Finally, I get to work on the covers :)
I had that messed up recycled A4 paper with blotches of paint on it and I didn't think it would be good enough to cut up and collage with! Instead of collaging this time I went for looking for the images in the paint. It was very messy and decided to just stick it on first and see what I can find. I also liked that little bit of golden fabric paint in the center of it…. but.. couldn't see anything.
What to do now? Snip snip snip the excess paper and look again! Still.. NOTHING!!!! GRRRRR
OK OK, don't panic, just work on another area, so I go add some paint around the edges to create a border. I'm not sure if I used the combination of yellow and green before, it was usually with blue, so I opted for green this time. And yes indeed, this paint is very dry and when you apply it with your fingers it uses up a lot of it! But, it created a nice texture :)
Now, take another look and see if we can find someone or something on the page… and YES, We found the screaming man!! YAY :) It reminded me of that painting called The Scream by Edvard Munch, accept mine was not staring at me mine was wearing a nice blue cape, had lovely red lips and sprigs for hair! Don't ask me why he looks like this, this is how he wished to be, I don't decide, I just follow. Turned out he also had a friend called "thoughts" that is hovering around his head all the time, like a black cloud! Yes, crazy things can be seen in paint!
Back to my doodling, I used a turquoise glitter acrylic paint tube on the yellow and a white one on the green. Had to add two layers for the with glitter or it wont show. Good, now that is the front done, with the main character.
On to the back and who do I see??? Ohhhhh It's Squidward Tentacles from SpongeBob SquarePants :) Or at least he reminds me of him. He was also wearing something purple. Only difference is that mine was smiling, which is unusual for Mr. Tentacles. I liked this one :)
For the border I used the same colors as on the front cover but switched the design around so as not to make them all look like one page. This is, after all, the cover!
Now that the main characters are done, as well as the border, time to see what else can be added. I got the idea to use golden fabric paint to follow that gold blotch that was in the center of the paper I used. Put gold all around. It turned out pretty nice and because of it's transparency it let the paint below show, and it did unify the background a bit better. Made both Mr. Scream and Mr. Tentacles stand out, especially after I gave Mr. Tentacles a bit of a pink hue with his purple skin :) And, that's that, it's finished! The cover is DONE DONE DONE :)
Happy journaling!
This is how it looks if I open both sides flat:
You can enjoy the whole creative process here:
Supplies used: (in order of appearance)
- Recycled product manual
- Masking tape to protect the spine
- Recycled paper with mopped up paint
- Wood glue
- Acrylic paint
- Recycled misprint of another art journal page
- Nail sticker flowers
- Acrylic varnish to seal the page
