What can you do with Stenciled-Gelli Printed Papers?

After creating some beautiful alternative gelli plate prints, using Cecilia Swatton's amazing stencil designs, (exclusive at Stencil Girl Stencils) this question always seems to arise:  What do you use these papers for?  And I always have an answer.  

There are many uses,  depending on the type of paper that I recycled.  The list is long and includes creating bound art journals, but this week I used these beautiful painted papers to create something new:  "Art Jewelry".  

Easy and lightweight!  These take only a few supplies such as: eyelets, hand punches for the shapes and rounded corners, Glossy Accents if you want the paper to look like polished stone, a cropodile tool to create holes and set eylets, plus miscellaneous jewelry parts to create earrings and pendants such as these.



































But since nothing is allowed to go to waste, even the negative cut-out shapes are put to use.  Here they were used to create some fun bookmarks to give as gifts.  Just need to pick up some tassles of tie some raffia through the eyelet and they will be finished. 

Alternative Gelli Plate Prints

At our open studio this morning we played around with an alternative Gelli Plate printing technique, using stencils from my good friend Cecilia Swatton, via Stencil Girl.  Along with a variety of texture tools, these were some of the prints that were made.  Totally had a great time and will be making some fun and funky jewelry next week from these awesome papers.

 

 

Updating This Blog

Our recent move has been completed and we are finally-well almost-settled into our new home.  We are loving the new location, which is central to the whole valley and closer to most of our friends.  We have changed a number of things over the past few months, downsized a whole lot and I'm able to devote more time to my beloved passion of painting.  I have started a new "Open Studio" paint group at the Taylorsville Senior Center on Plymouth View recently and it has been well accepted by the community.  Each Friday AM we have a small group of artists get together, but the group will be growing as the word spreads that there's a new paint group opened for seniors to join.  You don't have to live in Taylorsville to use the beautiful facilities, but you will have to be a member of at least one local senior center.
We recently went up to the canyon to grab some pics of the amazing fall colors.  This is a shot of Bonnie getting a shot of our darling hubbies taking a break in the shade.  An interesting photo, the shadow from the trees looks cave like.  There were so many people that we ended up parking in a no parking zone and of course, anticipating the outrageous crowds of illegal parkers, the state raked in the bucks from all the tickets that were issued!  Probably met their whole yearly budget!  LOL!  Seriously though, the parking needs improvement! 
We ended our day by having the experience of watching a D-box movie: "The Maze Runner".  If you have not had the experience of a D-box movie, save your money!  The chairs were the most uncomfortable chairs ever in a theater!  They were suppose to move, but ours rarely did.  They actually kept me awake the entire movie though.  I liked the movie but you can tell there will be a sequel because it leaves you guessing about what's next. 
I will be updating and working on this blog again in the near future.  I also will be participating in a new blog hop in October, so I hope you will follow the blog to get updated as the fun approaches.  I will have a stencil tutorial to share with you and there will be a blog giveaway!  Add your email in the sidebar to follow....

Kandinski Circles

I recently found a new project that inspired, motivated and relaxed me all at the same time!  Kandinski Circles.  I painted these with watercolor but you could color these easy designs with just about anything.  A great art journal project or a wonderful way to spend a rainy afternoon with the kids.  They're simply circles drawn inside of circles and colored in.  When drawing these move your hand to the end of the pencil and loosely move your wrist to get some interesting shapes/circles.  Follow up with crayons, watercolors, pencils, markers, acrylics, etc.  Relax, listen to music, talk to friends, and just have some fun!

A New Blog

My local watercolor guild here in Sandy Utah is interested in having an on-line presence and sharing their work in one central place that is easy enough that all can participate.  I have been working on getting the blog set up and will be adding more fun things soon.  Please take a moment to go explore the home page, along with an experiment for textures page and get signed up to follow us by e-mail.  The guild's new blog address is:  Sandy WC Guild  (Click the name and it will take you to the blog). 
This blog isn't just about watercolor, it will feature many other things.

