That's a jazzy kite!

Ever since I saw Three Muses challenge of Fly a Kite, I've had this idea floating around in my head.  I just couldn't let go of it, so eventually had to create it in my journal.

Welcome to my jazzy kite!

Let's go fly a kite....  

The journal page already had some ink on it from mopping up some previous spills.  I sprayed the whole page with water and then the lower part with Lime Crush followed by Cut Grass in patches.  The top part of the page was sprayed with Vibrant Turquoise.  Once it was dry I lay stencils over the top (flowers, Letters and a clock) and sprayed through them with water and let them sit until the ink re-dissolved before I mopped them with paper towel.  Next I applied some Gesso through a harlequin stencil and left it all to dry while I worked on the saxophone.

I sketched the saxophone shape onto a vintage text page, cut it out then painted it in Golden Translucent Primary Yellow.  I stamped on it with music stamp in Pumice Stone Distress ink and at the same time I stamped on the background across the grass.

Next came a little colouring of the sax with some cheap oil pastels and a charcoal pencil before I glued it to the background.  Finally I drew the music coming from the sax and going into the sky with kite being represented by the treble clef.

A totally bonkers bit of work, but my muse is happy now.  Thanks so much for looking, it is always appreciated.

My heart was broken

I learnt a valuable art lesson today with this piece.  When things go terribly wrong with a piece, don't throw it away, just keep working it until the problem is resolved.

I am so pleased I did.....

My heart is full of hope

Because this piece went through a major rework, it has a ridiculous number of layers.  I'll omit the error layers in the description, so as not to confuse anyone.  The first layer was gesso, followed by high build molding paste through a stencil.  Then came golden fluid acrylics in red, white,  yellow and my new favourite Iron Oxide (it sparkles).
While that was drying I used a gel medium transfer technique on the cherubs to put them on canvas (worked really well).  Then I used a scrap of canvas as a stamp and randomly stamped with heavy paint.
The wings are grunge paper, painted brown / black then embossed with silver, then again with UTEE to give a look of tin.  Distressed them with black paint to knock back the shine.
The large heart is a technique I've been playing with for a few weeks.  Card stock with high gesso peaks, texture paste, bead gel and high lift molding paste.
Next I applied paint techniques using burnt umber, fine gold, fine bronze, teal, white and some more iron oxide.

The heart shape was torn from orange card stock, painted it with Lumiere paints and then glued it to the base card before stamping with a crackle stamp.  It was finished off with some random stamping and my trusty oil pastels.

Who's knocking at the door?

This week the Sunday Postcard Art theme is Doors.  I'm quite a fan of old doors and have lots of photo's so was mildly tempted to try some digital art, however since I love to play with paint and glue I decided to stay with mixed media.  If you would like to see the video of it being made, it's Here and is approx 11 mins.

A very tiny key can open a very heavy door - Charles Dickens

 I'm really happy with the way the faux wood planks turned out and the 'brass' heads to the screws.  You can barely see from the photo above but there is a strip of copper at the base of the door treated with verdigris paint.  I bought the copper strip from a garden centre, it's designed to keep snails out of plant pots!

The door handle (ring type thing) was originally holding two little keys.  One of the little keys is now hanging from the birds beak.

Once again, I had a great time doing this and loved every minute.