of painted plaster pieces and added an image.  I'm not really sure where to go next, and I'd love ideas. I have made one other similar piece, which you can see here.  Thanks in advance for your ideas.

The Season of Childhood

Dina Wakley is challenging art journalers to move outside their journals this month and work on a canvas or other background. She suggests doing two per week! So, here's my first project. It's a plaster nicho, painted with acrylics and featuring bunting from some Cosmo Cricket paper and painted chipboard from Maya Road.  There's a little journaling on the bunting which reads"Childhood is the most beautiful of all of life's seasons." It also fits perfectly into Gingersnap Creations subject for this month, "Babes and Tots." It feels great to be finishing some projects.  Got any great quotes about childhood to share?

So, what do you think of this?

Plaster is one of my favorite media with which to work.  I've been thinking about some new ways to use it, and I've come up with this design, which is sortof like a patchwork collage:

I like the result pretty well, although I'm going to do something with the upper left hand corner to fill it in.  I'm curious about your reaction to this piece. I almost went totally abstract with just plaster strips in different colors and textures but couldn't resist adding images. I almost stopped there but it felt a little unfinished. I thought about using a row of buttons up top or something more subtle than the lace, flowers and word. So, I'm wondering whether you think this would be better if it were more abstract or less elaborate?  I also considered covering it all with beeswax. What do you think of that idea? I'll no doubt try all these ideas this summer, as well as some others.  So, at this point, I'm open to any and all feedback.
Thanks!

A final fashion statement

As you may recall, I was honored in the month of November to be asked to be a contributing artist at Gingersnap Creations blog during "fashion & sewing" month.  I had such a wonderful time that I wanted to make one more piece that fit the month's theme.  This wall hanging is done on plaster wrap, painted in a Michael DeMeng color wash style.  I added some grungepaper flowers with vintage buttons as their centers and a bit of vintage lace.  I'm tempted to add a quote in white above the two lower left flowers, but I'm holding off on that for right now.  It feels good to be getting back to working with plaster and to actually finish a piece (this one has been "in process" all month).  And, for some more good news, the Gingers liked my work so much that they asked me to stay on for another month!  Yea me! So, you'll be seeing more of my creations there during December.
In other news, my computer has reached a critical stage in its continuing decline.  So, today I bit the bullet and ordered a new computer.  It'll take a few weeks to arrive, so I'll keep limping along with this one until then.  My biggest current problem is the inability to link to many blogs because my computer reads them as "threats." I can still visit and comment on my ipad, but it's hard for me to add links here in blogger. On the upside, I ordered Photoshop Elements, so 2011 will definitely be the year I move into more photo editing.  I also ordered my Christmas present to myself last week - a fixed 80mm portrait lens, as well as a replacement for the telephoto (70-200, I think) that I broke over the summer).  What are you getting for Christmas?

Playing with Paint

The Something Completely Different Challenge Blog is continuing its "torso" theme this month, and this week's challenge is black and red.  Well, here's my totally awesome Michael DeMeng-inspired entry! I blogged yesterday about DeMeng's cool new app (for ipad or ipod) which gives fabulous recipes for mixing Golden paint washes.  I couldn't resist stealing away to the studio today to play with paint.  Here's some color samples I made:

The colors in the top row are oil slick, ushzz, serial killer red. In the bottom row are fire water, jelly brain and undead red.  The torso ATC above is made on undead red.
I also decided that Michael, former bartender, needed to get plastered (so to speak).  I experimented with fire water on plaster and the result was spectacular (IMHO):

Not sure what I'm going to do with the samples or the big plaster sheet, but I'll be sure to share what I do.  In the meantime, I'm also submitting this to the for the Gingersnap Creations Supply Challenge (Paint). I just read the rules, and you can submit more than one thing, which is great because I was having trouble deciding whether this was better than this flag mini-album I posted earlier.  Anyway, it was so much fun to play today! My wish for you is that you get a chance to enjoy some creative play this weekend.

