Imagine This

This is the End

COLOUR PLAY ROUND ROBIN CLOSES


(Click on either side of the image to have a closer look)

Our last assignment for the Arte-Ed-Anima Colour Play RR was to do a wax rubbing and use the colors blue, black, and silver. I did this in my talented friend, Lynne Porter's, Colour Play journal. Her theme was alchemy. Here is the cover she created for her journal:

 
Alchemy, Colour Play Journal by Lynne Porter

Lynne is a talented artist from Yorkshire, England and her journal cover was outstanding. The cover itself was about as thick as a standard stretched canvas and was attached to the rest of the journal with small brass hinges. She cut a hole in the middle of the cover so that a thick block of vials from the Sign In page  could poke through the hole and be part of the cover. Very clever and quite well done!

This was a hard assignment for me because I had to do research on wax rubbings and because this assigned color combination is so NOT my palette! And add to that -- all these scans are terrible. A digital image just won't capture the shiny silver nor the wonderful textures. Even I have to admit that this spread turned out alright in real life . . . just not my colors. . . and not in the scans. Be sure to click on the images for a better look, they look a little more true in a larger scan.

The two large blue images are my wax rubbings. They are both headstone rubbings which I did at Oakwood Cemetery in Huntsville. It turns out that wax rubbings are just putting your paper over something with a rough, distinctly textured image and rubbing across it with a wax cake. Actually, I used a jumbo Crayola crayon on non-fusible interfacing. I cut out the rubbed images, mounted, and embellished the spread.

(Please click on the image to get a little better look)

The left side is mounted on my brayered paper which is highly textured and infused with tiny holeless beads, glitter, minute mica pieces, etc. On the tree are four alchemical symbols. To the left of the tree, I attached an "evil eye" which swings from side to side on a silver bar. The "evil eye" is said to ward off evil spirits. Also on the left, bottom is a silver, Celtic-style heart embellishment. Both of these 3D embellishments are difficult to see in a scan.

The wax rubbed piece on the right side of the spread is a flower done in blue wax crayon on non-fusible interfacing (Notice that you can slightly see through this interfacing.) The image is cut out and mounted on a background of vintage map and clip art picture of an old alchemy lab. The whole thing is mounted on black embossed paper. You can't see the embossed squares in this scan. However, if you click on the next scan (below) you can see a little of the embossing in the black background. Although the outline around the picture of the lab looks black in the scan, it is actually silver mirror card stock. I used silver wax to add a little more rubbing through punchinella randomly on the piece.

   
(Please Click on the image to get a better look)    

Between the two pages of the spread, I wired in a small booklet. The covers of the booklet are decorated with more of the brayered paper that I used on the left side of the spread. The booklet is a traditional stab binding through eyelets in a vintage metal ruler. The medallion on the cover is a white ink print on black cover stock of a hand image I designed and had made into a rubber stamp. That image on black paper is mounted on silver mirror cover-stock and then attached to the cover.

Inside the booklet are images from two cards of Symbolon, The Deck of Rememberance by Orban, Zinnel, and Weller.

(Please Click on the image to get a better look)

At the bottom of the image on the right side, I attached a tiny, clear vinyl envelope into which I put a "magic" coin to bring Lynne good luck.

The ending of this round robin is bittersweet. I'll miss those crazy assignments for the Arte-Ed-Anima Colour Play book but I don't doubt for a minute that we'll be onto another idea soon. We've submitted designs already for the 2009 Wall Calendar designed by Arte-Ed-Anima's own Kim Logan, skilled artist and photographer.  And this just might not be the last of the Colour Play books that you will see. There is a little something more in the works that I can't say anything more about -- you all know how that goes... sometimes you have to wait until an offer comes to fruition before you can post about it, right? Right! Just stay tuned.

There will be more later from Arte-Ed-Anima no matter what. Ya can't keep a group of crazy artists down! (Especially when they are led by that incorrigible and multi-talented Brit, Sue Berry. Watch for her name in lights - it's bound to happen! LOL.)

