FALL CROP 2013: Anna's Art Class

[AnnaB]

I am getting ready to post my class soon... I think I need to go find some snacks and something to drink, in order to keep my head straight during the class.

Here's a recap of the list of supplies I posted earlier. At the bottom I added a couple of things. If you wanna follow the class as I post the instructions, a heat gun is necessary. But if you have to wait for drying, don't panic... just follow along and continue working on your project later on. All the class info will remain here on the MB also after the crop, if you want to go back and have a look!

Materials:
-a 6x6 or 8x8 canvas (or cardboard or paper if you prefer, you can also work in a journal if you like)
-a 4x6 photo of someone and it should be a portrait in profile, preferrably printed on some kind of heavier paper or cardstock, my "someone" is my daughter Alva and I'm creating my canvas for her
-any kind of liquid glue, matte medium or mod podge
-patterned paper (I'm only using one piece, slightly smaller than the canvas)
-white gesso
-black gesso or black acrylic paint (preferably matte)
-a white sharpie poster paint pen, or a white posca pen or any other white pen that writes on top of the black paint
-stamps (any background stamps you love)
-black ink (permanent/water proof)
-other decos of your choice

optionally:-other paints or mists of your choice (I used some Glimmer Glam)
-posca pen in other colours
-spray bottle with water
-Faber Castell Pitt Artist pens, brush tip (in a matching colour)

additions:
scissors
heat gun (useful, but not 100% necessary)

[KarenP]

Yay! I got my mini canvas this week - it was buy one get one free! Score!

[AnnaB]

Yay! I got my mini canvas this week - it was buy one get one free! Score!

Awesome!

[sug]

what are Posca pens? alcohol based? water based?

[AnnaB]

Welcome to the class! I'm so excited to get to share this project with you and I hope you will enjoy it! Please feel free to ask any questions you may have, at any point!

What are we doing?
We're going to create a canvas with stamps and paint, and we'll be creating our own stencil out of a photo, to use on our project. We'll be using black paint (or gesso) for the silhouette and on top of the silhouette we're going to add some writing in white.

The theme...
You can start to think about the your theme right away. I'm creating my canvas for my daughter Alva, using a photo of her for the silhouette and the writing on top will be lots of positive words describing her. I wrote a long list of all the words I could come up with and then I picked words from that list, when it was time to write on the canvas.

If you dont' want to do a canvas...
Of course this project can be done on paper or in a journal too – it doesn’t need to be a canvas. You can also use a photo from a magazine or any random photo and you don’t have to describe a person in your writing, but could choose another theme if you wish!

I am inspired by...
When I first started art journaling a whole bunch of years ago, I took several classes with the fabulous Dina Wakley and her work using silhouettes has inspired me when creating this project. I think you all know her, but, still... for lots of wonderful inspiration, check out her webpage here: http://dinawakley.com/

[AnnaB]

what are Posca pens? alcohol based? water based?

They are waterbased markers, similar to the Sharpie Poster paint!

[AnnaB]

The first thing I did was to choose a piece of patterned paper for the background. My canvas is 8x8 and I cut the paper to be a bit smaller. Before adding the paper to the canvas, I did some stamping on the background using a couple of the stamps from the November kit.

I haven't yet glued the paper down, it's just placed on the canvas so you can see the size.



The stamping is rather random, but one thing that I do love is to let some of the stamping go off the edge of the paper. The outlined image from the “let’s go” stamp set for November is one of my new favourite stamps and I’ll be colouring some of the stamped images in with a Faber Castell pen later on. If you have a stamp that you can use in a similar way, colouring an area using pens or paint, please go ahead and use it, but other stamps works just fine too. It’s just to add interest and to create patterns.

You can also add colour on top of any background stamps or inbetween lines created by stamps, so it doesn't have to be a stamp like this, with an "empty area" but you can find areas to colour anyway. I'm rambling... I hope it makes some sense!

[AnnaB]

I then glued down the paper to my canvas, using matte medium.



