IT'S ALL BALANCED!

Hi and welcome to my first post as a newbie on the Anything But A Card team.... and what a thrill it was to have been asked to join. The inspiration this month was taken from this beautiful photo,

with the added criteria of balance. Pop on over to the ABAC Challenge at:
http://anythingbutacard.blogspot.ca/  to see how this inspiration has taken the rest of the team.

I decided to take the artistic meaning of balance and designed a yin-yang zen-tangled inspired pattern.

I  find this style of doodling quite relaxing and it was a technique I used regularly in my former life as a teacher. The designs the children came up with were always amazing and they were always so engrossed when doing them (this = quiet! always a big plus in the classroom!!)
This design was drawn onto white cardstock. To make sure my pattern was the same both sides, I first outlined the white section and then photocopied the design. The rest of the colour was added to both sides of the design before I put them in place. Even though this looks fiddly, it wasn't really. The only thing I found to be a problem, was when I joined the two pieces together and discovered I still had a small gap! Easily fixed... just added another pattern element.  Once all of the drawing and shading was completed, the whole piece was adhered to a canvas which had been prepared by painting with white and black gesso. I used 2 - 3 coats of both to get a good coverage. Stick-on black beads were placed along the white / black border: gave some extra dimension as well as covering any small paint line errors. I used the same idea with the outside of the circle, using larger stick-on pearls. I didn't have any black ones in the size I wanted, so coloured the white ones with a permanent ink pen.
The flowers were cut from a lace paper I've had for years. The other component was chipboard flourishes, again painted with the 2 gessos.
All of the gluing was done with Collage Pauge and this was also used as a sealer over the whole of the canvas. I used a permanent Sharpie pen for the design.
Thank you for visiting. I always love to read your comments. Come over and play with us.
Cheers, Di