GRAB THE BROLLIES!!!

Hi and welcome. As I'm writing this post, the temperature outside has dropped and I know we're in for another chilly night.... just right for snuggling up in a warm doona!
Our inspiration at ARTastic this  month was based on the artwork of Shirley Charlton (aka Shirlroma) called "Umbrellas, wet street". 
I loved this piece, with its wet, reflective appearance, the pops of colour from clothing and umbrellas and the texture on the pavement. 

I had a photo taken on our last holiday in Tasmania, showing the reflective view of yachts and old buildings on the waterfront area of Hobart, and the rain falling on the nearby Mt Wellington. This, was just right for our theme and added criteria this month. Minutes after taking this photo we had to make a dash for cover... no brollies on our holiday!

The background was stencilled onto white card, using a new stencil which I thought went so well with a flagstone look.

 

This was left to dry slightly before spraying with various ink sprays and building up layers of colour using Glimmer Mists and Lindy Stamp Gang Sprays. These gave a beautiful metallic , watery sheen to the whole of the background. Once these were dry I sprayed sections with Dylusions Ink Spays and let them dribble freely down the page... helped by misting with water.

 

 

 

Umbrellas were made from papers which had also been sprayed or inked in some way. This one I stamped with versamark and heat embossed using a white embossing powder. It was then overstamped and coloured with Inca Gold 'Rose Quartz'.

 

 

Two of the brollies were cut from smooshed Distress Inks, using some of this year's colour releases. two were cut from paper sprayed with Dylusions Ink Sprays, and the remaining one on the centre of the grouping was cut from tissue paper which had been painted with Dylusions Acrylic paints (the most yummy colours!)

 

The title was also cut from the same types of paper and then given a coat of Glossy Accents to give them a wet look. This was also applied to the ribs of the umbrellas.
A lot of messy fun, using techniques and mediums I love to play with.
If you want to play with us, pop on over to:artastic and check out what the team has done. We'd love to see your art here.
Cheers, for now.
Di

 

 

FAVOURITE PLACES

Hi and welcome. Today I'm sharing a canvas featuring some of the places I love to visit in my local area as well as an artwork by an indigenous Australian artist, Sally Morgan, as my DT piece for Anything But A Card. Our theme this month has been  "Inspired By the Masters".

This artwork by Sally Morgan is a screen print "Aboriginal Land" from 1995. This depicts images of  six different Australian landscapes including desert, rivers, mountains and trees. The whole piece has been encircled by a rainbow serpent to give strength and unity to the print. It is also a creation spirit in Aboriginal Australia.

I chose a 50 x 35cm canvas so that I could work a number of photos on a larger area. The background was sprayed with Dylusions Inks and Lindy Stamp Gang sprays. A border of leaves was stencilled on with Viva Modelling Creams and Ferro combinations.

I also stencilled on a water effect with the same products. The photos I used all have some significance with each other, as well as some Aboriginal significance. 
The top photo is an aerial view of Mt Warning, named so by Captain Cook and known as Wollumbin by the local Aboriginals. This peak and the rim of mountains around it are the remains of a huge shield volcano which covered this area. With the erosion over the millennium, the beautiful Tweed Valley, Richmond Valley and the Border ranges were formed.
The remaining photos are of the Nimbin Rocks, Whian Whian Falls (taken one very misty morning),  rapids at a creek near Protester's Falls, and overflow from Rocky Creek Dam, after a period of flooding rain.
Rain that falls in the Mt Warning and Border Ranges catchment area impact these creeks and dams, hence the water connection on the canvas.
Many of the towns and villages, particularly in the Tweed have Aboriginal names, including the home town of my childhood and teenage years, Murwillumbah.
They are all a part of rainforest areas and that is why I have chosen to use the leaves to connect them. My bright colours, inspired by Sally Morgan, have been used in the flowers that I've made. These represent lillypilly flowers which are a typical rainforest tree. These were painted onto card using modelling cream and then streaks and dots of pearl pens. Additional leaves were stamped onto mop-up card and cut out.
Pop on over to: anythingbutacard and check out what masters the rest of the team has chosen and how they've been inspired.

Catch you again soon.
Cheers, Di

INTO THE WILD at Anything But A Card

Green with envy is the theme this month at Anything but A Card. I've gone with the green component, using a photo taken in Tasmania...Horseshoe Falls at Russell Falls National Park. .... and it was certainly green, with gorgeous tree ferns and rocks covered with thick, long strands of  moss everywhere one looked.

The background was covered with panels of different green card stock, stamped with Darkroom Door stamps. The same stamps were used for the leaves which were then fussy cut, blinged up a bit with 3D stamping paint and then arranged on the layout. I used a curved arrangement to suggest movement of wind and water. Additional features included a punched strip, a postcard style paper that was perfect... into the wild... and a sprayed, die cut tissue paper dragonfly.

 

 

 

 

 

Pop on over to:anythingbutacard and check out what the rest of the team has done for this month's challenge. We'd love to see your work here.
Cheers for  now,
Di.

STRIATED SUNSET

Hi and welcome. This month's criteria at ARTastic is to use a quote on whatever you create. As the colours in the inspirational artwork were reminiscent of some of my sunset photos, this is what I decided to go with.

A quote from John Ruskin, 'At sunset nature is painting for us... day after day... infinite beauty."   has been used for this, along with some of the colours, stripes and splotches from the inspiration artwork.

The features of stripes, patterning and colour has also been extended onto the black background through the use of stencilling with swipes of colour using texture pastes, sprays and dimensional pearls. Some of the background colour was also applied using the serrated edges of plastic knives. I have also used sprayed and torn tissue paper, again using the colours from this month's artwork.