All water/wet media will be included, along with monthly challenges for our show & tell (which I hope we will start doing at our local monthly meetings beginning 2014),  (you can play along with these challenges too and post your results on your blog!  Simply leave us a link in the comments.) There are additional pages that share experimental results at the moment, but I will be posting techniques for: stenciling, carving textures, acrylics, inks, book reviews, etc. etc.  The possibilities are endless.  Please join us and don't forget to leave comments! 
Feedback is always monitored due to spammers, so your comments will not appear until they have been approved.  You may also share a link to your own website or blog in your comment.  We would love to venture over and take a peek at what you are creating. 
If you are interested in sharing a technique you have created, or a link to a good video you think would help inspire us, please leave the link in the comments and I will check it out.  If you host free tutorials, we would love to know about them, if you have written a book, a pdf zine or an e-book, again we would love to know about it. 
I recently set up a Facebook Group as well, but to keep life simple for me, I will be posting only to this blog and to the Sandy WC Guild blog.  No sense in duplicating my efforts. 
Not sure I shared this work in progress (above) with you all yet, but this is an enlarged area of berries in a bush taken from a photo I took up in Idaho at a fish hatchery.  I got kind of carried away with making the little streets on the leaves to make them look like maps viewed from space.  So, OK, I'm not always "photo realistic".  :-D

Paint It

 

I think this book would be a welcome addition to any child's (young or old) library.  While it is clearly designed for the beginning artists who want to explore the many options afforded by mixed media, it carries some of the projects into an intermediate level, but still remains doable for all ages.  At first I was skeptical only because I am an experienced mixed media artist, but the further I investigated the projects shown in the book, the more inspired I became.  The book is full of useful information, inspirational projects and easy to follow instructions.  Published by: Capstone Young Readers publishing company, it is precise in its instructions, has great photos for guidance and I am impressed with all of the information this one compact book supplies.   The mixed media projects include: Creating "Color Fields"-(which are modern day abstracts), making your own scratchboards (I remember these from elementary school and I loved creating designs by scratching off the black surface), indirect & direct painting with oils, and Chinese Brush work.  This book touches a bit on surrealism, plein air (outdoor painting), mosaics and so much more.
I'll be adding this book to my Granddaughters library for Christmas.  I'm going to love doing these projects with her.  Share your time, share your art. 
PS.  If you do art journaling and want to learn about a variety of supplies and techniques, this is a beginners book that would help you incorporate many forms of mixed media into your journals.  From: watercolor, to oil pastels, to acrylics and applying textures, this book covers what you need to get started. 

Please note-I am an affiliate of Amazon and I do receive a few pennies for every book you purchase via the link.  It adds up and allows me to purchase a book or two each year.  So thanks for clicking on....

5 Stencil Techniques To Share!

The following posts are each a technique that can be used with stencils.

My friend Cecilia has a new line of beautifully made stencils at Stencilgirl and I wanted to share some techniques for using them with you.  I am a hoarder of stencils.  I love, love, love them and have them hanging on pegboard hooks.  I have them filling plastic bins and simply overflowing in some drawers.  They are like rubber stamps, just can't ever have enough. 

Here is a quick and easy way to get layers of fabulous color:
Start with a decorated Artist Paper, also known as: Scrapbooking Paper.  Thin some acrylic paint in your choice of colors and base coat the paper.  You want the paint to be transparent so you see some of the decorative paper underneath.
Once this paint layer is dry, you will want to work relatively fast for the next step.

Paint this paper with Black Gesso and while it is still wet, lay your stencil down on top and spritz with rubbing alcohol.  (The cheapest you can find is OK.)  Keeping the stencil in place, take a paper towel or baby wipe and lightly scrub away the gesso from the design.  As you can see from these samples, what you get is determined by the acrylic paint you first selected.  Let everything dry and your newly made paper is ready to use in a journal, add images, etc.

PS The gingko leaf is one of Cecilia's stencils available at Stencilgirl. 

To view even more techniques and stencils that were designed by Cecilia, please visit her BLOG

Scroll down for another stencil technique!

