Weekend Art-O-Rama - Part 2

Looking back through my journal, I really did create a lot of spreads!  I was very much into playing in my paints with my fingers.  I find it very freeing to put the paint brushes aside and to "become part of the paint." This particular spread was completed using my fingers exclusively.  I began applying black, fuchsia and cobalt blue craft paint in a random, swirly pattern all over the pages.  Even before the background dried, I began to see the face on the far right so I indicated the eyes, nose and mouth using black paint.  The next two faces followed, and while the black paint was still wet, I began applying white paint to better define the features and add highlights.  I don't know where these creepy images come from, but maybe someday I'll figure that out - or not!  I have titled this spread "We Three Creeps".

This next spread is one of my favorites from this past weekend.  Remember the "Junk To Journal" posts?  Well, I decided to flip through some of my treasures from the paint store and I came across the card with the pear.  I just love pear images and I've been saying I need to complete "the obligatory pear painting" for years now.  I thought I would cut the pear out and use it in a spread that would become a preliminary for my painting.  That was my intention anyway.  What I ended up with was a very whimsical character with a pear nose.

I applied these paint colors as the background in a random fashion using an old credit card.  While the background dried, I cut out the pear.  The moment I placed it on the page I saw a nose and proceeded to draw a face around it.  I was thinking about all the artists who painted pears and even googled a few "just to be sure".  After I finished painting the figure, I added the lettering and then wrote in names of artists who have painted pears. 

He still makes me smile when I look at him.  He's very European with his handsome mustache, beret and striped shirt. Is that an accordion I hear? Do I smell fresh baked croissants?  Nope - that would be my imagination manifest through inspiration, and I hope you'll let your imagination come out and play when you're in "Happy Creating!"

Junk to Journal: Floral Extravaganza

Have you been looking at your junk mail with artist eyes?  Here's another "junk to journal" to get your creative juices flowing.  Remember the lovely gold American Express (AE) multi-fold junk mail?  Don't feel bad if you don't remember.  Actually, I might not have posted this pic!  Anyway, it's got a little pocket on one end and the other end is basically tri-fold.  It also came with a fake (AE) Gold Card (like I'm going to use THAT!)  Actually I will be using it but not to make any purchases.  I'll show you a more creative use for that soon!

This junk mail made me think of an air travel ticket envelope so I flipped through my journal to see if I had any pages prepped that "felt right" for the job.  I came across a spread that felt really tropical to me and made me think of flying down to Sanibel and into those shades of pink, teal and yellow that I immediately associate with Florida.  Once I settled on that spread, my next step was to attach the AE junk mail with a

glue stick.  I then covered all pages of the AE mail with white acrylic paint.  After that dried, I began adding more yellow, pink and teal to all pages including the previously painted areas.  I wanted my new AE addition to look as if it had been a part of the spread all along.  Next came a change of plans.  I was tidying up a bit and came across a spring flower bulb catalog.  Of course, I couldn't throw it out and had to stop and thumb through the pages.  That's when my travel spread turned into a flower garden.  All those luscious blooms were going to look GREAT on my spread.  I would figure out the rest as I went along.  That's one of the great things about being creative.  There's always time to change direction and make room for new ideas that pop into your head!

                                      

It was time to cut flowers and begin arranging them on the spread.  I decided to add a few horizontal lines to represent a trellis and to add further interest to the spread. I also added some blue to the right hand side of the spread to accommodate a lovely blue blossom on the preceding page.  The blooms in the catalog were all so lovely I wanted to save them all.  (And I'd like one of each plant for my backyard, please!)

After I applied my flowers, I then added quotes about flowers. One of my favorites is from the great artist, Claude Monet, whose work has been of great influence to me.  "I perhaps owe becoming a painter to flowers".  I took another quote from The Koran: "Bread feeds the body, indeed, but flowers feed also the soul."  My final quote was actually taken from poet, Edna St.Vincent Millay's poem, "Afternoon on a Hill":

 I will be the gladdest thing
Under the sun!
I will touch a hundred flowers
And not pick one.

Finally, I added my own thoughts on flowers:  "I have shared some of my deepest sorrows and greatest joys in the company of flowers."  And what became of the pocket?  I found an old deck of playing cards and used them as "dream cards" representing flowers that I would love to add to my garden!

I hope you enjoyed this installment of "Junk to Journal" and I hope it inspires you to transform the junk mail you find in YOUR mailbox!

Junk to Journal: "Look Into the Southern Sky"

I really liked this accordion fold booklet that I received from Cleveland MOMA several years ago.  It's an invitation to a gallery show filled with extensive information about the show/artists.  (Yes - I'm a closet hoarder but I don't need an intervention just yet.  Well, maybe....)  I knew that one day I would use this invitation in my own artwork, and as it turns out, it was perfect for a "junk to journal" project.

When I began, the only thing I knew for certain was that I wanted to maintain some of the color on each page, and I also wanted to make sure that some of the words were still visible.  Other than that, I had no idea in what direction I was headed.  I loved the black/gray striped cover, and that gave me the idea to look through my portfolio of magazine pages.  I'm wild for color, but I'm also drawn to black & white (b/w)imagery so I had quite a few predominantly b/w images in my collection.  One such photo was that of a male.  It was a very moody photograph with very little contrast. The predominant feature was the large, black sunglasses.  I used that for the cover and decided to pull some of the red-orange color from one of the other pages.   I decided to paint over the features and also altered the hairline turning "him" into "her".   I came across the words "Look into the southern sky" and they just seemed to fit with the sunglasses and the feel of  the warm, sunny background.

Click on any image to enlarge

The next images that I came across were the skeleton heads.  There were actually 4 or 5 of them in one strip, but I tore them out individually.  I then came across the dog, the watch face, and the turquoise stone.   The stone reminded me of an art mannequin head right away.  I began playing with the images and it occurred to me that they looked like some kind of bizarre evolutionary timeline.  That's when the journal took on a "life of it's own".  It's a story of where we are now as a civilization and where, maybe, we're headed.  I hope you enjoy viewing the images.

Other notes of interest

I used this booklet upside down. The writing shows through the paint in places, but the font is small and can't easily be read upside down so it's not distracting.  I used tempera and acrylic paints and Mod Podge as an adhesive.  I also used a Sharpie extra fine black marker and a white gel pen.  No humans were harmed in the making of this art.