When it was all dry (you can speed the drying up using a heat gun) I used some white gesso around the edges to make the paper blend into the canvas a bit.

[AnnaB]

The next step is to take the photo out. I printed this on a heavy white paper/cardstock (no photo paper) and I didn’t use the highest quality setting, because it’s not necessary. To make it a bit easier to cut the silhouette out, I first outlined the image, using a black pen.



On this particular photo there's very little space left above her head. That's not optimal because it makes the stencil more fragile and difficult to use... and the photo that I acutally used (but didn't take photos of before) was slightly smaller, leaving more room around Alva's head.

[AnnaB]

Cut the silhouette out!

[AnnaB]

I used the cut out part and placed it where I wanted it to be on my canvas, before doing the next few steps. This is not completely necessary, but if you use lots of paint and texture, this is a good idea in order to keep the area that we’ll be painting black and later also writing onto, smooth and to avoid bumps.

I used a blue Distress Paint and made splatters over my entire canvas. Any acrylic paint can be used, just dilute it with water in order to make it thin enough to create the splatters. I loaded a brush with paint and then used another brush to hit the first one and make the paint splatter away. I was also shaking my brush up and down, above the canvas.

Ps. If I was to make another canvas today... I would have moved the silhouette slightly to the right, making her look into the canvas... I have no idea why I placed her in the middle... Ds.

[AnnaB]

I then took some extra paint on my finger and painted the edges a bit. In this step, you may of course add as much paint as you wish and you can use only one colour like me, or you can use several colours!

[kissy]

What a brilliant way to get a silhouette !!

[AnnaB]

My next step includes one of the wonderful Faber Castell Pitt Pens from the November Project Art kit. They contain pigmented India ink and are permanent when dry. I will show you several ways of using them in my Project Art post later in the month.

For this project, I am using one of them to colour my stamped images. You could also use acrylic paint or any other type of paint, like other types of markers or pencils.

I only added ink to a part of the area inside the outlined image and then I used a brush with some water to blend the ink and spread it out. When the ink is dry, it is permanent, but if you add some water right away, it’s possible to spread it and blend it. I think the surface you use probably matters too and the matte medium/gesso makes this technique possible. If you just have plain paper as your surface, the ink may be absorbed into the paper before it’s possible to blend it.

[AnnaB]

What a brilliant way to get a silhouette !!

Thank you Christine! I love that the end result is a silhouette that looks like Alva, but still it's not too obvious that it's her. The similarity is a bit subtle, sort of...

[AnnaB]

Next I added more of the blue Distress Paint. I added a few "dots" (using the dabber top) and since the Distress Paints are so reactive with water I sprayed some water on top of the paint and then tilted the canvas and let the paint drip down. You can do the same with other acrylic paints too. Just dilute them with some water if the paint is too heavy bodied.

[AnnaB]

When the paint was dry (again you can use a heat gun to speed it up) I took a couple of pens out. I used a white Sharpie poster paint pen and Posca pen in light blue. Both are water based markers and I find them to be very similar in how they can be used. They work on most surfaces and are really good at covering.



I used the pens to make scribbles… very inspired by Denise, she's made fabulously scribbled layouts! It’s really fun once you get going!

[AnnaB]

I then put the photo of Alva back again to protect the canvas while dripping on some Glimmer Glam. I used a pipette to make these splatters.

The Glam looks really dark here (it's a blue-greenish colour), but since I'll be adding a black silhouette, they won't stand out quite this much in the end.

You can of course use any kind of mist or paint for this!

[AnnaB]

Now it’s time to take the black gesso out, and to use the stencil we made earlier. Any black paint will do, as long as it’s possible to write on top of it. Matte paint is probaby the easiest and I also like the look of it, but I belive the Sharpie will work on top of glossy paint too.

[AnnaB]

Hold the stencil firmly in place and apply the paint carefully! Go from the stencil and into the center, rather than the other way around.



And here we go - my canvas after applying the black paint.