Art Journal

Little Differences – Art Journal

The Last Straw – There is a difference between giving up and knowing when you had enough.

This goes for many areas of life of course and sometimes you just have to declare you had enough. In this case I declared ENOUGH regarding a painting I had on the easel for a while. I just didn’t like it and it was sitting on the easel and once in a while I would do something to it and it would get worse. Funny enough, one day I looked at it and thought “you gotta go, I had enough.”

So I cut the house part out of the painting (unfinished but for me not worth the effort anymore) and thought, hey, that could be a part of an art journal spread. I mounted the canvas piece onto the background where I had used some acrylic paint and overlaid my Versailles stencil with black spray paint.

Now the page can remind me what not to do …and cutting apart the canvas actually speaks more to me than it did when it was a butchered painting.

All to say, there are a lot of things we artists usually do not show but I thought you would like to see ;)

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Leave a comment

Trying Hard – Art Journal

Trying hard to… Love.

This could be called “Trying hard to love this page” …but alas I hid the journaling behind the hand carved Love stamp because boy I felt absolutely blah the day I made this page, and I felt absolutely blah during the process too! You know sometimes just nothing works and you wanna crawl under the blanket with a good book and just let the day be done LOL. But I am not regretting the time making it because I love the Love stamp ;)

Now, how did I get here? I tested the stamp using it for the background with black archival ink and colored in some areas with colored pencils. I spread some acrylic paint – golden heavy body – which wasn’t the best choice in the first place to help push the stamping a bit into the background …oh well. Then I sketched the lady and totally overdid her face… which is cool – I am not a good face painter, nor am I particularly interested in painting faces, but I felt like “hey I am uninspired, now is a good time to try something new that you have never done”. Ha. At some point I liked her but then I kept going and she got some real face color issues LOL. I do however like the hair and I do like how the background looks like a pattern in her torso.

So there. I spilled my heart out about my day but because it wasn’t that important for y’all to know ;) I covered it up and that smeared the writing. At the time I could just laugh about it and say “wow …this is going really well but hey, fits her face” So, I just stamped my favorite element of the page right over the screwed up covered painting and called it a day.

Do you ever have days like that?

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Comments (1)

  • Robin

    |

    Thanks for sharing your struggles with this journal page. We have all been there. For what it’s worth, I absolutely love the bright yellow pattern on her top!!!!

    Reply

Leave a comment

Meet Me at the Corner – Art Journal

“Meet me at the corner of Catastrophe & Confusion.”

For this page I used a collage from a while ago – a 6×6″ piece which I had painted and stamped on with acrylic paint and Signo markers.

I stamped the background of my ledger with my Powerhouse, Warehouse, Queen Anne, Midcentury Modern and Brownstone rubber stamps, covering the images to mask off while layering. I adhered the collage with double-sided tape and I used the same green as in the collage to carry it a bit into the background and tie everything together.

For my journaling I used a Fude pen.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Leave a comment

Jealousy – Art Journal

“Jealousy is the fear of comparison.”

I sketched into my ledger with a Derwent pencil, added some watercolor, and colored in the hair and face with Caran D’ache Museum Aquarelle pencils. I used a super fine point Posca marker for the journaling.

The background is my Beacon stencil used with acrylic paint and a cosmetic sponge.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Leave a comment

Best Grass in Town – Art Journal

“I’m too busy working on my own grass to notice if yours is greener!”

I thought it would be fun to pull out some of my hand carved stamps again and put them together. There are about 5 hand made stamps in the background which I stamped with a black ink pad. Then I used some magenta and yellow paint and created a glaze with matte medium, spreading it over the background.

I stamped one of my Fan-fare stamps as well as the lady from my Actually I Can set inside the window and added some journaling with a fountain pen.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Comments (2)

  • Robin

    |

    I love the phrase almost as much as the art!!! So good!

    Reply

Leave a comment

Smart Choices – Art Journal

“Leave your imprint on the world… but think hard about the kind of imprint!”

We can make so many… the environment, our loved ones, society, etc.

For my background I used Daniel Smith tube watercolors – they were dried up on a palette and I wanted to use them up before they went bad. Then I made some marks – triangles, dots etc. – with Posca markers. I was really just playing around and it felt good.

For a focal point I stamped my Row Houses foam stamp with acrylic paint.

The printed portion of the quote is from tissue paper that was part of the packaging of some shoes I bought and I liked it… but then thought a bit deeper about the implication of the quote and wanted to add that too.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Leave a comment

Your Kindness is Due – Art Journal

“I have to remind you that Your Kindness is Due! ” – We can definitely use some more kindness :)

I grabbed a bunch of different stencils (Art Deco Empire, Art Deco Fairview, Amsterdam, and Toledo) and I used them with a blender tool and Distress Inks and Distress Oxide Inks which I applied through the stencils.

Lady liberty is stamped with green acrylic paint onto printer paper and cut out. The “I have to remind you” is from an old letter copy that I cut out. The tag is old – no clue – it was in the magic drawer LOL. I adhered these all with my fav glue stick.

But before I collaged in the tag, I traced it with a Derwent water soluble sketching pencil on the top and dissolved some of the pencil with a brush inside the traced tag. Then I added journaling with a thin black Posca pen.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Comments (2)

  • Sue Clarke

    |

    Love the message and the sneaker.

    Reply

Leave a comment

Potential is Scary – Art Journal

Potential is Scary

This art journal page came together in many stages. First I glued down collage paper like old letter pieces and parts of a pattern sheet I created a while ago (with my Mini Motifs and Triangle Love rubber stamp sets) using Gel Medium. I didn’t really know where this page was going to go – and so I just let each step inform the next. Hence the wildness of the page :)

Next I added some pink acrylic paint with a palette knife to tie the collage pieces together. I placed my Santa Fe Stencil on top and scraped some gesso over the stencil with a palette knife. It is raised but very thin, so it still works well in an art journal.

After it dried I used a water-soluble Derwent Pencil to sketch out the face. Instead of going over it with a brush, I used a Faber Castell white brush pen, creating a grayish, brushstroke-like effect. Later I went over it with a green acrylic pen as well. I then used a Posca marker for the journaling.

I finished up the page by stamping my Actually I Can rubber stamp.

This page reminded me how much I love playing with heavy body paints or gesso through stencils- and I definitely will visit this again. It is funny how play can sometimes remind you of techniques that you used to use a lot, that maybe you moved away from as you continued on your path and the next stage in your artmaking. If I pull out my earlier art journals I can definitely say for me it used to be all about actual texture in my journals.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Leave a comment

Do It Anyway – Art Journal

“Strive to create a world you might never live to see!”

I stamped my Row Houses foam stamp with acrylic paint onto the ledger and then added a sketch of the row houses on top. I also used some collage paper – an old letter and old prints of mine.

I had initially painted a lot of the background with yellow paint but I didn’t like it going over the top of the building so I toned it down a bit with a Gesso wash.

Then I added some stamping with my Mini Motifs rubber stamps and speckled some paint.

Here are some of the supplies I used:

Nat

Comments (1)

  • Sue Clarke

    |

    Love this quote. I believe that it’s the only way the world will improve!

    Reply

Leave a comment