Paper Lamination

I spent 3 days last week at Littleheath Barn doing a workshop led by Christine Chester.  It was so enjoyable.

Transparent fabrics are notoriously difficult to photograph but here goes!  This is the basic paper lamination with newspaper and organza, with matte medium scraped through a Thermofax screen.

The next two are the result of a gesso lamination.  My fabrics don't really echo each other as they should.

Another newspaper two

The next two are dry brush lamination using magazine pages.

I handstitched this piece.  It needs pressing and binding.

Find out more about Christine's online Paper Lamination course.

Thanks for joining me today
Bernice

A collaged zine

I thought I would have a go at another sort of zine.  One with a collaged background.

Collect together a variety of papers that have a similar colour.  Use book paper, patterned tissue paper, maps, music paper etc.

Tear up the papers into small, but not to small, pieces.  Very small pieces take longer to glue down!

Take an A4 sheet of paper and start glueing the torn papers to the A4 paper.  Use PVA or gel medium.  Put a layer of glue on the A4 sheet and over the top of the torn piece to ensure contact.  Make sure the collage pieces overlap with the next piec.

Cover the whole A4 sheet.  It's better to let the collage pieces go off the edge of the paper.

When the glue is dry trim the edges.

Take some gesso or white acrylic paint, and wipe it over the collaged papers.  I used a wet wipe.  You could use an old credit card.  Doing this blends all the papers together.   When the gesso is dry put the paper under a weight to flatten out ready for the next activity.

Make the zine as in previous posts.  Fold length ways from the collaged side

Fold inwards from the untouched side.

Then fold to make your zine.

WIth this zine, I'm going to make pockets.  You could just have 2 pockets with the tops open or as in this zine have two top opening pockets and two side opening pockets.  I've used double sided tape so you can see where to put your glue.

To make the inserts I found some Kraft paper tags.  The one on the right was a perfect fit so I cut the other smaller one to match.

I tried one out in the side pocket but decided it was too narrow.

I measured the size of the pocket and drew out the rectangles on the larger Kraft tag.  You can use any type of card.

To cut matching 'shoulders', put your two cards on top of each other.

The cut one corner off both pieces of card.

Turn the bottom card over and using the top card as a template cut the corners off at each side.

Punch holes in the tags.  You can thread string, ribbon or wool through the holes.

Your collaged zine is all ready to decorate with words, pictures, photographs.  Whatever takes your fancy!

Have fun!

Thanks for joining me today.

Bernice

Glimpses of Jesus 5

Glimpses of Jesus in the Old Testament is a year long bible study written by Simon Clay of Jubilee Church Solihull.   You can join in at any time.

Today's post is about the birth of Isaac in Genesis 18.

I made a very simple journal page for this.

I printed out the ultrasound scan of my grandson on ordinary printer paper and glued it to the journal page.  I put white gesso on the rest of the page and over the edge of the torn photo.  When that was dry I painted the gesso with grey paint.  Then I used sticker letters which I drew round with a pen.

Do have a look back through the posts on the Glimpses of Jesus blog where you will find links to other people's art and poetry.

Thanks for stopping by.
Bernice

Glimpses of Jesus 3

Glimpses of Jesus in the Old Testament is a year long bible study written by Simon Clay of Jubilee Church Solihull.   You can join in at any time.

Today's study is about Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3.  The part that stood out to me and inspired my journal page was later in the story in Genesis 15:5
He took him outside and said, “Look up at the sky and count the stars - if indeed you can count them.” Then he said to him, “So shall your offspring be.” 

I thought of the numerous stars in the sky - too many to count - and that one special star that led to the stable when Jesus was born.  And that led to this page.

I put a thin coat of gesso on the page and then used a snowflake stencil for the large star and a star stencil for the other stars.  I used Transparent Texture Paste through the stencil.

I put a thin layer of acrylic paint over the page and you can see the texture of the kitchen paper where I dabbed it off.   I wiped someo f the paint off the stars.

I put another coat of acrylic paint over the page.

I used some white acrylic paint through the stencil to make the large star show up.  It's not as neat as I would have liked it to have been.  The paste had spread under the stencil.  Then I wrote around the edge of the page.

You can join in with the Bible study without doing a creative response.  I do hope you will join me.