Spring - From the Wingkeeper

Mail art by Sharon Tomlinson (Click on image for closer look.)

Ya gotta love spring! Even my mail perked up in bright spring colors and flowers. I got this surprise from my talented friend, Sharon Tomlinson of All Norah's Art. According to her blog, Sharon has declared March "Mail Art Month." Lucky me -- I got a sample of her fantastic mail art. See the little lavender spot just below the address label? That is actually a little section of the see-through window of a business envelope and a purple flower is showing through the window. Isn't that a clever idea? The purple flower is on a gorgeous napkin that Sharon tucked inside. Sharon is the napkin queen. Her use of napkins in her art is exemplary and exciting. I always get the best napkins from her stash.

And that's not all. She slipped a few other things in for me as well. Check out the scan below and you'll see lots of neat goodies, a little note, and of course a couple of wonderful feathers. After all, Sharon is the Wingkeeper!

You must visit Sharon's blog and read her post about her wingkeeper episode with a titmouse. It is the most thrilling story if you are an outdoorsy type or a bird watcher or . . . even a curious artist. You also might want to scroll on down her blog to see some amazing pictures of blue bird nests, eggs, and babies!

Here is the picture of all the grand things that were nestled inside my RAK  from Sharon:

Don't miss the great idea of cutting decorative corners on those darling feather tags! Thanks so much, Sharon, for this bundle of Spring!. It makes me want to send something off to someone right away. That's the neat thing about RAKs (Random Acts of Kindness), They're contagious! (Hey, my address is on that envelope above. Anyone else feel infected by the Spring RAK bug?

He is RISEN!

 

He is not here; he has risen, just as he said. Come and see the place where he lay. Matthew 28:6 (NIV)

CHRIST AROSE

Low in the grave He lay
Jesus my Savior!
Waiting the coming day-
Jesus my Lord.                                                

                                                                    Up from the grave He arose,
                                                                   With a mighty triumph o'er His foes;
                                                                    He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
                                                                    And He lives forever with His saints to reign.
                                                                    He arose! He arose!
                                                                    Hallelujah! Christ arose!

                                                                    Vainly they watch His bed-
                                                                    Jesus my Savior!
                                                                    Vainly they seal the dead-
                                                                    Jesus my Lord!

                                                                    Up from the grave He arose,
                                                                    With a mighty triumph o'er His foes;
                                                                    He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
                                                                    And He lives forever with His saints to reign.
                                                                    He arose! He arose!
                                                                    Hallelujah! Christ arose!

                                                                    Death cannot keep his prey-
                                                                    Jesus my Savior!
                                                                    He tore the bars away-
                                                                    Jesus my Lord!

                                                                    Up from the grave He arose,
                                                                    With a mighty triumph o'er His foes;
                                                                    He arose a Victor from the dark domain,
                                                                    And He lives forever with His saints to reign.
                                                                    He arose! He arose!
                                                                    Hallelujah! Christ arose!

HAPPY EASTER!

Friday of Mourning (Good Friday)

Closing in on the end of the Round Robin

Damaged in Handling                                      R#6                  

I'm at the closing weeks of this art journal round robin called "Colour Play."  This is the spread I did for Liz Smith in her art journal. The assignment  this time is to use transparencies and the colors white, cream, tan, black & accent colour. (Note the British spelling! Isn't that quaint? When in . . .{an RR in}. . . Britian, do as the Brits do!) Every step of this round robin required the use of a different technique and prescribed colours.

The photos in the vintage photo album pages are actually transparencies made from vintage photos. The album page on the right is turned backwards so the funky ripped side revealing the yukky cardboard would show. Kewl! 

And what is that weird thingy in place of the brass shell on the far right? Well, I wanted it to look like the fourth shell used for photo holders was torn off and the brads from the back are falling down. I know -- weird. But all four shells on there - all neat and proper  - looked boring. So sue me.

