Monday 4 January 2016

Mixed Media Monday - Believe in the magic...


Happy new year!

I hope you all had a great time and are looking forward to 2016?  I don't do new year resolutions but I have decided that this year my aim is to get some of those 'long lost' craft purchases out of the cupboard and make myself use them!!  Gelli plate, melt pot and friendly plastic to name but a few!
To help me do this and to give me purpose for my blog posts I have decided to enter some online craft challenges, and the first one is from Mixed Media World  (you can click on the blog title for a link or there is a link in my blog list to the side).

The challenge is to create a mixed media piece using this photo as inspiration...

 
Living on the Isle of Wight this scene is quite a familiar one for me in the winter, and I have always found the beach at this time of year to be calming and somewhat magical, so the colour scheme immediately made me think of a fantasy/magical theme.  I apologise in advance as this post has quite a few photos to show the steps, but I will try to be as concise as possible.

I started my project by getting out all of the media that I had that matched the colour scheme, inks, glitters, beads, gelatos and more and because I knew I wanted to layer up some heavier items I decided to use a paper mache hanging icon as my base.  These are the items I started with although they may not all have been used and others may have been added...


The base for my project had some dry wall tape (I think that's what it is called!) and 2 coats of white gesso added.  I use art basics heavy gesso from Finnabair/Prima, as I like the thickness of the coverage...


Next I used a star stencil from Stampin'Up! and a textures one from TCW to add extra texture.  The stars were added using white crackle medium, however as I dried it with my heat gun (due to lack of patience) there were no crackles!  The bottom texture was with Golden glass bead gel...


Next was one of the most fun parts.  Using chipboard, MDF and metal embellishments that I have bought/collected from various places, I laid out the elements that I wanted.  Extra texture was also added under a few of the flowers using gauze.  I knew that it was going to be floral at the bottom but wanted to add some butterflies and dragonflies to my starry night sky.  When I was happy with the layout all the elements were stuck down with Pinflair glue gel, but I do often use the art basics thick matt gel instead.  Once these has dried (well almost), I painted over it all with white gesso, it had 2 coats then I gave the metal elements another coat as they needed a bit extra...



An attempt was made to try to let it all dry thoroughly on it's own, but I must admit that my heat gun was in use quite a lot!  Then it was time for my spray booth to be used, also known as a cardboard box.

I used sprays from Lindy's Stamp Gang (steel shimmer) and Dylusions (white and black) to provide my base.  My aim was to create an ombre type effect so I tried to keep the darker colour to the top.  Then I used gelatos to blend in more colour (white, Earl Grey and silver) and created a darker top by using a black Pitt marker from Faber-Castell and a white Posca pen at the bottom to keep it lighter.  I spent quite a while adding my mediums until I felt it looked right.  I then used my black marker around some of the elements to create more definition and also added highlights with my white pen and some silver gilding wax...


Glitter and embellishments were next, especially as I wanted this piece to feel magical.  I used glitters from art basics with soft gel medium in the different shades across the whole icon.  Microbeads in black and silver were added using thick matt gel, then beads from my collection were added to and around the flowers.  I also decided at this point that some splattered white would add a bit of extra interest...


Nearly done!  Finally I had to have some words on the piece so used an appropriate phrase from my Tim Holtz small talk book and stamped a fairy from Lavinia Stamps onto heat proof acetate and embossed her in black.  Glitter was added to the back of her wings and then she was able to be placed on the flowers. 

Here is the final piece plus a couple of close up shots...




I had really good fun making this and look forward to the next challenge that I do.  I am also going to keep to my decision and get some dies out over the next week that haven't seen much daylight and see if by getting some cutting done I can be inspired.

Enjoy your week whatever you are doing,

Jane x

3 comments:

  1. Lovely creation, so much interest and inspiration!!

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  2. Absolutely stunning creation I'm so glad you decided to join our challenge ;)
    Thanks for joining us at MMW and good luck
    Hugs
    Donna xxx

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  3. I love how you have used the colours, fabulous make. Thanks for playing along hugs Debs xx

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