Mixed Media Art Journal / Sketchbook pages!

First of all I wish to apologise for being such a bad blogger! I have just been caught up in lots of 'life's stuff' at the moment and haven't really had a lot of spare time on my hands.

Anyway, we have moved onto a new 'block' of lessons in Art and this time it's Mixed Media!! Yay!! ....I get to play!!! lol.

We had the choice of four themes, but I picked 'The/my environment, simply because it was carrying on from the last block and I didn't need to kind of freak my poor brain out trying to concentrate on something else!! Lazy I know , but, hey, my poor wee brain has enough to think about just now! !

Enough rambling for now.....as I said earlier, I have chosen The / My Environment and of all things i chose to do it just HAD to be the Oil Refinery at Grangemouth!! .... Jeez... NOT very creative I hear you say...buuuuut... there IS a method in my madness because I am also working on stuff that is made with oil or derivatives of oil. So you see, it all ties together, AND it will tie in with something I have planned for further into this lesson!

So lets get down to business then shall we?..... First off all these to pages are supposed to represent the positives and negatives of the Refinery, and it's seems to have turned out ok. Had an absolute blast (sorry) putting it together but boy was the prep work a nightmare....took forever!!

BACKGROUND

Is done by roughly painting a base of gesso on both pages, when dry I then sprayed lots of water and  used Dylusions Black Marble and Melted Chocolate spray inks, sprayed more water then just let the colours run into one another while drying off with a heat gun! Was looking for an "oil slick" look! I sprayed some Fireworks Interference Blue over the top of all that, wanted to get and "oil on water look"! Really pleased with the background, turned out exactly as I imagined (for a change)!




LEFT HAND PAGE



The large cooling tower is done using sandpaper! along with a dried out baby wipe for the steam!
The "pipes" at the bottom are actually Allen Keys that were freebies form flat pack furniture from Ikea and are coloured using alcohol inks to give a kind of rusty look.
The cogs are die-cuts from mirri card and coloured using alcohol inks!

The oil drums were done by dragging dollops of white, green, brown and black acrylic paint along the page with an old bank card again to achieve a rusty look. when dried I just sketched the drums using some fine liners!

The "oil " is done with melted UTEE, Black and Interference Blue melted together in the meltpot and then dribbled onto the page. I wanted it to look like the oil was being poured from the drums!

The Flaring tower is sketched with fine liners and then water coloured. I used some yellow and peach/pink fusible fibres for the flame.


Here are a couple of close ups of the details.... the "pipes" and also the "oil"

And here are the oil drums....

RIGHT HAND PAGE

The trees are done with twigs from my garden and covered with parcel tape! Not the self adhesive shiny stuff but the horrible licky sticky stuff! I used a wet sponge! Wasn't going to lick THAT! YUK! lol They were coloured using alcohol inks!

The painting is a little chipboard frame again coloured using alcohol inks, and the painting is actually done on a "mop up" piece of kitchen roll from an earlier project, I just used a stamp from my stash to give it  a little interest and 'hung' it from the tree using a piece of string.

The flowers were done on coloured book pages using a stamp from my stash with buttons for centres.

The paint palette is sketched and i used a versamark pen and some embossing powders from my stash for the paint, added a wee cheapo paint brush to finish it off!

The "rainbow" paint pots are courtesy of a colour swatch brochure from B&Q!!

Quite a "Dark" piece but to be honest, despite the fact that I live not too far from the refinery it DOES have its advantages....I mean I would never have been able to study art at college if I couldn't use paint because there wasn't any oil to make it with!! lol!! I KNEW I would tie those two together SOMEHOW!!! lol..

So there you have it, this is what has kept me busy over the weekend! I sincerely hope it was what my lecturer was looking for!!

Take care everyone and thanks for dropping by!

Jackie x

Art Postcards.

In 'Contextual Studies' for Art we are working on 'timelines and movements'!

The brief was to do six art postcards on each movement of our choice but putting our own take on things! I have completed five and will work on the final one tomorrow, (getting really sore from sitting too long just now)

Anyway here's what I've completed so far

CUBISM _ 1907 - 1919

And it's a 'painting' of my lava lamp!! And it's loosely based on Pablo Picasso ... (I think) lol

FAUVISM - 1904 - 1908

And this one is done in the Style of Henri Matisse

GERMAN EXPRESSIONISM 1910 's - 1920's

TO BE COMPLETED.....



