This is a great page. Writing collage and drawing.
Such an elegant page, I love the mottled texture and the rubber stamped element.
Again I'm looking at sketchbooks on youtube instead of my usual art journals. This is a nice selection of nature inspired drawings. Does nature inspire you? Record it in your art journal!
Originally uploaded by lessherger
This piece was a little more involved than some of the others I've posted. So bear with me as I go through the steps. First I started with a gesso'd page. I wrote on it with G2 gel ink. I allowed the ink to fully dry. I then sketched in the face on the right side with a watersoluble ink pen. On the left side I added a heavy layer of blue watercolor crayon. I scribbled hard and pressed it into the recesses. I wet my brush and used gloss gel medium to mix it with the watercolor crayon. I kept my brush moving and mixed the gel medium with the crayon very well. I used the excess to add some color around the face on the right hand page, I used some of it to blur and seal the watersoluble ink.
I colored a circular die cut and put it around the left eye. It's a common motif in a lot of my art journals. From the center point of this circular die cut I used a ruler to create a radial ray pattern around the eye. I painted this in with a liquid yellow paint. Towards the ends I added some water to thin my paint and allow the color to fade out, like a flashlight beam. Over the parts of the face that were not sealed I worked quickly but deliberately blurred the features in the liquid paint.
It is important to note that between each layer I either allowed it to dry or dried it with my heat gun.
Around the die cut I used my watercolor crayon to add a red "glow." This was a tad too transparent so I added some prismacolor colored pencils. I felt the image needed something more so I added the trio of stars dangling from around the eye. I deliberately allowed the ink closest to the eye to blur a bit. I did this by moistening the image in that area with a damp brush.
I wanted to soften the edges a bit so with a large bristle brush I scrubbed a very thin layer of white paint into the edges of the painting. I allowed this to dry fully before I noticed that the pages were very sticky. Gloss gel medium sticks to itself when you use it. After it fully dried I coated the entire page with a very thin coat of bee's wax. After I coated the page I buffed it out with a soft rag. Sticking problem solved.
You can see the full sized image and get a lot of detail by clicking on
the thumbnail above and clicking the "see all sizes" button above the
image that comes up.
Seems this is on a lot of minds lately.
I love the accounting paper this is done on.
One of the things I really love about being “in charge” of a
site like Art Journaling Ning, is that I have contact with a lot of people with similar interests and
passions as I. Case in point, Samantha Kira, aka Journal Girl, has decided to
step into the AJ Ning class world. This is a great thing for all the art
journalers of AJ Ning. Why? She has a totally different style and approach to
art journaling than I do. We have similar ideas as anyone who is into AJ will
but her style is very different than mine.
Her first free workshop (per AJ ning rules and regulations) is
about layers and it’s packed full of information and ideas to get members
working in layers. It’s already, only a few days old, and active. Head over to AJ
ning and check the layers workshop out and play with layers. Lots of videos and
talk, it’s what makes a workshop great!
Next up she’s got a paid workshop going on. It’s called True To
You: Organic Exploration for the Visual Journaler. Read more about it here so that you can read what she has to say about it.It focuses around authentic
expression and mining your life for prompts rather than looking for external
prompts. In short I’d say it’s a series of essays on looking within to journal authentically.
Many people want to learn how to create art, thus they sign up for classes that
teach you how to copy, this is not that sort of workshop. Kira will teach you
techniques but also how to look within yourself.
This is what I think AJ is all about authentic expression. About looking within yourself, using physical materials to get at the mental materials, making them real and working on them. Part therapy and part craft and part art. I'm so very excited to see Journal Girl's paid workshop.
On days like today when my breathing is shallow, allergy
meds aren’t making a dent in my misery, I like to wander the house and think
about staying awake. Instead I succumb to the misery of my allergies and cold
and fall asleep, yet again, on the couch.
Today will be a waste in terms of getting anything done. The lawn needs
mowing, the house needs cleaning and the dogs walking but I’m too sick to do
it. The sad reality of owning your own place is that you can’t call the landlord
because the lawn is too high to walk through; instead you just piss off your
neighbors.
Ah well, what can I do? Perhaps I’ll mow between naps.
Most of the time I get one big cold per year and that’s it,
then every now and then I get sick a lot. This happened one summer during
college, I was sick most of the summer and then once when I was teaching. But
it’s been years since I’ve been this miserable more than once per year. Lets
hope I get no more colds this year. I hate this.
this is a great image. I love love love the use of the color to build the image. I love the scribbles used to build texture.
I love ink drips and burnt sienna pages. dirt and grunge are what I think of when I see them.