Happiness + Raindrops (8.20.2016)

I know it's been a few days since I've posted anything on this blog, and that's mostly because I haven't finished a whole lot. 

I've been working on and off on several different projects, but not many of them were titled or officially donned complete. Thus, today I am going to be sharing a finished page and something that's almost finished but not quite there yet. I hope you enjoy looking!

The first page I'm showing here was something I had started a while back - so long ago at this point that I actually don't even remember when I started it. There was just an unfinished page in one of my art journals (the altered magazine I've used in the video here) that I decided to go back to. In the end, I'm incredibly happy with the results.

• First and foremost, I like the color palette. In the closeups above, you can see that there are many colors that show through in the background, but it is predominantly a soft shade of pink. If I had to guess what I did here, I most likely toned down the layers underneath with a layer of white paint because they were clashing. 
• The turquoise circles were cut out of a piece of ruled paper I had scraped paint over after completing another page. There were a few more layers on it, and the color and faint lines showing through were far too intriguing to not do something with. As a result, I cut them out and collaged them down, adding layers of paint and oil pastel over the top of them.
• Here's a sneak peek of what I started to do with the paper left over after cutting the circles.

Finally, we focus in on the quote. Sometimes I read a quote somewhere, whether it be on the motivational app I have or in a book, and I decide that it is something I need to remember. This was one of those times.

Happiness is a direction, not a destination.

Sometimes I need to remind myself of that.

Now we move onto the page that's not quite finished. 

This was simply done on a folded over piece of printer paper, though I decided to switch things up a bit and not fold it perfectly in half. I actually love the way this looks at this point in time, and the drips of paint remind me vaguely of raindrops, which I adore.

Here you can see a little bit of a close up of some of the layers. I especially love the upper cloud, where the paint has been picked up and reveals the background layers. There is some stamping, some stenciling (the clouds are actually stenciled as well), and a lot of paint.

At this point, all I think it truly needs is a title to finish it off. 

 So, as you can see, I've been doing quite a bit in the past few days (there's more where this came from), so you can expect to see from me at some point in the near future, with all of the pages I wrap up. I'll be looking forward to seeing you then!

Minimal Layers + A Short Story (8.11.2016)

Today's post is going to be a bit of a shorter one, since I've been working quite a bit lately (I just finished seven days straight) and haven't been able to make much time for mixed media. However, among the chaos I was able to make time to put together one page, which is actually pretty minimal in its layers compared to a lot of the other art I've been working on lately.

This page was actually done on the inside of the folded piece of card stock Unseen Beauty was created on, and you can see a little bit of where I began the next page in the edges of these photos. Consider it a sneak peek.

I'm not quite sure why I decided to call this page Awake, considering that I most likely wan't fully awake when I finished it. However, there is a ton that I love about this page and I want to touch on a few points.

• I started this page off with a page out of the phone book, glued onto the page upside down. The intention was always to keep the layers thin so that the text could show through and I succeeded in doing just that.
• As you can see in both the left and right hand photos, there are some areas with a scallop pattern. That effect was achieved by putting down a bit of a thicker layer of white acrylic paint and using the end of my paintbrush to carve away the pattern for a bit of texture.
• The pink circles were collaged down onto the page, and then blended into the background using layers of paint, both acrylic and watercolor, gelatos, oil pastels and a gel pen. I really wanted to focus on these circles in particular on this page - the concept was really what inspired the whole thing.

As much as I love this page, I want to pull away for a minute in order to bring attention to something that one of my art journal pages brought into being. I wrote a short story the other day - I'd say it was in the thriller genre, and it was inspired by a brainstorming session I did while looking at The Evolution of an Idea.

I got there in a pretty roundabout way, and it's not really easy to see any similarities between the two pieces, but there was a connection, just the same. It's called Chosen Fate and can be found here if you want to check it out!

In the end, even though I've been exhausted recently, it makes me happy to share these things with you guys. I hope you enjoy seeing the finished pieces as much as I enjoy making them and I hope to see you all again soon!

The Struggle (7.28.2016)

The title of this page is a direct reference to the making of it.

This was a work and progress over a series of days, and it fought me every step of the way. I'm still not completely happy with the way it turned out, but I decided to call it done. I also heavily considered not sharing it at all, but there are a few small bits that stood out to me as being nice, and I also wanted to show that everyone struggles sometimes.

However, even with the chaos  of the page, there are a few parts that I do like. That's what I keep trying to focus on, and it has helped significantly.

• First and foremost, on the left, you can see the section on the bottom, where a bit of collage work, green and blue paint, and doodles done in pen show through. As I was proceeding through the layers that followed, I took special care to keep this section intact.
• On the right, you can see a bit where I did some stitching with thread. Also in this photo you can see multiple layers of paint, stenciling, stamping and collage. As you can see, I was struggling to find something that worked. If this photograph alone was the entire piece, I would be incredibly happy with it.

In the end, we all struggle. Sometimes there's nothing we can do to avoid it, and everything seems to be working against us. The best we can do is push through and focus on the good things. I hope you all got something out of this, and I'll talk to you soon.

A Fresh Start (7.26.2016)

Before I get into the actual art, a bit of a note about the World of Immensum. 

Even though all of my more formal artwork all takes place in the same world, my mixed media is more of place for me to play with ideas and techniques - they don't have specific ideas in mind, but they can inspire ideas. With that being said, until I figure out a way to share the stories that come up from this sort of mixed media, I will be focusing on the latter.

Now, without further ado, the art journal awaits!

In order to kick this project off strong, I decided to begin a new journal. 

This is the cover page, which I always love to start with before moving on to the actual pages. For a lot of people, the complete opposite is the case - they like to finish their entire journal before polishing the whole thing off by completing the covers. Either way is fine, this is just the way I like to do it. 

These pictures show a lot of the finer details/my favorite bits of this particular cover.

• In the left hand photo, you can see a lot of the texture that I got from my stamped title piece. I used foam stamps and a mixture of red and brown acrylic paint. Then I simply loaded it on and allowed it to dry. I also love where the tiny bit of the butterfly wing overlaps with said title piece.
• On the right, there are a lot of things going on that I love. The thing that sticks out to me the most though is the patterned piece of tissue paper that is pretty much front and center. I've been hoarding it for a long while now, because I found it almost too pretty to use. However, I finally broke, and I'm glad that I did as it fits perfectly. The horizontal brush strokes were done with a metallic paint that I adore.

This is the second piece that I've finished in the past few days, and I'm pretty happy with it. The idea was to work with brighter, more playful colors (thus the title), and was done in a much smaller format, on a 3x5 index card.

A big part of my style is that I don't like to be limited to any one thing, including what types of canvases or background pieces I decide to work on. This is a prime example of just that.

As you can see, the title was cut out of newspaper titles and glued down (I've collected many cut-out letters through the years and have them organized into envelopes for easier access).

With the finer details of this piece, you can see that there are some areas where I put down white paint and then proceeded to scratch it away in a circular pattern, revealing the background behind it. The drawn lines along the yellow paint marks are also incredibly appealing to me.

I tend to use a lot of paint and layers in my mixed media, and these pieces are no exception. I hope you all enjoy looking at these pieces as much as I enjoyed making them, and I look forward to hearing what you think!