Surrealism - 1920 -1930

This is just one of my own pieces. I just had a little play with some Dylusions, and some of my favourite rubber stamps along with a label printer and came up with this....Not sure how "surreal" it appears to everybody else but boy do I love those colours!!! The phrase is actually the lyrics from the Enigma song Prism of Life in case you were wondering.

POP ART

Now I could have went the easy road and did something to do with Andy Warhol....but I didn't.... I had a little look at Robert Rauschenberg's work and I love it!! So this piece is very loosely based on his work....despite the fact that Tim Holtz and The Artistic Stamper are in there as well....So I just collaged some of Tim's papers and used some of the Artistic Stamper's steam punk stamps!

MINIMALISM


A VERY simple piece ! I just drew round the circles in the  Dylusions "Chequered Dots" stencil and coloured them using a black fine liner! Simple but effective and it's again loosely based on Frank Stella's work.

So there you have it.... been a busy few days and I still have some more stuff to catch up on but I'll manage. I will post the German Expressionism one when I have that completed. And, that I'm afraid will NOT be tonight! It's Friday and I NEED to relax a little! Hopefully!  Wouldn't mind a nice little Bacardi or two but alas, the big nasty painkillers I'm on will NOT allow! *sighs*

So take care everyone and thanks for dropping by.

Have a great weekend

Jackie x

Alternative self portrait .... pt II

Hello everyone, I finally managed to get the other pieces for my Alternative Self Portrait. This is a project for Analytical drawing in Art and Design at college.....if you look at the previous post you will see the other three pieces I've completed.

This piece is done in Charcoal and Gouache paint and is a piece about my favourite boots, jacket and perfume!

 

 

And the final piece is a painting in Gouche of my Chinese Therapy Balls and basically signifies my liking of the 'different'!.

I was really quite daunted to start this piece because there was so much detail in it but once I got going it wasn't as bad as I thought. I did cheat when it came to the balls though....I used a bottle of nail polish remover to draw around to get good circles! lol... REALLY pleased with the way it's turned out though!

I THINK I've achieved the aim but won't really know how well untill I get back to College and hopefully that will be on Monday! Still feeling very sore and miserable with this sciatica though, but I NEED to go back. I just can't take any more time off.

I have some more pieces ready to be 'blogged' for another project I'm working on in a different class so watch this space....

TTFN

Jackie x

An Alternative self Portrait.

Well it's been a wee while since I last blogged anything and to be honest I just haven't had the time. Just been busy catching up and studying.

I haven't been to college for a week and I'm off again next week thank to 'unforseen circumstances'! OR if you prefer....a rather nasty recurrence of Sciatica, and, by way of trying NOT to hurt it even more when packing my bag for college last week I ended up pulling a muscle in my back! Ouch was NOT the word I used lol!! But it'll do for now....Soooo after a doctor's appointment, and some seriously strong painkillers I now find myself ever so slightly 'floating' all over the place!

Anyway.... enough of this rambling.... In our analytical drawing class we were issued with a brief to do five finely finished detailed pieces on one subject of our choice. I decided to go for an Alternative Self Portrait, thought it would be fun, and something a little bit different.

So below I've posted photos of the three pieces I've done so far..... Hoping to get the other two finished this weekend if I can sit still long enough!!

This first piece represents my favourite band! Yep! As if you all didn't guess already lol.... It's Iron Maiden !! So i decided to draw my 'hoodie' using pastels! I just part of it but I'm really pleased with the end result!

This one represents one of my hobbies.... knitting and crochet, done in watercolours and detailed with a fine liner uni pin pen.

And last one for now is just something that represent me and what i like.... just some art/craft materials painted using acrylics! REALLY pleased with this as I've never painted a 'proper' complete picture before!

So there you have it.... sorry I can't stay for a bit longer but it hurts too much to sit for too long. So I'll say Cheerio for now,

Take care everyone and thanks for dropping by,

Jackie x

More playing in my college sketchbook!

Well, I've been playing lots while on half term holiday!


First of all, I was taken on a little visit to the astounding Glencoe on Sunday last week by my arty buddy at college along with her husband! Had a real hoot too as we are all mostly on the same 'wavelength'!

