“He said: “There are only two days in the year that nothing can be done. One is called yesterday and the other is called tomorrow. So today is the right day to love, believe, do and mostly live.”
The red/pink part of the Art Journal spread was done with some mono printing on a gelli plate. I used my Downtown Foam Stamp onto the plate and love how the pattern came through.
I painted part of the spread over with black gesso and once dry stamped on top with the Versailles Stamps from my Large Floral rubber stamp Set. For the white I used the second white pad in the Moonlight Duo Stamp Sets. So cool – once the white is dry it is permanent and it is pretty opaque as you can see.
I really love how this turned out – there is something about the grungy look of the monoprinted part and the black and white that just speaks to me.
Here are some of the supplies I used for this page:
If you have taken a class with me in the past couple years, I have surely “forced” you to try ArtGrafs ;) No, seriously those little watercolor graphites are one of my favorite things to use with foam stamps.
Simply wet the foam stamp a little bit, rub the water-soluble graphite on top and stamp. You can use different colors and blend them as well. Take note that this doesn’t work with any graphite- it needs to be like this one water-soluble.
The ArtGrafs are so crazily pigmented that you can stamp several times, simply spritz some water in between on the foam stamp and check if you cannot get yet another wonderful image stamped off.
Day 30 – Watercolor
Oh Yes! You heard right – use your foam stamps with watercolor! For this I use a little trick:
I add my watercolor out of the tube on top of a gel plate and then add water and thin it down then press my stamp into the paint and stamp on paper.
The plate acts as a palette and inkpad and helps that the watercolor doesn’t dry too quick. For dry watercolor in pans, simply load your wet brush and watercolor and try to apply directly to your stamp. If that doesn’t work, try to add the paint first to the plate and then stamp into it. Trust me it is fun to try
Day 31- Connect
There are many ways you can “connect” the prompts of the last days- either use several different techniques on one art journal spread, create layers, or like I did create an Art Journal. I bound my own art journal –based on my online workshop BYOAJ – Bind Your Own Art Journal.
For the cover I printed on some fabric and then I chose my favorite Foam Stamplifier pages and made them into signatures for my book. They will provide great starting prompts when I want to art journal and remind me of the different techniques.
Here are the foam stamps I used for those prompts:
“I have no idea what I’m doing and that’s kind of how I love it” – True for a lot of areas in my life ;)
I painted with my new Art Alchemy Acrylic Paint, which Finnabair has sent me to try. I like that they are a bit on the thicker side and the colors are beautiful. I used my Batik Mini foam stamps and love how much texture they created. For the circles I used a round sponge which I had laying around and then stamped inside of it in white with the back end of a brush.