Background showing stencilling and scraping. Coppery tones were added later.

Please drop by the ARTastic site and have a look at how the rest of the team has played with this month's theme. You'll be in for a real treat! Check it all out at:artastic



Thank you for dropping by. Your comments always give me a buzz and brighten my day.
Catch you soon.
Cheers, Di



FRIENDSHIP TAG

Hi again. This month Anything But A card Challenges has its theme centred around friendship. For this challenge I have made a very large tag.

The base is made from black cardstock. This was stencilled with modelling cream. The next layer is a wallpaper sample and then I've added a topper from Graphic 45 Botanical Tea Collection.
I'd been thinking that a number of my fiends are some distance away from me and though we rarely see each other, when we do have the chance to catch up in person, or on the phone, our conversations flow easily. I decided that I would make up a quote to say this... True friendship transcends time and distance.  I think that most of you would have friends that this is true for.
To complete the tag I added 2 of my new  and rapidly becoming favourite, dies and embossing folders from the Tim Holtz range. Both were cut from card I had sprayed with various Lindy Stamp Gang sprays and then stencilled with modelling cream.
The ribbon at the top is a gorgeous hand- dyed silk ribbon I purchased at a local craft fair.
Pop on over to: anythingbutacard and check out what the rest of the team has done for this challenge. We'd love to see your art here.

Thanks for stopping by.
Cheers, Di

NERIDA WELCOMES IN THE NEW YEAR

Hi and Happy New Year everyone. I hope 2015 brings you much joy, good health, love, peace and the chance to indulge in your favourite pastimes.
The full impact of summer has hit us in the southern regions of our planet and in light of this, Pixels and Paper Challenges have for your inspiration a theme that will sure to have you searching for the summer fun moments.

My take on this can only be described as different, as it brought out the inner child and my love of fantasy.

Let me introduce you to Nerida in her wondrous under-the-sea grotto. With her you'll also see some of her close friends.

 

I've used a large canvas board on which to create this artwork. The surface was coated with gesso before spraying with various inks including; Lindy Stamp Gang, Perfect Pearls Mists and Dylusions Sprays. I use combinations of blues, aquas, greens, yellows, and silver before a final quick burst with Perfect Pearls "Perfect Pearls".

 

 

Once dried, the background was stencilled with Viva Decors Modelling Cream, again using sea-toned colours. The Mother of Pearl was the perfect one to use for the bubbles,

Nerida, a mermaid from a Chocolate Baroque set, was stamped, photographed and then copied onto A4 laser print paper, to give me the size I required. She was coloured using a water brush and the same set of modelling cream colours. I also used these for colouring the other stamped pieces (small seahorse and seaweed).
The dolphin is a photo of part of a large door feature I did while teaching. Again, the photo of this piece was printed onto laser paper and the dolphin cut out.
Chipboard sea shapes were inked with chalk edgers before decorating with Viva Decor Pens.
Strings of beads were added to make some interesting underwater plants.

Larger beads were added to the top of the grotto. These were placed to look as though they were swaying in gentle ocean currents.

I hope you enjoyed meeting Nerida and her friends.
I really had fun doing this canvas and I am loving the effects that can be done with a combination of sprays, modelling creams and stencils.
Pop on over to:pixelsandpaperchallengeblog to see what the rest of the team have done with our inspiration photo.

 

 



 

Thank you for stopping by. Cheers, for now. Di

YIN-YANG OF SEASONS AT ANYTHING BUT A CARD

Hi and welcome. At Anything But A Card this month we are celebrating either autumn or spring or a combination of both, as I have done. For the challenge this month I decided to do a reverse canvas (40cm x 40cm) and a yin-yang stylised design celebrating autumn and spring.

I started with the canvas, painting it with acrylic paints ad adding mists of Perfect Pearls and Dylusions to give some extra colour and depth. At this stage I wasn't too concerned that the colours weren't exactly in half, since a good proportion was going to be covered up anyway.

The yin-yang design was drawn onto white card stock. Flowers and leaves were hand drawn and then coloured using combinations of watercolour crayons, Distress Inks ( inks pressed onto plastic sheeting and the colour picked up with a fine brush) and Mementoluxe inks (applied the same way). The background was painted on using a combination of Inca  Golds (applied with a water brush) and 3D Texture Paint (applied the same way).

 
After I  had put this piece onto the canvas I added some more Inca Gold to sections.
At this stage, I decided the frame needed some additional colour applied, so I daubed on Distress Stains  before gluing on the additional leaves and flowers.

Leaves were diecut using Tim Holtz Tattered Leaves die. These were made from a combination of patterned papers and cream card stock smooshed with Distress Inks and spritzed with Lindy's Stamp Gang Sprays (I'm loving the richness of these). While these were still damp I scrunched them up and let them dry before opening them out and tweaking them a bit more.
Different cones and dried seed pods were added., as well as a ceramic gecko.

Flowers were made using the Tattered Florals dies. These were made from smooshed and sprayed card stock and again scrunched while damp and left to dry. Some were formed into rose shapes
while others were just layered.

Acetate packaging was stamped with butterflies, cut out and coloured with alcohol inks.
The canvas and yin-yang design was finished with Collage Pauge to seal it.
When the whole piece was finished (or so I thought), I decided it needed some extra glam, so I used a combination of Perfect Pearls, Liquid Pearls and Viva Pearl pens to outline flowers, add some detail to the leaves and to also go around the outer edge of the circle.

It's now ready to find a spot to hang it.

Thank you for stopping by. Do pop on over to:http://anythingbutacard.blogspot.ca/ and have a look at what the rest of the design team has done with the Autumn Magic/ Spring Wonder Challenge. We'd love to see your art here.
Cheers for now,
Di