The Colourguru

A LITTLE bit of Venice

Go & get a cuppa or a cool drink (depending on which hemisphere you are in) this is going to be a long post............lol!  I have been working on the latest Journal challenge from Sarah to firstly create a pocket on your page, & then turn that into a house........continuing on, create a little town of sorts around it, using collage & what ever art materials you like to work with.  I got out my travel books & decided that I wanted to make a 'venice' style town & that I was going to some how integrate my 'face of the day' into my composition.  I decided to make the 'pocket' house on a larger scale & create 'canals' with buildings in between. 
I have put hours & hours in to this spread - but it's probably still only three-quarters finished.  Sarah suggested we used a brown paper bag, however I already had embroidered a piece of 600lb watercolour paper when I made the journal, intending to make a pocket somewhere, but then didn't end up using it..... SO - I thought I'd use that instead.  It is REALLY rigid & thick & the challenge was working out a way to fix it into my book.......I wasn't confident that any glue I had would do the job.  I finally decided I would 'lace' it in & set about working out my page layout & what shape I wanted the main house & where I would lace it on.  I used my Japanese screw punch to make holes all around the edge of the 'pocket' piece - then used it as a template to mark the page & punched the page as well.  This gave me a sense of proportion for the rest of the spread & made it easier to move forward with 'structuring' the composition. I hand made some papers to use & tried Ranger Colour Wash for my main colour work.  These were really good on the watercolour paper.  I bought them at the art retreat I went to a couple of months ago (then didn't use them for what we were supposed to do with them) & haven't really had the occasion to get them out.  I AM SOLD ON THEM.  They were great - they 'flood' nicely on to the paper & as I only have either pencil or crayon to do watercolour with, it was much easier using these to cover larger areas.  They are VERY watery though, & strong colours - so a little goes a long way.  After I was happy with the colours I had laid down, then I cut out a whole lot of buildings AND OF COURSE - being Venice, I had to have a bridge (it was kinda copied from one of my pics of the Rialto bridge, but it doesn't really bear a close resemblence.   Then it was time to work on my face, for my pocket..... well, when you see the finished result, the hair has a kinda 'Sophia Loren' beehive look about it, it just kinda got out of control!! LOL!!!  BUT - the face looks kinda ok....I am happy to see some progress! (I have just gone back through this post & deleted about 6 places I begin with SO - I say that alot IRL!)......SOOOO.... I am tired & going to bed.....but the last thing I did was lace on the pocket with some of my hand dyed thread.  Here she is resting for the evening - I will get back to it some time tomorrow.  Everything is more or less just little 'blocks' & it all looks quite raw... I need to do all of the line work to turn them into buildings of sorts & I still want to add some doors & windows & some stamping & some other bits'n'bobs.......(I haven't had a car all week as it is in for repairs - it does wonders for your productivity when you can't go anywhere! LOL!)

 

I art because I am

FIRST, before I begin with today's post, I need to write a postscript about yesterday's...... it's a bit deep, (& probably an overshare) so you may want to just skip it & look at the art (that's OK).... sometimes I am a bit lost with all of this talk about 'rediscovering our childhood' (or whatever terms it is couched in) - in essence, being unhibited 'as a child' is in their art efforts - there is an underlying assumption that 'childhood' is something good, & needs to be re-gained.... however childhood was not a happy or a safe place for me & all that I ever wanted was to grow up, so that I had more control over the things that happened to me.......
I am happy to be a grown up.

I don't feel safe being a child or childlike. 

i feel scared

Some days, I wish I could undo this feeling, & wonder what it would be like to have a mother or a father in my life as an adult, or to have a family..... I spend my life 'adoping' pseudo family......... my life experiences have helped me to develop compassion & understanding & are the building blocks of who I am today.  So I don't really regret it.  I just don't want to go back there.