Thanks for stopping by.
Bernice

Day 24 My Attitude of Gratitude Journal

If you want to join in with making an Attitude of Gratitude Journal through the month of November click through to the Challenge blog.

Here on this blog I am going to share how I made the page for today's prompt on Photography. 

Today's art challenge was to 'use the gesso transfer technique to add a photo to your page'.

I decided to use a photo to make the whole background and because it was wet and miserable I printed off an inkjet copy of the photo and didn't go out to get a laser photocopy of it.  I also printed a mirror image version to see which I would use.

I tore round the edge of the printout and scraped gesso onto the whole page.

I stuck the printout on, print side down and smoothed it on.  Some of it wrinkled and some of it didn't really stick properly.

When it was totally dry, I sprayed water onto the paper and rubbed it away with my fingers.

As I said, not all of it was stuck properly, plus I think I wet some of it too much so bits of the image came away.  I decided I would stick with though so you can see what happens when mistakes happen - they are called opportunities.

I sprayed the whole page with Lime ink and stamped with Archival Ink.  At this point I didn't like the page too much.  I hadn't realised that the ink would make the page so dark.

So I put some orange acrylic paint on part of the page with my fingers.  I sprayed the verse with orange ink before sticking it on the page. I journaled and added highlights with a white pen.

It's still not wonderful but I can come back to it later to play around with it.

If you use an inkjet printout I think you probably need to leave it to dry for longer than the 5 minutes I left it.  And actually using a laser photocopy does get better results.  I have used a photocopy before and the image transfer was great.

Anyway, a day for you to experiment.  Have fun.  See you tomorrow.

Day 22 My Attitude of Gratitude Journal

If you want to join in with making an Attitude of Gratitude Journal through the month of November click through to the Challenge blog.

Here on this blog I am going to share how I made the page for today's prompt on Thanksgiving.

Today's art challenge was to 'find a way to add texture to your page today'.

I spread a narrow strip of gesso down the left hand side of the page and pressed a rubber stamp into the gesso and left the gesso to dry.  Remember to clean your stamp straightaway.

I wiped some turquoise and some green acrylic paint onto the whole page.

Then I stamped the leaves with gesso instead of ink.

When the gesso had dried I sprayed with pink ink and restamped the leaf stamps with black Archival ink. 

I  also stamped some leaves off the edge of the page.  I stuck the verse on and did the journaling.

As the gesso dried it absorbed some of the bright pink ink so now the leaves are slightly pink!

Another page to come back to I think.  I might possibly highlight the flower pattern on the left hand side with black pen.  Not sure though!  What do you think?

See you tomorrow.

Day 20 My Attitude of Gratitude Journal

If you want to join in with making an Attitude of Gratitude Journal through the month of November click through to the Challenge blog.

Here on this blog I am going to share how I made the page for today's prompt on Health.

Today's art challenge was to 'make your own stamp to use on your page today'.

There's a lot of photos in today's post!

Here are some examples of stamps I've made in the past.  The top four in this picture were made from a product no longer made but you could use foam or flat sponge to cut out shapes and stick on card as I have done.  The bottom stamp is made from chipboard letters stuck onto card.

The top stamp is made from string stuck into pva glue.  The stamp on the left is string and small bits of sponge and the small stamp is made from cutting into a thin piece of polystyrene.

This next stamp is made from plastic tile spacers.

These two stamps are made from Kling-On and stuck onto pieces of thick acetate from packaging.  The Kling-On was put through a die cutter using two Tim Holtz dies.  Tim Holtz suggests you use foam.  I printed the dress form with orange acrylic paint and black Archival ink.    

 

So, on to today's page.

This started as a piece of black cardstock.  I put a thin layer of gesso over the whole page and whilst it was wet added in some orange acrylic paint.

I used 3 colours of acrylic paint (Paint Dabbers) on my tile spacer stamp and stamped onto the page.  The effect is totally random due to how the spacers touch the paper!

I stamped the dress form with black Archival ink.  I stuck on the verse and highlighted the strips and some of the spacer shapes with a black pen.

I like the way that the texture of the cardstock shows through the black ink on the dress form.

And here is the finished page with the journaling.

I'm excited to see what stamp or stamps you make today.