My journey with my mixed media art journal page "It Is Written, If You Believe, You Shall Triumph"Having used a lot of collage pieces in my last page and not having much luck with an image, this time I decided to use less. I took the plunge and talked myself into directly using gesso on the manual page, which is pretty thin for mixed media, but it seemed to be strong enough :)
It was also nice to hear the crackling of that paper while I was applying gesso and then the acrylic paint for the background :) I don't know what it is, but the sound of paper movement and tearing is so nice to me, probably because it's part of the creation process :D
This time I also decided to use only one "shade/color" of collage pieces to see if it would make finding an image easier. It was successful, in my opinion! I also just centered the collage because of the background to cover the paper in the middle, no other intentions where there other than creating art with no direction in mind.
I've been busy organizing a lot of stuff at home as I have to downsize with everything. Discovering that I have a lot of paper that I kept for recycling, this then prompted me to use as much as I could in each page, as long as it fits, so as to use up my current overflowing supply. This is when the thing sheets of written paper came in. This was part of my "gratitude" writing that I wanted to use and I think it gave a nice effect and contrast with the blue color :)
I'm always amazed at what becomes of each page in this journal in particular, since I've taken the leap to starting with only the intention of creating something and without knowing what that will be.
For instance, this time the collage looked a bit like King Tut from Ancient Egypt :) He just popped out of the collage, one line at a time :)
I also had no idea what the text for this page would be, but when it came it seemed to fit perfectly :)
This time I also used my acrylic paint in a tube to doodle on the edge and even wrote with it and it went very well. I might do that more often too as I like the textured effect to the touch. Feels nice all those lines under my fingers when I feel the page. The same goes for the text.
All in all I believe this is one of my favorite pages up till now :)
Please feel free to comment and share your opinion and suggestions :) You can also check the final picture of this page on my blog, the colors are better there.
Here is the actual creative process as it happens:
Supplies used: (in order of appearance)
- Masking tape to protect the spine
- Gesso (to prime)
- Acrylic paint
- Recycled pieces of paint covered paper for collage
- Wood glue (watered down to make it easier to spread)
- Recycled notebook paper (my gratitude lists)
- Permanent markers (for outlining and text)
- Fluid paint marker (gold for the Ankh on his headdress)
- Acrylic varnish to seal the page (Matt/gel medium)