These thoughts have been plaguing me all day...........and now that they are out of my system........I can move on to today's artwork......These are the inside of the front cover & first page of my newly made journal.  It's a bit different from my first go at this.....One of the changes is my 'princess warrior'.  When I thought about it, I actually don't want a knight in shining armour - I want a bejewelled princess, who's role would be somewhere between Zena & Willow (if you know of Zena on TV - it's an old show, I don't think it is currently running) - not a servant - more like a personal aid - an armour bearer........ I have had the privilege of having had several of these people in my various professional roles - but never in a creative role....I need a princess warrior from the sistahood to protect my introspection while I create.  I need walls to keep the world out & preserve my solitude.  Oh, and of course, some one to bring CAKE!  (I already have fresh ground coffee taken care of) LOL!!  In my first (now defunct) journal, I just picked any colour for the eye on the page, however, the Hebrew origins of my name mean 'a horn of eye paint', ie kohl or mascara - so I wanted to have a go at drawing my own eye.  I have a bluey green eye colour with an indigo outer ring.....I knew I had blue/green eyes, but I hadn't taken alot of notice of the detail of them before - there's a tripping experience!!! LOL!!!  Examining your own eyes in the mirror.  TRY IT - I bet you don't know what your eyes really look like!

OK - sorry that the beginning of this post was a bit strong - tomorrow - only light & fluffy art - I promise!!! LOL!!!

A Journey of the Soul

Together at Last!!!  My handmade journal book is finally together....and I love it - the pages are Artistico Fabricano watercolour paper, the cover is chipboard & various layers of other papers, & it is bound with polished linen string I got from France last time I was there.  Delicious!!! The volume is textural - old & wise looking - trustworthy - holding secrets of my soul.....confidante - a memory keeper......   The trouble that I realize now is, that I have created a treasure, because of the time & love I have invested in birthing it - it has much more value to be than a 'throw away' moleskin book.  That then, of itself, creates a psychological problem - some thing valuable only deserves my BEST artwork - therefore it is difficult to 'explore' & give myself permission to be messy in it.  I realized as I was recreating my 'Naming' page & my 'Creation Protector & Nurturer' page that all of a sudden I was being VERY careful, trying to write neatly, being cautious with the placement of the elements.......I will have to try to keep a check on this through the process.  Already I have found myself baulking at some of the things that Sarah is suggesting - thinking that it is FAR too random & MESSY - I have to let myself be more liberal & free to create.  Althougth I know I am going through an evolutionary process at the moment in every sense of my existence...........I am not at this point transformed into a different being - so FOR NOW (this may be different in time to come) - I still need some elemental order in my excessively random world....& this translates to my art....well, the art that I am creating right now at least........so the challenge set by Sarah was to write all over a page, then gesso over it (I don't get that - why cover up how you feel), then cover it with all different tapes & then gesso over the tapes, regardless of their texture or type......too much mess for me & text is an intrinsic part of my creativity - essentially I am a teacher & I want to tell a story - I don't want to cover up the words..........THE BIG challenge I face with that, is that my writing doesn't enjoy the same level of annonimity that writing that will be securely hidden behind two layers of gesso & a layer of various tapes does.......... this is the place that my challenge lies in this project.. my text from this page spread reads: 'Creativity is not merely the innocent spontaneity of our youth & childhood, it must also be married to the passions, the grief's, the encounters, the environmental influences, of adulthood.  It is in the crucible of euphoric entwinements (I wanted to write sex), our engagement with creation & the experiences of soul crushing grief; that creations are conceived, that, when born, change your world.'  ALL of the stamps used in this page are from Alpha Stamps - if you have children in your life or like to use nursery rhyme themes, Alpha Stamps has a fabulous range of rubber stamps & collage sheets great for all kinds of projects.

Secret Garden

Today I have touched the holy grail - LOL!!  I have ventured into the world of hands!  Oh & I thought that noses were hard!  I realize that this lady has a row of pickets top & bottom of her eyes, but again, all in the name of progress!  I created this spread on top of pastings from my own Nanna's gardening book, so it is special to me.  The journal's cover is just about finished, it has had a liberal sanding, waxing & sealing & is looking very much like the old battered look that I wanted.  I am going to use leather strips to tie around it when it is finished.  This is the last of the drawings that I did while I was away - as you can see - on one of the days - I gave up in disgust & thought I'd look at things from a different viewpoint!

