Finally! Took some art classes again.

After a too-long-to-measure hiatus, I finally signed up for a couple art classes at The Queen's Ink in Savage Mill, and boy, am I glad I did! The special guest instructor was Dyan Reaveley, international and European educator with Ranger products. What a treat! Dyan is a well-known and admired artist, teacher and shopkeeper from the U.K. Just listening to her accent and euphemisms all day was jolly good fun! Cannot get the technique "shimmy butt roll" out of my head. Thanks so much.
The first class was a darling 6 x 6 chunky canvas (her examples shown above) which we painted and embellished with such products as acrylic paint daubers, Perfect Pearls, Perfect Pearls glimmer mists, Color Wash sprays, Tim Holtz's die cuts, Dyan's darling, hot new rubber stamps and many new techniques.
The Queen's Ink in Savage, MD in the rehab'd Savage Mill hosted the event. It's an outstanding place for classes, and owner Patti Euler is a blast. The store is stocked to the rafters with needful supplies and goodies. It's hard not to come home with one of everything.
I met some lovely new art friends, including Donna Walsh of Words Have Wings on Etsy. We commiserated at the same table for seven hours and tried to avoid spraying each other with Glimmer Mists!
Waiting for some finishing touches to dry on my own canvas, and then I'll post pics.
My next class was an accordian fold book, and Dyan's samples are pictured here. We used a lot of the same products on watercolor paper, and added a bookbinding technique, as well as stencil use and more fun rubber stamps. Didn't get quite finished, so working on it today, and will post pics soon.
The classes were good-sized at 20, and you can see some classroom shots above. That's Her Majesty Dyan at the paper cutter. I also got some great treasures in the shop, including a fun, new journaling system called SMASH. Hope to start that today, too, and will post pics soonish. Cheerio and Shimmy Butt Roll and all that.

Published Again- Always a Thrill!

I was excited to find this greeting card I made on page 54 of the latest Stampers' Sampler magazine by Stampington and Co. (April/May 2009). It is one of the first pieces of 'art' I ever made back when I started this blog nearly two years ago. The Mona is a rubber art stamp by Tim Holtz stamped with Staz-On ink onto a heat-resistant transparency. It is layered over various papers. There's a couple more layers to the card that you can't see here, so....go buy the magazine!

There's so much art I've been waiting to do: I am in a Marie Antoinette swap hosted by The Junkk Drawer's Maria Rodarte and I am partnered with the talented Kathy Jacobson of a Bit of Serendipity, who is also featured on the COVER of the stamping magazine I just mentioned. Intimidating? Maybe!

The 12 ladies behind Creative Therapy on Wordpress have also asked me to be a guest artist for August 22, so I have a piece of art to create for a prompt they will supply that will in turn prompt their readers to create art from my art/prompt. Follow that?

Book reviews are due to Gabreial, the heart and soul of Vintage Indie, for my friend Rebecca's French by Heart, and The Artist Within: A Guide to Becoming Creatively Fit by Whitney Ferre'.

I celebrated my first Passover, and I have to say, matzoh and I have to get better acquainted. I hear there's chocolate-covered. That would be a good way to start!

Meanwhile, my art journal is gathering dust. My beads are not being beaded. I did plant some pansies, and whipped my crochet hook a few rows through a new afghan, but there's so much to do and so little (free) time. If time were for sale, I'd like to buy some! I guess I'll just have to adopt Mona's mellow countenance for now. Enough blogging! Off to the studio.

Oh, Happy Accident! And I Will Share, Too!

A lot of my art friends talk about “happy accidents,” but the only accidents I’d ever had were quite unhappy: foot in the paint can, spilling the water cup, cat prints on the project. Until now. What started as an accident- letting a wet baby wipe touch a recently-printed transparency- ended up with a cool fabric-like result.

I’m sure we’ve all used baby wipes or wet wipes for something artistic, besides cleaning our hands. In fact, one of my all-time favorite technique books is Bernie Berlin’s Artist Trading Card Workshop. I still pull it out from time-to-time as a reference. And, although she discusses applying liquid water color to wipes and using gel medium to “make” transparencies via transfer, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone transfer a transparency to a baby wipe (by accident or not).

My first “accidental” version, “Friends Forever,” did not pick up a lot of the image, which was a transparency printed from a photo of two porcelain doll heads I own. However, I like the very vague, faded image of the two dolls, which seems so appropriate with the words “remember” and “friends forever.”

