Feb 18 African woman

This lady is opposite the Bwa lady and the last entry in the book of Aquarius. The book finished up at 1 1/2" thick. Not very much in it about Aquarius although according to my new reference green is this signs color and it does have lots of green in it. Too bad i didnt know that earlier; i would have made a green book instead of lavender. Come to think of it though - another reference i had said lavender or violet. No matter - it has plenty of both colors as well as other colors too.
Aquarius was my sisters sign, she was born on Feb 2, ground hogs day. Apparently the ground hog saw his shadow this year which indicates an early spring. We are experiencing a cold Artic front presently with high winds so once thats over spring will be sprung.
Renee passed away ten years ago. We were not loving sisters when we were children but became good friends as adults and i miss her still.
The African lady was colored with Crayola Window paints which went out of control in a few areas because i didnt make a border with the thicker black paint to contain it.I also added gel pen markings. The wire wrapped neck would have been gold if my wire had of been a heavier gauge and then her earrings would have been gold to co ordinate as well because that is my memory of pictures of African women with long wrapped necks. The black and yellow background paper was a gift and a well placed slit made way for her neck to slip right into her dress.
Tomorrow a new book for the start of my sign; Pisces.

Feb 17 African Bwa lady

I'm enjoying making these swirly curly backgrounds. First i painted the cs with Lumieres purple, blue and yellow. I recently found a tiny .25 version of the Spirograph. I used to love playing with it when my kids had it when they were small. I guess i'm the one who wore it out! oh how i loved watching that pendulum swing! Anyhow i used this little plastic version in a couple of spots. Its not quite the same old fun; i'd rather draw freehand.
The lady is a Bwa hybrid compiled of a few different parts of other people and some made up. As well, her head is upside down. Her umbrella is built in. Isnt that a good idea?!

Feb 16 Two natures at war

In each of us two natures are at war; the good and the evil.
All our lives the fight goes on between them
and one of them must conquer.
But in our own hands
lies the power to choose.
What we want most to be
we are.

I had written down who to attribute the quote to but right now i cant find it.
I saw this technique on http://alteredsilver.blogspirit.com and he said he had seen it at http://www.jenminnis.com/gallery

I was really intrigued, tried it and its fun and a great technique. You take a magazine picture, something not too complicated, and paint it with a thin layer of gesso. This man was actually fishing in a river and the background had alot of trees which have now magically disappeared. When the gesso's dry go over the main lines with a black sharpie - you can still see them faintly otherwise you might have to improvise a little here and there.
Apply another coat of gesso. (i keep my gesso brush in a ziplock bag on days or on techniques when i know its going to be used a few times) You might want to repeat the black outlining and gesso several times. Its best if you can incorporate some texture with the gesso. I didnt think of it for this picture but it would have been much nicer if i would have made textured rays splaying out from the man.
In the original technique i think they used acrylic paint, maybe you can use watercolor. I'm not too familar with working with acrylic but started with it here and as usual was unhappy with my painting. I ended up using my good old trusty markers. I then sanded lightly and re-drew the lines.

Feb 15 Zetti Flygirl

I noticed if i dont type something with the picture it will be placed in the area of the previous ones title and i dont know how to avoid this happening. So i'll have to type so the next pic will have a space of its own.
The background of this picture is greeting paper. I stamped the zetti swirls all around it with Memories white but it didnt show up very well. I was aiming for a colorful zetti look but nothing that would distract from the flygirl. The ink turned a pale pink from a reaction from the paper and the bckgrd was still too vivid. I went over the lines with a white ink pen and when that wasnt enough i went between the swirls with more, and so on and so on etc. etc. I think i overdid it but now we know where a typical flygirl lives.

Feb 14 Valentine

Feb 13 Volcanic Basalt

Basalts are vertical columns of rock that began as liquid lava from eruptions that happened millions of years ago. This example began at the equator about 200 million years ago and as a result an arc of islands were formed. These islands migrated north, smashed into North America and formed mountain ranges in California and Oregon. This is my rendition of the basalt at the Devils Postpile National Monument in CA.

Feb 12 Mask

The mask is colored with markers and gel pens. I made the bckgrd paper with a hand carved stamp but didnt like it much so i overstamped it with a fish net stamp from the American Stamp Co.

