It's halloween!

The challenge at Sunday Postcard Art this week is Retro Halloween.  I'm not really a fan of Halloween and always struggle with art for this holiday.  However, it wouldn't be called a challenge if it was easy, would it :)

I'm such a lonely pumpkin!

I coloured white card stock with both yellow and orange water soluble crayons and then wiped it with a baby wipe to spread the colour.  Next came some quickly hand drawn buildings on a hill.  For some reason I painted them with Mars black rather than colour them with a marker, which would have been much quicker.

Next came stamping across everything in Archival Sap Green ink and a cobweb stamp.  Then stamping again with the same stamp but with Monarch Orange Ink.  I notice it looks silver on the photo where it overlaps the Mars Black paint.  (Might have to play with this as a technique)

I drew a pumpkin and coloured him with Inktensils in orange, yellow, dark brown and light brown, then applied a little water to spread the colour and blend.  I drew around the outside of the pumpkin with a deep blue inktensil and applied water to give a soft outline.  The moon was hand drawn on white printer paper and painted with silver paint.

Finally I stamped around the bottom edges with a leaf stamp, first in StayzOn Black and then my favourite London Fog.

By the light of the silvery moon...

The challenge at Sunday Postcard Art today is moonlight, and anything about Halloween is always a challenge for me.  It was late last night, the darkness all around and rain hitting the window pane when I was overcome by madness and my creation was born.....

Step away from the cleaning fluids now!

I didn't know if the idea would work but gave it a try.  I have a Paper Artsy stamp of a ruined monastery with a ghostly figure and I decided to try to stamp it with bleach on midnight blue card stock.  Yes, that's right - bleach!

I made the stamp pad from folded kitchen towel and applied bleach to the pad.  The first couple of attempts were a shambles with either the image being too soaked with bleach or not enough.  I realised it was impossible to get a clean image so I chose one that was under 'done' and used a paintbrush to finish up the monastery, and the moon.

The leaves around the sides and base are stamped in London Fog Gray and StayzOn black.  The moon was enhanced with some very translucent Golden Fluid medium in Zinc White.  The bats are actually swallows from a sea scene but I pressed extra hard on the stamp to make them fatter, voila bats!

There is no texture and I'm not sure this piece will survive very long since I didn't apply anything to prevent the action of the bleach continuing.  If you try this technique, it all depends on the type of paper what your results will be.  When I tried gray paper, the bleach removed the colour back to a pale gold.
Always wash your brushes and stamps quickly to avoid any damage.