Little Things

The cover of my 'Soul Journal' is coming along nicely - I am just taking some extra time with it, to work it up before I do the stitching as it will be difficult to add anything once it is all together (though I know that's how journal girl does it - but when you are slapping on paint & glue & medium - I'd prefer to keep my pages out the way & the cover is easier to manage)  I am VERY unstructured when it comes to painting - my MOST common tool is a paddle stick......but in this instance, I did use a brush.  You can see that I just literally open my paint drawers & add as I go - after a liberal coating of colour - the I wipe it all back with baby wipes......I then dries overnight (NO - a hair dryer won't do it! - it will make the polymers in the acrylic paint get soft & rubbery from the heat - the paint needs to harden so that I can take to it with a sanding block!)  So that's drying - so I have gotten back to my little squares........ I found that my book was too big to use literal inch squares, so I used my next size up punch, about 1.25in.........also, even with 24, they looked a bit lonely on my double spread.......    I couldn't seem to get a 'square' of my chair that actually still looked like a chair or that you could recognise, that got me to thinking about keeping some elements whole & cutting them out...... & off I went.  Abby will be proud of all of my negative space, but it is still a little on the 'vacant' side for me - perhaps I will add more to this page later when I discover some treasure.... do you ever do that?  Find something much later & add it to something you had already done with?  The background is made from Walnut Ink & then I stamped into it using Moonglow bucket o'blood red (what a villianous name?!) & Green Pepper Press Juliet stamps (some of my favs.)  As promised.....more faces from last week.......I haven't drawn one yet today - that can be next!

Take 2

      The new journal is under construction - it's size was rather arbitrarily decided by the size of a quarter of a piece of watercolour paper - folded in half - it worked out to be a tad narrower than A4, but just as tall........which is great, cos I hate having to do 4 scans of a double page spread & then stitch it together in Photoshop - it's not hard to do, it just makes the whole process of posting take much more time.  I wanted a different look than I usually do with my own style of coptic stitching (it has an open spine & you see the signatures)  I wanted this one more like a book so I followed these instructions from 'a girl & her journal' .  Can you believe it?  I actually had a book cover to recycle that was EXACTLY the right size - A - mazing!   (it was shiny yellow, red & purple - but that wasn't a problem).  If I walk you through the whole process - we'll both be here all day, but sufficient to say that I gave the cover a liberal coating of recycled dictionary, music & bible pages........in several stages......cover, dry, sand off, cover, dry, sand off.  As you use lots of glue I like to dry it thoroughly, so while it has been drying today, I have been firstly cutting out little 'inchies' from my magazine clippings that we collected ready for this new journal challenge from Sarah.  We had a list of 24 things we needed to find in magazines....my challenge is the only ones I buy are either Paper Arts or Design & Decoration (AND nothing comes between my Art mags & me; let alone a pair of scissors or a knife!!! LOL!!!).......with the art ones off limits - that just left the design books.......... so some of the elements were harder to find than others.  The cover is still under construction, so I started working in the first signature as the pages won't be effected by the binding/stiching process. I remade my 'Art & Soul' page - it's different than the first one, because I didn't have more of the images that I used AND my page is taller by about a third...the window is WAY out of square (that'd never open & close!! LOL!!) ..... there is subsequently more text, a bigger, coloured in garden & a different 'sacred' picture.  The new text reads:  'Why is making art scary?  It is tangible evidence of your existence, or you being, of your personhood.  If my art is not of an acceptable standard, does that mean that I am not acceptable either.  Why do I think that?  Why does the world only place value on what we do & not realise that each one of us is a living, breathing miracle & let me be me.'........OK.......deeeeeeeep, now for something more light hearted - 2 more of my peeps from when we were away - I really don't like either of them - but there you go, all in the name of progress......The one in the green dress I did on our anniversary & is called 'The Keeper of Hearts' (you may notice she has a whole collection of them).  The red kept bleeding into the green & it was hard to get detail at this scale.....I know - pretty ordinary!  The mermaid just kinda slipped off the page as I ran out of room to get her proportion right...& I just COULD NOT get my white gel pen to work over the water colour crayon to create detailing in the water......there is a little bit there, but I wanted to do quite a bit of line work on it in the water.......I am using A5 sized (about half a quarto size) watercolour paper & rendering in water colour using pencils & Neocolour II crayons...........the limiting thing I was finding with this was that to fit a whole body or any detailing in, the head had to be small & the whole drawing thing was supposed to be about doing a face a day.....yep - you'll see I kinda lost the plot along the way a little.  I think that I am back on track now, as I will probably end up doing my 'faces' in my art journal spread some how or other in the composition.  Of course todays was a 'redraw' of the face in the original journal - but I do like this one a bit better - in particular - I think that the hair is better, & of course I don't have the severe bleeding issues I had with the other paper, so the detail is a bit finer.

