Emerge

Spray ink goodness with a semi side-profile celebrating our positive qualities, a lesson from the lovely Life Book 2014 teacher Tamara Laporte.

I love how this piece turned out, like a butterfly her face emerging into something new. The mix of soft and luminous skin tones against the vibrant splashes of ink puts flutters in my heart. Many believe the butterfly symbolises change and growth maybe in the form of personality or way of thinking. In Chinese culture a pair of butterflies seen flying together is a symbol of love.

When spraying or splattering with inks you never quite know what you are going to get, adding to the thrill of it. My inner neat freak did come out a little but I think she was justified in this case. As it was more for enhancing the artwork, that's my excuse and I am sticking with it!

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I ended flipping the page to portrait instead of landscape for this lesson to take advantage of this gorgeous texture for her hair.

Dylusions spray inks, glimmer mists, cran d'ache watersoluble crayons, acrylic paint, black paint pen, graphite pencil and stencils were used here. The glimmer mists have a beautiful shimmer to them, I tried to capture a little of that with this shot.

Areas where I thought were not working I blended in white acrylic paint. I used a little watered down ink in small sections of the hair with extra splatters on the page to unify everything and now she is complete. 

I have learnt a lot while creating this piece it gave me a great sense of freedom. Each piece of art teaches me something different and can result in evoking different emotions. I can be my own worst critic when it comes to my art but I believe I am taking small steps with my confidence and enjoying the process more every time.

I hope you like her, let me know what you think.

Until next time, Happy Creating!

Sugar Love

Wishing you some Sugar Love this Valentine's Day!

I have been working away on Life Book lessons, I won't post every lesson here but thought you might like to see this fun page inspired by Marieke Blokland wk 5 class.

Who says Valentine's Day is only for couples? Or has to be about roses and chocolates. I think it is important to give ourselves that special attention we all deserve no matter what the day! Finding positive ways to fill up our being with love and nurturing. It could be as simple as lighting a scented candle, listening to your favourite music, reading a book or going for a walk. Whatever gives your heart joy, remember to give yourself some sweet inner love.

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I drew the sugar babe figure on cold pressed watercolour paper, then using acrylics and cran d'ache watersoluble crayons painted her in. Her cute polka dot dress is made from scrapbook paper. After I cut her out she was glued down to the background using gel medium.

The background consists of black gesso with layers of acrylic paint applied with a brayer. Some scratched in circles add to the texture along with oil pastel and Japanese washi tape for the overall effect. Graphite pencil was used for the finishing touches and white sharpie paint pen for the highlights.

I think she has a bit of a 1950's vibe going on, what do you think?

Until next time, Happy Creating!

Little Red Riding Hood

Do you let your imagination play tricks on you? That is what inspired this artwork.

Rather than a physical wolf, I thought this piece would benefit from a little twist on the Little Red Riding Hood theme, letting her imagination run wild instead. I quite like the idea of the trees symbolising bars, trapping Red in this state of mind.

As a child, did you know the Little Red Riding Hood fairytale? Were you afraid of the big bad wolf? Maybe the story made you jump at the slightest sound or see ominous shadows in the dark, getting to the point where you let your imagination take over. It has always intrigued me on how the mind works and how our natural instinct kicks in to survival mode.

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This is an artwork that I started in 2013 and I promised myself to complete it along with a couple of other ones this year. The background is left over yellow dylusions ink from a stencil that I patted onto hot pressed watercolour paper from another project. Gesso was used on the face and hand, so I would have a nice base to begin painting the skin tones on. 

Acrylic paint and caran d'ache watersoluble crayons were used throughout.

I love the pattern on this scrapbook paper, perfect for a vintage cloak. I first trace over the drawing of the cloak and then transfer it onto the patterned paper. A sharp pointed scissors makes cutting this out an easy task.

After gluing the cloak pieces in place I gave it a touch of realism with some shading.

Layer after layer this artwork started to reveal itself. I am very happy I decided to go ahead and finish Little Red Riding Hood. After all it's not about the destination, it's about the journey isn't it?

Comments are welcomed and encouraged.

Until next time, Happy Creating!