La Mal du Pays

A simple piece: Wooden frame, written letter background, found metal piece, inscription on copper, and a chicken.

The metal piece was found on my parents' farm. Not sure what it is, but I enjoy it.

"La Mal Du Pays" is a French phrase translating to our "homesick".

And a little plastic chicken makes it all the more "homely".

Wanderlust

Another experimentation in "large" art. This one was a (I believe) wooden serving tray, again, thrifted. I loved the background design and almost just kept it for decoration. But I decided to go with a travel theme, hence the name, and add a clear fill and small planes. Fun fact: airplanes are really difficult to draw and cut from tissue paper.

The planes were drawn on white tissue paper then dipped in clear wax to collage into the piece.

The compass is made from a metal sheet. I carved in the design with a wooden stick and filled with black paint. The arrow is an old clock hand which took me 3 days to find. It was where it was supposed to be, but upside-down and, therefore, invisible. 

I laid some turquoise and black thread into the wax to give it some direction as well.

The handwritten directions were the last thing added to this piece. Again, I am sitting and waiting for it to fall off the wall, but it is so far doing well. :D

Emergence

This piece is fairly different for me, I am trying some new techniques and ideas to incorporate in my other works.

After showing at a couple of galleries last month, one critique I heard was that my works were too small to grab attention in a gallery setting. So now I'm trying some larger works. But that also brings complications. Adding weight to these pieces adds stress on the hanging mechanisms and to the 3D collage materials. I've reinforced both of those things, but I'm also sitting here with them on the wall to see if they're going to fall down. How fun. 

This piece began as a wooden octagon that I found at a thrift store. It was originally a "make your own clock" kit. 

I added a plaster face that had been "gifted" to me last year and did a fill with yellow beeswax. It smells delightful.

Then I added nails and black thread to create a geometric design over the other elements.

From this piece I've decided to add more plaster pieces (I love the element of realism and the endless possibilities of using casts and molds), and geometric designs. It is a nice contrast between the organic themes of the face and wax vs the geometric strings and wood.

Balance

Another piece in my ever-growing Circus collection. This is a 3D encaustic collage with plastic toys, wooden blocks, encaustic fill, and background illustration. Still staying with primary colors on this one. 

Still not finished with this theme. There's more to say about it and I haven't quite achieved what I want yet.

what i love this week....

art journals! the one above can be found at izabella's tattered letters. i've designed a few journal covers and finished one complete altered journal. i guess what i love most about these projects are the layers. there is no limit on how much or how little you can add to these things, and they still look amazing.
i think this is my most "professional" looking journal cover. the girl is a collaged piece onto a painted diamond background. then i used a gold crayon for some swirls, and that's it!
this piece was another of my first ones, and for some reason i thought that it was an excellent idea to take a picture before the glue dried, so ignore the glue spots. it is a painted background, no stamps. the i collaged on some clock parts and circuit board along with a gold part of a clock face with the word "art" inside connected to a gold chain. the i added an old belt that no longer fits to bind it all together.
this is the cover to my completed journal. it is collaged wallpaper with an octopus drawn on, ha. it also has some painted speckled on there. it is bound with a super cute sparkly pink belt that i loved. the spine is decorated with yarn, ribbon and beads and feathers, that's my favorite part.
this one was my first altered journal. it is green with collaged chinese newspaper and some drawings on the side. then i embellished it with some buttons, mirrors, letters, wire and beads.



i love how puffy these books get when they are filled with writings, souvenirs, and all sorts of collage elements. i also love the decorated spines.

altered journals are one of my favorite projects and is definitely a project i want to incorporate into my classroom. it's a project that can easily be very beautiful and personal. for some of the most amazing journals i have seen, because of subject matter, craftsmanship and originality, you should visit Luthien's Pimp & Paint.

things with wings

inspired by bug collections and the completely adorable Agitha from Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, (btw, if you haven't played you should, and if you have then i'm sure you'll agree that her house if the most gorgeous and wonderfully whimsical bohemian place ever. i want her house so bad.) i decided to make this piece with butterflies for the Simon Says Stamp and Show challenge.

i started with some wonderful black and cream wallpaper i found in a sample book. then i used some music note scrapbook paper from hobby lobby and some gorgeous chipboard butterflies. probably one of the most simple pieces i've done, but it's beautiful and classic.

what i love this week....

bottles! i have been wanting to do a new bottle project, but the inspiration isn't coming! so i'm re-exploring some old projects, and you get to see them too! the one above can be found at Scrapbooking.com and was the inspiration for my first altered bottle.
for this bottle, i used white masking tape and covered the whole surface. then i used a gold and brown mixture all over and a sharpie for the black swirls. next i added some rebar wire (spray painted gold) and beads to the top. i also painted the stopper gold and added a clear stone in the center. next, i added a flower made from newspaper with a button as the center.
i plan to use this bottle as an element in a larger work sometime.


another previous bottle work i had done was a mother's day present. this one was inspired by the piece to the left at Rubber Road Adventures.

for mine, i used gold, masking tape and swirlies again. then i made some flower stems from rebar wire and mounted pictures of my siblings and i on different flower cut shapes made from cardboard, coasters and newspaper. then i added some fake plants as fillers. i decorated the outside of the vase with buttons, flowers, glass shards and beads. i also added some flowers i made from scrapbook paper and felt.

a little love

i don't do many love pieces, but i kind of felt like it today, so here is a love piece!
it is on a small 5"x7" canvas that i got in a three pack from dollar tree (love!). i started with a cardboard heart that i glued to the center of the canvas. then i glued sheet music over the top and burnished it to fit over the heart. then i used red, green and black oil pastels to add color to the whole piece.

next i got a little creative. i wanted to use some Tim Holtz sprockets, but i only have 2 left and zero money. growing up poor has forced me to find ways around no materials and no money. what i did have was a spare sheet of rubber stamp material. so i traced my last sprockets, cut them out and stuck them to paper clips for some makeshift stamps. i really like them! ha.

so i used these stamps and some swirly stamps to build up some nice layers around the edge and alphabet stamps on the top and bottom. then i used silver crayon on the green and gold on the red for some more swirls.

finally, i added the key and screw. i just used a regular screwdriver and stuck it through the canvas and everything. and the last thing i added was the text, "love", cut from a magazine.

what i love this week....

initially i was going to post one of these every tuesday, but i had spare internet time while working on the latest project so i got this one done early!

so what i love this week is....tea cups! the ones above were found at Oh Joy! sometimes i like to feel fancy and sweet, and now is one of those times. so were the time when i created these pieces.

this first one is a simple ATC (which i really need to get working on some more!) i used scrapbook paper pasted onto card stock to add depth and cut them into tea cup and tea pot shapes. i love using scrapbook paper for silhouettes, it just seems so fulfilling to the composition.

this one is also and ATC. all of the elements are scrapbook paper, the tea cup is raised. the text and black swirls are stamps, the swirls are from Michael's and the text "you're my cup of cocoa" was a birthday gift from a friend ages ago.

this last one is an encaustics piece i did in my summer workshop. again, scrapbook papers were used for the silhouettes and collaged into the wax medium. the text "your late" i wrote out and image transferred onto it. the orange is the only part of the piece that is not collaged, it is encaustic paint. i think this piece has a kind of Alice in Wonderland feel, and that's what i was thinking when i made the text. the green lines at the top are incised and filled with encaustic paint.