 

A sorry day

IT IS A SORRY DAY INDEED - I have spent most of the day hunting for another suitable 'replacement' for my new art journal project without much joy.  A pet hate of mine is how manufacturers make beautifully covered books with sh*!$@ paper in them - WHY BOTHER!  Anyone who appreciates & is prepared to pay for a nice journal book usually ALSO wants nice paper........URGGH!  I am over it.............I have bought large sheets of my evergreen fav......Fabrico Artistico watercolour paper & will make my own book - I can't go wrong with this - (I have tried 'soft pressed' this time, I haven't used this one before, but it's nice, & the colour is really soft white - delish!) it just means it's going to take me at least another day before I will be ready to start again in my journal.......VERY annoying..........SO - I have about 10 faces that I did while I was away & I am going to bare my soul by showing you the GOOD, the bAd & the just plain Ugly.......(with a Kapital UH!).......but, I still think worth the process....I don't want my blog to be a place of perfect art - it's just my art & hopefully my regular readers will be supportive, knowing that I am being very brave doing this.

I realize my Elven girl has an off centred nose, which made her lips all queer; AND she has a kinda hunching Quasimodo looks about her - come to think of it, her hands could be his as well!

I am actually pretty happy with my 'skating girl', but in person, her left eye bled & I have botched the repair job.  I am sure someone with more watercolour experience would have known what to do.  I used rock salt to get the effect on her dress. Oh, & maybe her sash is a little skewiff to her bust line......

The journalling on around the window on my page from last night says.......'my art is SACRED, not because it is so fabulous, but because it is a part of my soul gaining outward expression, then shared with the world.'  Be kind to me - I am 'drawingly challenged' LOL!

Home

We are home.  Although it is special to be away - it's lovely to be home - I always miss my bed & of course we miss our babies.  Our Princess has learned to say 's' and 'l' in the 10 days we have been away.  Her diction seems to have taken a huge leap forward & she seems different in only a couple of weeks - how quickly they change when they are littlies!  We have had 11 hours on the road today & were greeted with a sick little princess who needed some TLC from her Nonna & Poppa, while mummy went to uni.......so I'm a bit tired now that I finally have gotten to my computer.  Thanks everyone for your encouraging words about my 'face of the day' drawings.  I still think they are sadly lacking, but I have to admit that even after a couple of weeks, I can see some progress, even if it is slight.  Sorry, this is a terrible scan, the colour of these is actually alot more delicate, it seems as though the darker areas are exaggerated & you don't see the tonal values at all.  My inspiration for these were the mouths & eyes of Sharon Tomlinson - I LOVE how she makes her lips full & almost pouty & Polynesian looking.  OK!! practice, practice, practice, practice - Misty SAYS - PRACTICE!!!!  I am working on it!  Today's face was done in the car as we drove along, on our long trip, we were talking about house design alot of the way & one of our Paper Traders Round Robin Travelling Art Journal topics for the next project is 'The House within my Head'.  So this is the 'house in my head' today.  After creating one 'head house', I might have a play with a different shape in the next couple of days, as I would probably now either straighten up the head, or make the house more sloped........also, I don't like how the house & head connect, I want to work on a smoother transition there.  Yesterday's diva is looking on with much suspicion.  She is a little more shaded than she looks, however, it is a simple drawing.

ps - I added our wedding pic to my last post - the fashion of the day!