Daddy's Little Girl

I've been missing my dad a lot lately.  I don't think I realized that until I realized that much of my art recently has been about little girls and their fathers. I think that's one of the wonderful things of art - it helps me get in touch with my subconscious feelings.  
Anyway, I made this bunting shaped mini-album on Saturday while teaching a class on plaster journals.  The flags are made out of plaster.  The ones on top are painted with a variety of acrylic paints.  The pink flags on the bottom are sprayed with glimmer mists, and the flag in the middle is collaged with a variety of patterned papers and the painted over with ecru paint.  Each of the flags is decorated with a small dress (made using the confined collage technique) and a heart (either made out of plaster or out of confined collage).  I transcribed a poem called "Daddy's Little Angel" onto the flags.  You can click on the pictures to enlarge them and see the details.
I came up with this idea after seeing this post on Dina Wakley's blog in which she featured a canvas pennant banner album from Maya Road.  I'm submitting this project to the Gingersnap Creative blog for their acrylic paint supply challenge.  Also, the top four pages fit Shimelle's prompts for creating with hearts. The outside ones on the bottom row fit her prompt for creating with the color pink and the middle bottom flag meets the prompt for creating with more than four different patterned papers.
The winner of the "haiku in blogland" contest will be announced tomorrow! Thanks to everyone who played

Let's Talk Heat Embossing

Studio L3's Compendium of Curiosities Challenge this week features distress embossing powders.  Linda suggested that people either love 'em or hate 'em.  I'd say I'm in a love/hate relationship with them - like I am with most embossing (LOL!).  I love it when it works but get frustrated when it doesn't.  I've done enough embossing to know that its success is affected by humdity, ink type, paper type, and all kinds of other things.  I decided to try embossing on plaster, and I love the effect, but find it sort of fragile.  Most of the distress powders wiped offed, even after being heat set and cooling.  I was able to get this part of the image to stay intact, but I'm not sure how well it will hold up.  Oh well, in the meantime, I love it.  I guess I'll think of it like a sandsculpture, something you can only enjoy until the elements wash it away.  How do you feel about embossing in general?  How about distress embossing?  Got any great embossing tips to pass along?

Butterfly Bookmark

Took a little break from Shimelle's class to work on a few challenges.   I really wanted to complete the Studio L3 Compendium of Curiosities challenge for this week (before it changed)- shabby chic.  So, I used that technique to make the background for this bookmark and also on the grungeboard butterflies. The background is plaster, and, as usual, the plaster worked beautifully with Tim's techniques.  For my theme, I used "connect," the prompt from the Sunday Creative. I like how the butterflies have their own connection to each other and how they are also connected (by the flight line) to the rest of the world.  I'm using this bookmark to keep my place in my Compendium of Curiosities!  

"Open" and Class Review of Creativity Boot Camp

I really enjoyed Creativity Boot Camp, a wonderful, free, two week class that gave class participants lots of options for what to get out of it.  Participants were challenged to pick one medium and create something in that medium each day, incorporating  a random prompt.  I chose plaster as my medium because it's something that I had been meaning to explore but hadn't gotten around to working with.  The randomness and openness of the prompts gave me the opportunity to create all kinds of things that I really loved and to discover new ways in which to use plaster.  You can peruse these by checking my labels for plaster or bootcamp  I loved having the push to create every day for two weeks - I think I really grew as an artist and have many more ideas for what to do with plaster.  The class also had a variety of ways to connect with other participants - a comments section, which I liked; a mr. linky tool that was fantastic and easy to use; a blog roll in which I participated; a flickr group (which I ignored - I hate flickr); and some forums which I perused occasionally.  I found several new blogs and artists through the class, who I know will continue to inspire me as I visit their blogs.  The class also had an "assignment" every day - often involving writing.  I didn't do these very often because they didn't really "speak to me," but that was okay! I had thought about a lot of the same things when I worked through The Artist's Way a few years ago.  I think other participants got a great deal out of these activities.  I did love, love, love the photo walk assignment though - such fun!  One of the most interesting things about the class was how it took on a life of its own.  I think it was originally intended to be a fairly small class for a few blog friends, but it drew hundreds of creative, interesting people.  Simply amazing!  CBC is continuing with weekly prompts called "Sunday Creative," and I'm really glad it is.  I want to continue to use plaster and to share my creations with others.  The first Sunday creative prompt was "open," and I used radiant pearls to create this card with an open water lily on plaster.  I hope you like it!
All-in-all, Creativity Boot Camp was a wonderful experience for me and something that allowed people to grow in whatever ways they chose.  As I said before, simply amazing!
If you participated, what did you think about it?  What was your favorite creation?