I thought this would make a great little wall hanging in a girl’s room or a nice gift for a sister or friend (or both). I also thought I could do even better, if I “tried” the accidental procedure. This produced a nearly perfect image, and after letting the wipe dry completely, made for an almost fabric appearance or flocked feel. The result is my 5” x 5” wall-hanging “Adore,” which also has a definition of “sister” at the bottom. And, although I don’t have a sister, I’m betting I have some “art sisters” who might like to receive one of these. Here's a little how-to I will share.


Transparency/Wet Wipe Transfer Technique
5” x 5” Wall Hanging

Supplies:

5” x 5” cardboard or canvas – I used the backing of a watercolor paper pad, cut to size.
Background paper(s) or paints- I used Shabby Cottage Studio.com background papers
Vintage sheet music scraps
Tim Holtz Distress Ink in Vintage Photo
Rub-Ons (words and swirls)- I used Classic K McKenna Decorative Rub-Ons, We R Memory Keepers Precious Metals Coppered-Out Swirls Rub-Ons and 7 Gypsies Ink Memories Texture Rub-Ons-black velvet

3/16” white eyelets and eyelet setters
15” length of coordinating ribbon
Gold- or silver-leaf pen
Burnisher/bone folder
Baby or travel wipes, wet in package
Freshly-printed transparency- I used Computer Graffix for ink jet printer
Krylon Workable Fixativ

Instructions:

Prepare surface by covering board or canvas with background papers or paints as desired. I covered both sides.
Meanwhile, print a desired photo onto transparency. Be careful not to touch or smear. Let dry flat a bit, about 30 min. If you do the transfer too soon, your colors will run into an unrecognizable mess. I also found if I did not let the transparency dry flat, the ink would run.
To make your transfer, take a wet wipe straight from package unfold and place flat over ink side of transparency. Try to place flat in one fluid motion, as any movement will smear your image. After a minute or two, press your wipe smooth over the image with a burnisher or bone folder. There is no need to scrape violently.
Gently lift up your wipe to see your transfer. Let dry completely, ink side up. You can place under a lamp or in a warm, dry spot to speed things along. This should take 2-3 hours.
When you are ready to apply your art, spray both sides of wipe lightly with fixative. I don’t know if this is necessary, but after getting a great transfer, I did not want any more Unhappy accidents!
Cut around image as desired and apply to background with a light coat of gel medium. Smooth into place. After edging torn sheet music with distress ink, apply in a pleasing pattern, also with gel medium or glue stick.
When surface is dry again, apply rub-ons as desired and edge artwork with leafing pen. When leafing ink is dry, set eyelets in top corners; string ribbon through, and knot in back.

The Blog Heard 'Round the World

Okay, well France is around the world, right? A Flickr observer messaged me in French to ask if he/she could put my Mona Lisa card above on her blog. So, naturally, I was delighted and was able to suss out what was being asked, and peck out a passable "tres bien, merci." So, a little college French finally pays off after how many years?

Turns out the blog is dedicated to Mona-philes who alter art with the famed one's face. A quick visit to http://papou.blog.lemonde.fr/ will turn up Mona in The Scream, The Kiss, cross-eyed, well-endowed, smoking, biker chick and much more.

My card even got a couple of comments, which I had to resort to Google translate. Apparently, one reader thought Mona looked a little sad for a greeting card. Apparently, some people believe Mona can have different expressions- what a concept!

In any event, Mona also has her US followers, with a Flickr group dedicated to "jocondophiles" as well. A trip to http://www.flickr.com/groups/manyfacesofmonalisa/, to which I already belonged, will give you Mona as E.T. (my new fave), Mona as Robocop and Mona as a Bond girl. The group's current contest is to place Mona squarely in the middle of Mardi Gras. This happens to work well for me, since I am hostessing a fat book page swap for Chubbyville http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Chubbyville/ in February with the Mardi Gras theme. So Mona will get a workout. Hmmmm....Mona in Flashdance....yet another idea. Poor girl! Was she smiling or smirking?

By the way, my card was made by stamping a Tim Holtz image of Mona onto a transparency and affixing that with brads to a piece of background paper with another piece of paper with the word "create" and typewriter key stickers to spell "art." Merci beaucoup.