Finally a face!

Finally, I am at an internet cafe that accepts a USB key, so I can upload some stuff.  I actually did this face a couple of days before I left, however I was not happy with the 'eye' alignment, it's a bit off & I needed some remedial help from Abby to fix it a bit - so it didn't end up getting posted. Now that I am nearly two weeks down the track, I am struggling between realism & fantacy.  As I am using actual 'drawing' instructions to create my faces, they end up looking a bit too real, (but not good enough to be real) - but not 'unreal' enough to be caricatures....  I have printed out a few faces by various artists so that I can learn from them, with regard to shading & shadowing (Suzi Blu, DJ Pettit, Sharon Tomlinson, Misty Mawn) however, when I use there's as inspiration, I can't help but comparing & mine just look TERRIBLE.  SO - my lesson from this face - work on better eye alignment, BEFORE they are coloured in!

My Alpha Stamps design team collegue Sarah Whitmire has a GREAT art journaling challenge on her blog if you are up for an art adventure!  It looks fun & I hope to be able to join in when I get back.

Suzi Blu & Me

                                                                                I have had a little time to reflect & try to pick up the pieces of the rest of my year, as this is not where I thought that it was headed when it started 6 months ago. I didn't set a lot of goals, (which is unusual for me) as our direction for the year was pretty well determined & we knew where we were heading & thought we knew how the year would pan out.  ENTER: life shipwreck.......(major players disoriented & in disarray).....and now, left on the shore amongst a collection of flotsome & jetsome I am working at moving on........... When I read my posts from the start of the year, I realised that I really had wanted to prioritize drawing this year.  I haven't, this goal has slipped by the wayside of other far more immediate challenges.  I guess doing the class with Misty didn't help there - I really didn't do too well there at all.  (PLEASE don't ever take this as ANY reflection on Misty - I was the DUD student - I just didn't get it!)
I don't know how many of you have discovered the amazing young artist Suzi Blu - I know, she lives a little on the eccentric side of life - but don't say anything bad - I love her!  She appears to be so liberated in her thinking regarding composition & so free with her use of materials - oh, & obviously uninhibited about being in front of the camera!! LOL!! She is liberating about having permission to create art despite what you consider your shortcomings & inhibitions - watch this - you'll be painting in no time! I can SOOO relate to feeling like she can only breath when she is painting & life lived in between is gasps of breath waiting until you can be there painting again.  I feel like that about creating art - it's not painting specifically for me - just creating in general..... (though I certainly have withdrawal symptoms if I don't have my hands in some paint, smooshing it around, for any extended period of time!)  BUT unlike her, I DO have a husband, DO have children & DO have grandbabies & whilst I love them all desparately - I could easily just become a hermit not emerging out of my studio at all right now.

I checked into Suzi's blog, & saw her newest YouTube video clip & it got me right back on track.  It was all about giving yourself permission to try & fail.  SO - I have been working over the last couple of days on creating a 'Face of the Day'.  I realize that these are NOT Mona Lisa's each of them has things about them that I think needs some improvement - but I figure that if I persevere for a little while, I should see some improvement over time.  I rendered the first one (at the top) with Caran d'Ache Neocolour II crayons.  I have the 84 set, & I there is not really a good 'flesh' colour in it..... (I believe this has been remedied in the new bigger set) the fleshy tone is more 'coral' looking to me & a little 'luminous'.  The bottom one is rendered with Faber Castell Albrecht Durer Watercolour pencils.  I like the pencils better.  Although I like my crayons, I like the control I have with the pencils better.  Particularly for doing eyes.  Also, I think that it's easier to get subtle variations of tone where as with the Neocolour II crayons it ends up in a pool of murk!  Anyways - I'll keep working on them & you will see my progress evolve..........oh, & PS....if you watch the Suzi YouTube clip - I live with the bad man!