Smooth, Alcohol Ink Tags

I love plaster because it is so highly textured, so it was difficult to figure out what to do with today's prompt at Creativity Boot Camp - "smooth."  I decided to smooth it out by adding several coats of gesso on top of it.  I got it so smooth that I was able to get alcohol inks to "stick" to it!  I love alcohol ink and am happy to find another surface to use them on.  I'm making another set of tags for my art journaling class which continues this weekend.  I can't find my hole punch, but I will punch a hole and add some nice ribbon before I give these out on Sunday.  Art journaling and scrapbooking have both helped me come to terms with my handwriting because I do not do any computer journaling - it's all by hand.  Have you learned to love your handwriting yet?

Hush

I absolutely love how this turned out! It's a scrapbook page on plaster that will go into my "favorite photos" album that I created in Shimelle's Something from Almost Nothing class.   When I was reconstituting this piece of plaster, I used water that had some paint in it from my brushes, and I loved how it gave it a very light tint. For this background, I decided not to paint it or add any other colorant.  When I read the prompt for today's Creativity Boot Camp assignment, I thought of this picture of a nest I found in a hollowed out tree on a nature hike this spring.  I stamped the title and feathers and am just really pleased with it! In fact, instead of putting it in an album, I might frame instead!

It's Raining Tim! Hallelujah! (drizzle)

There's a new Tim Holtz based challenge going on in blogland! It's being hosted by Studio L3 and features challenges from Tim's A Compendium of Curiosities.  The first challenge features the water stamping technique found on page 35 of the book.  I've been thinking about umbrellas and Tim's umbrella man stamp since the Creativity Boot Camp prompt, drizzle, went up last night.  I decided to see how the water stamping technique would work on plaster, and I'm thrilled with the results.  In fact, I think it works even better than my attempt to use this technique on paper, which you can see here.  I put two layers of gesso down on the plaster before the distress inks, and I think that helped a lot.  I can definitely see using this technique to create very cool backgrounds for larger plaster pieces.  Anyone going to join me in this Tim challenge?  In other blogland announcements, Shimelle posted a bit about her summer class.  I signed up already.  Have you?

Little Bits of Fun (Ornament & Fly)

I'm really pleased with these little plaster tags I made as gifties for the students in my art journaling class on tomorrow (Sunday).  They are little ornaments that I will put on top of their package of supplies and fit the Creativity Boot Camp Saturday prompt "ornament".  Each one has an inspirational quote about art journaling:
*Trust that small still voice that says "This might work and I'll try it."
*Painting is just another way of keeping a diary." and
*Inspiration does exist, but it must find you working."
I also made another ATC with a home theme.  It is response to the Creative Boot Camp prompt "Fly."

One of the reasons I have been making ATC's with houses is that my mixed media group is doing a "Home" themed ATC swap this month.

My Town (multilayered plaster aj page)

"Where I was born, where I was raised, where I keep all my yesterdays." Montgomery Gentry
"There's only one place they call me one of their own." Bon Jovi
Multilayered techniques are right up my alley! I am working on a Gratitude Art Journal, with plaster pages.  Each page in the journal will complete the phrase, "I am grateful . . ."  This page is about how happy I am that I grew up in a small town and lived there my entire life, until I went away to college.  I am happy to be giving my children the same experience, even though it's in a different town than the one where I grew up. The quotes today are from country songs.  I always use a lot of quotes and words in all my art.  It is a definite part of my style.  The technique I used for this involved collaging patterned papers on to a plaster page and then painting over it with several layers of paint.  I journaled in between the layers of paint and used a glazing technique for the top layer, so that some of the underneath would show through. If you click on the image above, you can see the details better and read the journaling. This is the same technique I used for my creative circle blog hop post, which you can see here. A different art journal page I did about where I grew up is here. Thanks for all your lovely feedback on my recent posts!