The background is real - not copied - vintage papers collaged on and then like an idiot, I covered them almost entirely with diluted white acrylic, tissue paper, other collage items, and rubber stampings. Oh well, I know of their authenticity and it makes me love this spread for Liz.

A while back, Liz created a spread in my journal using the required molding paste and the colors blue, green and gold.

Journal Spread by Liz Smith

This round Robin designed as a one year project for a terrific group of laid-back, talented, artistic-type friends has gone on now for over two years! And we are all still great friends and much better artists, too, if I do say so myself. A person changes over the course of two years! I'll have one more spread to share with you and then this project comes to a close and no telling what we'll dream up to do next - besides, of course, publishing the 2009 Arte-Ed-Anima wall calendar. YES. I love these gals and their art, too. Here's to Art-Ed-Anima! Hot-Diggity-Dog!! (which is what you get when you cross a hot pepper, a shovel, and a Chihuahua- my grandchildren are visiting -- can you tell?)

Hey, Remember that RR I'm in?

The Arte-Ed-Anima RR, Colour Play, has been going on now for two years! We are all making a push to get it finished and the books back to their owners. This is the latest entry I've done:

For this spread, my assignment was to use Claudine Hellmuth's peeling paper technique (as described in her book, Collage Discovery Workshop) and the colors yellow, ochre, gold, and red brown. If you look very closely, you might see the peeling paper background.

This spread is in Evie Zaccardelli's book. Evie is a talented mixed media artist from Scotland who sells her paintings and fabric pieces in her etsy shop . This is a spread Evie did for my book:

Altered Journal spread by Evie Zaccardelli

Her assignment was to use the colors hot pink and lime green to make a Nick Bantock style collage. Didn't she do it with imagination? We all felt that hot pink and lime green was hard to do in the Bantock style. But Evie pulled it off well. My Lime green and hot pink spread using the Bantock style was in Sue Berry's book:

 

Evie also did a peeling paper technique using the yellow, gold, ochre, and red brown colors. Hers was done in Sue Leslie's book:

(Collage by Evie Zaccardelli)

All of these artists are in the Art-Ed-Anima group with me and do fantastic art work. Both Sues live in England. Yes, that is the very same group who did the 2008 calendar. Check it out.

Miss Witherspoon Rides Again!

Imagine my surprise . . .

As I was watching my new IndieArts DVD issue 5, I suddenly saw my paperdoll article from Art Doll Quarterly (ADQ)! Remember the story of how Miss Witherspoon - AKA Remington Express, my altered booklet paperdoll, spent  FIVE YEARS at Stampington -- lost in the halls of magazine editors -- and then was published in ADQ?

Have you seen Indie Arts, the DVD Magazine? I've only seen two issues so far and I've really enjoyed both.

(Click on image to read contents.)

Issue 5 includes an on-location visit to Stampington with visits to all the departments and editors' offices. At the time, Michelle Flores was editor of Belle Armoire, Belle Armoire Jewelry, and Art Doll Quarterly. When she was featured on the DVD, as she discussed each magazine, there were pictures flashed on the screen of pieces shown in the respective magazines. When she started talking about Art Doll Quarterly, there on the screen was the page about my paperdoll.

WOW! Was I ever surprised! And thrilled, too, of course.

(Click on image to read article.)

I recommend IndieArts the DVD magazine. It has very interesting and informative articles and interviews, as well as, gallery views of various artists' work.The other issue I have is issue 6 winter 2008:

(Click on image to read contents.)

The next issue, Issue 7 Spring 2008, is due out April 1. Each issue has a preview guide which includes a detailed viewing guide complete with web sites for the artists involved. I'm not affiliated with Indie Arts -- just a satisfied customer - as they say. I recommend that you have a look at the issues available and check out the viewing guides. Each issue is a fun couple of hours of watching current trends in this world of independent art. The DVDs have menu selections so that you can watch one or more articles at a time as you please - in whatever order you want to see them. Check it out.