Feb 11 The French Mime

This is a printout of a collage that didnt have great colors. Although the new colors are now muted, muddy and some are uneven and not exactly what i had envisioned, i do like it much better now.
I used an old credit card to cover it with matte gel medium and when it was dry i colored it with a variety of markers; Tom Bo, Marvie,Sharpie and misc. I keep the "misc" on hand for the grandkids otherwise they make the more expensive Tom Bo's fluffy too fast! I changed colors several times throughout in attempt to make it brighter. It would look bright while still wet but after becoming completely dry it sort of muted down so on went another coat of the same or a different color. At first the colors beaded up like oil on water but after a few coats they started to soak in. After messing with it off and on all day it took on a totally different look; it became very smooth and waxy. I am now anxious to try this method again to see how many layers of color it takes until it changes and how it'll look with even more layers. I'm convinced the unusual finish was the result of using several different brands of markers. I hope i can find the right combination in the right order again to achieve a similar finish.

oH oH i just looked at how it looks when enlarged....it dosn't look great. But it is; the pic dosn't do the piece justice. You dont notice all the irregularities and sloppy painting. The waxy finish is really very nice; its different and oddly suits the art.
Also, much to my dismay i noticed that i had forgotten to fix her eyes before scanning...they are fixed now but no need to scan again.

Feb 10 Monas stand - in

Mona was tired of sitting, posing and holding that silly smile. One day she asked Leo if she could get away for awhile to play bingo. Leo asked "do you know a girl who can take your place?" Mona asked her good friend lorraina if she would pose for an hour or two. lorraina asked "whats in it for me?" Mona replied " you can wear my jewelry" Well, lorraina loved jewelry so she jumped at the chance. Little did she know she would be the next Ms. Republique Francaise La Poste 5,00 !

Feb 9 doodles by lorraina de Vinci

Feb 8 The gypsy girl

Gypsy Lament

I knew a gypsy girl last spring
with laughter in her eyes
She made a rope of silver stars,
and climbed to reach the skies.

She made a road of tangled silk,
burned gold at dawn and then,
She said " there are lands
that i must see
But i'll be back again!"

Feb 7 Zetti

This frame was so much fun to make. It reminded me of the serendipity technique but my goal with this was just to make texture. There was no need to arrange colors because everything got painted in the end. Also for serendipity i usually use reg. light weight papers and do some stamping. This was mostly a little heavier cs like paintchips, a little mesh, wire and no stamping. Zetti is often seen in happy bright colors and that was my original plan. But you know what happens when i plan. I painted it with gesso first then 2 Lumieres and it just sort of blended and did what i liked so i left it at that. Making the collage for it was harder as i just wasnt really feeling zetti-ish. Painting the dots black and adding the few little lines was an after thought as was the curl on his cheek which i think came close to ruining it.

Feb 6 swirly lady

Feb. 5 Odyssey

Abstract with black sharpie and Tombow markers

Feb 4th Faux walk in the woods

This walk turned up strange, unique and rare items! At the bottom are fibres sent to me as a rak and on the left side just above is a wad of pink paper. This consists of tiny rolls of excess paper that are removed from the edges of the mold when i make paper. I set them aside in little piles and let them dry into these cool shapes. Its resting on a piece of tapa paper that i brought from Hawaii. Dried clematis vines hang from the pole beside the remains of 3 grass'es. Next is a leaf from my failed experiment of skeletonizing leaves with bleach. I gave it a little pat with a green inkpad because the poor thing was bleached pure white. Last is an emu feather which was given to me from someone who visited one of the emu farms in the Okanagan area of B.C. The paper they are resting on is a printout of an incredible piece of old weathered cardboard that came blowing down my street.

Feb. 3 spiderweb angel

You need your sunglasses on for this one. I used Alex Plus caulk and scraped it onto the cs with an old credit card. I wanted it to gradually slope from high ridges and texture on the outer edges to thin near the center but was only slightly successful with this. When it was dry i used a single edged razor blade to remove as much as possible from the center where i glued the image which i had colored with gel pens. Some of the grout came off in bits big enough to curl and re-apply for more texture. I also wanted to hide the straight edges of the image but there wasnt enough extra grout to work with. I applied a thin layer of the caulk to a small piece of acetate and when it was dry i scraped and peeled off enough to have lots to use for added texture. I didnt use any glue for this as the grout was rubbery enough to stick to itself so i placed the little bits then painted overall with gesso. When it was dry i played with coloring it; various paints, inks, and ended up liking the effects of markers better because my newest 3 markers have those almost florescent colors. I then topped it all with Pearl-X.