The Picnic Dress (collage on plaster)

She wore this dress to the picnic, and memories of the day lingered in its folds. 
Day 2 of Creativity Boot Camp, and the creative prompt is "picnic."  WTF???  I take a deep breath and think about some of the things I have been wanting to do with plaster (my chosen media), and one of them has been to create certain shapes and collage on them. One of the shapes I have contemplated is a simple dress or shirt.  I figure I can make a nice, spring dress that someone might wear to a picnic and then collage on a variety of flowers and heritage images of women.
As I look through my collage images, I find one of my favorite images. . . I don't know who the couple is exactly (beyond friends or relatives of my Aunt Vera) or what the circumstances are, but this photo always reminds me of budding romance.  I imagine that the couple met each other while attending a picnic.
As I start to sketch the picnic dress on to the plaster panel, I am having trouble imagining it as a freestanding form, but I really begin to like the idea of it as a dress hanging on a clothesline.  I have always been fascinated  by clothes hanging on a clothesline, and you can see a favorite photo here and the art journal page it inspired here.  As I continue to paint and collage and create, an idea is born for a series of collages on plaster.  The series is titled "On the Clothesline," and today's collage is the first in the series, "She wore this dress to the picnic."  On the back, I have written, "She wore this dress to the picnic, and memories of the day lingered in its folds."  ETA: I came up with the words to tell the story; they aren't a quote from someone else.
I hope you enjoy my creation (and its story).

Creativity Boot Camp Media, Take 2!

"Art is the only way to run away without leaving home."  Twyla Tharp


I'm very excited about taking the two week free class, Creativity Boot Camp, which you can learn about here.  Participants are to choose one media to work on during the two weeks, and I have chosen to work in plaster.  It's a media I love and one that I think can really become a signature of my artwork.  Sorry for the odd post yesterday asking about your media (the only content was an "x").  Not sure how that happened, but it was interesting to hear that many of you are still undecided . . . a couple of photographers, an art journaler and a digi-gal round out the list.  Really hoping people decide to do a variety of things.
The creative prompt for day 1 was "ivory," so I made this ivory house out of plaster and put it on an ATC titled "Run away. . ." The idea is based on the Twyla Tharp quote above.

House Party Update

Yesterday I announced the details for my upcoming House Party. You can find the details here.  I have received emails and created envelopes for:
Cindy
Cherry
Kimberlee
Nancy
Deb
Margi
Jacky
Karen
Sharyn and
Mel
If you emailed me your address and are not on the list, please email me again at rinda1961@yahoo.com, and I'll get an envelope together for you.  Also, if you're not on the list and want to participate, email me your mailing address.  The more the merrier!
The art today is a simple card I made on a plaster background and featuring a hand-drawn house. ETA:  The plaster I use is sold as redi-wrap or rigid wrap in the U.S.  You can buy it at Michael's in the paper mache aisle.  It's the stuff you would use to make a plaster cast.  I featured other art using it during the last blog hop, which you can see here, and also in this post on classes I plan to teach (including one  on creating with plaster).

An Inspiring Word for 2010?

Ali Edwards, an inspiring and self-titled "life artist" hosts an exercise every year where her blog readers choose an inspiring word for the upcoming year.  She describes the exercise like this, "Essentially the idea is to choose a word (or let it choose you) that has the potential to make an impact on your life. Maybe you want to invite something or maybe you are hoping to subtract something. Maybe your word will be practical or hopeful or creative or fanciful. Maybe you need a big word, something in-your-face that will challenge you everyday. Maybe you need something smaller and quieter that will whisper gentle tidings as you make your way throughout the year."


I have chosen a word for the last few years and found it helpful in both my art and my life.  In 2007, I chose "open" and illustrated the word with a series of ATC's.  In 2008, I chose the word "flow" and took the picture above to illustrate it.  In 2009, I created a plaster piece with my word, "accomplish."  I have started to think about a word for 2010, but haven't settled on one yet.  Have you done this?  What word have you chosen?  Is it something you will do in 2010?  What will be your inspiring word?