Stencil Technique #2

This technique is super easy and done in no time at all.  Any paper that is thin enough to do a rubbing will work, even a shipping tag!  You will need a clear wax crayon, a piece of paper (I used an old ledger paper) the stencil of your choice, (again I used Cecilia's Gingko stencil), and a dye based inkpad in your choice of colors.
Lay your stencil down on a hard work surface, place the paper over the stencil and rub the crayon around to get a rubbing of the stencil.  You might have to rub fairly hard to get a decent imprint.  This creates a wax resist that can now be used with the dye inkpad or thinned acrylic paint.  If you use paint, you will need to wipe of the wax areas with a baby wipe, but since I used a thin paper here, I chose to use a piece of polyfil to apply my ink.  The polyester in this fiberfill allows the ink to blend on the paper if using multiple colors, but it also will remove any ink from the waxed areas, polishing the wax to a soft shine. 

Scroll down for another stencil technique!

Stencil Technique #3

For a quick watercolor effect, I used a watercolor paper as the substrate, my stencil of choice, a baby wipe and ink color of choice.  The baby wipe has enough moisture in it that a watercolor effect simply appears.  I dabbed the color through the stencil, but didn't try to get color over the whole stencil.  I like the grungy look of the hit or miss approach.  Randomness is a good thing. 

Scroll down for yet another great technique!

Stencil Technique #4

The substrate I used for this technique was a recycled cardboard that I salvaged from a cardboard shoe box.  (See post below for another project I did using recycled shoe boxes).  I didn't have to paint a base coat of paint on this since it already had a black paper coating, but if the substrate you choose to work with needs a base coat, choose any color you like.  Next, grab a glue stick!  That's right, you want to cover the substrate with a glue stick, this will give you the amazing crackle texture you see here in the background.  Let this set for just a couple of minutes and apply an acrylic paint that you slightly thinned.  You don't want it too thick, but you don't want it too thin either.  Just like Goldilocks, you want it just right-like thick gravy!  LOL!  Let this dry, then take another stencil and dab another acrylic with a stencil brush in a random hit or miss action.  (The lines are from a beautiful heart stencil from Stencil Girl).  The red design is another stencil from Stencil Girl, but to apply this I again used a baby wipe and an inkpad.  A hit or miss action for applying, allows all the underneath colors to show through. 

Want more techniques?  Keep scrolling!

Stencil Technique #5

This will be my last technique and I think you will love it.  Start with a sheet of glossy photo paper, a cosmetic sponge and some Mod Podge or a liquid gel medium.  (I used mod podge for my sample that is shown here.)  Lay your stencil of choice on top of the glossy paper and using a cosmetic sponge, simply dab the mod podge on the stencil.  I tried to make sure it was evenly coated so I got a good impression from the stencil design.  Set this aside to dry.  I let mine dry overnight since you will be doing multiple steps on top of this. 
So, the next day, when it is dry, you will need to use a dye inkpad or various inkpads of your choice.  (I choose to use a denim blue and walnut. inks.)  With a polyfil, buff the ink over the entire surface of the glossy paper.  this will stick everywhere but over the mod podge.  This acts as a resist.  The darker the color of the inks, the better the resist will show up, so you may want to apply several applications of ink.  Now you need a texture plate of some sort.  Something like this collagraph I made using Tim Holtz's grunge board design.  (To make this I simply glued the design onto a thick cardboard.) 
Place the texture plate, collagraph, rubber stamp, etc. on a hard surface, lay your glossy paper over the top, grab a nail file or piece of sand paper and lightly sand along the surface of the paper at an angle.  You don't want to drag the file over the whole paper, just the edge of the file, over the texture plate.  This produces what looks like a rubbing even in the resist areas.  Move your texture plate as often as needed, turning it in different directions. 
I hope you enjoyed these quick and easy techniques for using stencils and please, go venture over to Stencilgirl to see who else has some amazing stencils being offered there!  I was pleasantly surprised!  A great lineup! 

More Washed Out Ink Projects

 I had so much fun with this washed out technique that my daughter and I decided to experiment on a couple of those journal tablets, the cardboard covered comp books and this is what we came up with.  She used a wonderful scrapbooking paper stencil which really gave her lots of pattern.  She said her bookcover looks like silver foil where the spray paint is and I used a 4 pattern page of stencils that came in a kit of 8 patterns.  It's been fun having an art partner again these past few weeks!