2 collages, 9 squares each

This is what it looks like cut in half and in the Aquarius book. I layered them on a piece of painted and stamped paper towel. I tried them on differently colored ones to look more versatile but liked this one best. Now they are portraits which is ironic because the painting i had copied was in the landscape format but i had worked as portrait with my head turned sideways. So, other than the few little letters and numbers etc being sideways, they still can cut it as abstracts. Bet that artist didnt know he could do the same and get dbl the money!

Feb. 1st and 2nd

As you can see the picture is one collage of 18 squares. Unfortunately, i forgot to cut it to fit my book before proceeding. It was too big and is now 2 pieces of art and in the book for Feb 1 and 2. I spent a lot of time working with this idea that enchanted me on Ebay. Yes, i was going to attempt to rip the artist off with a copy of his art! Well, it had a a $1500. price and it was incredibly beautiful; wouldnt you if you thought you could? Of course his was all paint on a million dollar canvas and mine would be on a piece of cardstock. His was very textured and dripping with amazing colors. My copy would be made of TomBow markers and a little stamping. And although his was spectacular without any words, symbols or markings mine would have a few little things, and of course his was a landscape wheras mine would be a portrait in order for it to fit into my book. His was about 4' x 6' and mine about 4" x 6" otherwise it would be exactly the same, lol. Well, its much easier to have a model to copy than to have to dream it up myself. So i went for it!
What we might actually have in common is hundreds of layers...well,i know mine does.

As much as i admire the uneveness of this type of abstract and desire to do it; i have a hard time creating uneven shapes,lines,squares and colors but i keep trying! I actually had to keep hitting my arm to make it stop reaching for the ruler. I find myself automatically correcting things and having to force myself to make it be a little off and wobbly. I want the colors of the squares to be equal - blue in the upper right and bottom left, have the same amount of each color throughout or mirror the opposite side. Needless to say it drove me nuts because the squares were all different sizes and shapes. The way his was colored was wayyy too many of the same color in a group, then another group of a different color, then just one of this and 2 more of that...it literally gave me nightmares because his actually consisted of only 3 colors....i kid you not. 3 colors all looking different in 18 squares. OK so give me a break; mine is going to have to have a few more that that!
I tell you this so you'll appreciate all the effort this challenge took me,lol.
I hope the artist dosnt see mine and recognise it as a rip off of his and sue me, lol again. This is the difference between $1500. and 15 cents.
I wonder why it is that a person can enjoy something so well but simply cannot do it themselves. I'm stuck with my own artistic style and way of doing things no matter how hard i try to do something different and i guess that poor fellow is too. He'll probably keep turning out $1500. paintings while nobody will ever offer me 15 cents. Its like a part of who we are and maybe hes trying to do my style but i wont tell him my secrets. Well, i'll keep trying different things and maybe one day i'll buy some real paint, and good brushes, yeah, thats it, i probably just need some good brushes....

Jan 31 Italy

Wine label collage on a background of another one of a kind paper; an odd shade of green with a very dull matte finish. I make alot of bckground papers in the summer because i have a good place to work where i can leave all the supplies out. So, theres paints of every type along with dyes, wax crayons, puttys, mediums and misc of all sorts. Needless to say, i often end up with papers that consist of unknowns.
As far as i know theres only one of this type, thank goodness because it was difficult to work with.
The collage was already under way before i noticed the least bit of moisture made the green finish soften, actually sort of melt and roll off. I wanted to use it anyhow for its odd color. So i opted to assemble the lable pieces butted up against each other, like in the bargello technique to hide as much of the green as i could. At that point i hadnt planned to add a finish coat but after sanding to distress it a little i went too far and it was raw in places. I applied matt gel medium with my finger which picked up the green finish on the edge and made it look very old. I made a trellis with gold wire grape tendrils and stapled it on. I was happy enough with the piece until the trellis was on, then i felt it should have been smaller.
I've since wondered if the green paper had a water soluble wax crayon finish because i do have some of them. I've used them but not much and they've never reacted like this.

Jan 30 dragonfly joy

collage of found dragonfly image and scraps of two paper napkins - one was painted and stamped, the other is the bee, D, heart. The tiny bits of shiny paper were from a scrap of paper doily that i found in my stash. It had been painted long ago with something unknown and long forgotten but its very beautiful. I've been saving it for something special for too long and finally took the glue to it.