I took lots of photos but managed to sneak a couple with buildings in so I could use them in my sketchbook! It's themed on the 'built up environment' !

Here's the results of that little reconnaissance mission!

This piece is done in pastels and was basically a colour matching exercise, did not too bad with what I had in my box and I'm quite pleased with how it's turned out!

This one below took two attempts because it's a perspective challenge, we haven't covered that part yet so i was a bit unsure as to how to go about it, but I sussed it out and I'm really pleased with it! Again it's done using pastels, I really do like these, and will certainly be using them more often!

Now this piece below...well...I just HAD to lol.....I'll get away with it because there's still a building and a practice session so there won't be a problem! I hope!!

That church is actually a photo of The Tron in Edinburgh, which for any Scots reading this will know is situated in the Royal Mile and looks nothing like that!!

I printed off the photo in grey scale then over painted it with some Gouache, set it aside to dry while getting to work on the background.

It's all done using Gouache paints with some household items used for a textured feel, did the grass on the left with cling wrap lift off! This paint is great because you can go back and reactivate it to do something else to it, hence I managed to get all the lovely smudging effects for the grass!

The tree and wee Raven birdie are drawn by me, the moon was done by using an old book page and drawing round a CD, I just painted over it and used a stippling effect with the brush to give the moon 'dimples' !! The big Raven is a clip art image I downloaded and cut out, as are the grave stones on the opposite page. I just found a suitable quote and wrote that on an old book page which was coloured using an orange promarker!

I am thrilled with the way this has turned out! And, I seriously hope that the lecturers will think the same.


So thanks for reading my update on the sketchbook project,

Take care everyone

Jackie xx

Update on the college course!

Many apologies for the lack of blogging, but I've just been so wrapped up in this course, Got loads to do and masses of homework involving lots of research and also lots of experimenting!

anyway, I just wanted to show a few of the results I've been getting by using some products for the very first time! Quite pleased with some of them to be honest.

This was my first attempt at using Willow charcoals! Great stuff but really REALLY messy!! Absolutely thrilled with the way it turned out. didn't think i could draw like that!  The object of the exercise was to concentrate on the shading , hence the big metal pot!

This next piece was done using Pastels....now everyone in the class had a total blast with these. Our lecturer asked us to bring in 'clothing' and we rigged up a washing line and hung up our clothes! lol....everything from wooly socks to t-shirts to funky scarves and hats! Everyone's results were amazing and the whole lot of the 'drawings' are now on the wall of the classroom! As you can see by the image I brought in a little denim waistcoat, Jane (my lecturer) LOVED this and thought I had captured everything beautifully! Was I chuffed with what she said or what! :)

These next projects were a little more tricky...they involved 'blown up thumbnails'! .... taking a photo, framing part of it off, drawing the framed off part them blowing the whole thing up to fit the page! Quite difficult but once you get the hang of it it's not too bad. We basically had to experiment with different mediums.... I framed off part of the former Scotsman newspaper building in Edinburgh and 'destroyed' that three times lol !!

The first one is done using acrylics! I HATE this piece! It turned out looking like camouflage!! EEKS.... but we only had to use the three primary colours we had to mix those to get the secondary colour we wanted! ..... I may 'do something' else with this later on because i really loathe it!

The same piece again only this time using Gouache paints and I went for a green tone this time...

and finally yet another piece only this time we were allowed to use a full colour palette and watercolours! Quite like the way this turned out despite the fact that i am not really very comfortable using watercolours.

we were allowed to experiment with these first and tried out lots of different things to give different effects, table salt, sea salt, masking fluid, cling film, paper towels, wet on wet, wet on dry etc.....

I must admit to enjoying these little 'practice sessions because I think they give you a feel for the paint and let you know what you can and can't do with them, which gives you just a little more confidence when the time comes to actually use them 'properly'.

There is one final piece I am going to show because I do LOVE this piece and it is so far one of my favourites, (the denim waistcoat come a very close second).....it was another experiment using Gouache paints! I painted over a photo of the Tron Church in Edinburgh and it has turned out suitably 'retro spooky' !! Ewan my  colour theory lecturer also loves this.... the smudge ability factor with these paints is just great, be good for rainy day or fog or even reflections on water...

Am I enjoying this course?... well yes!! I have learnt so much in the short time I've been there so can't wait to see what everything will be like once the course is finished!

Thank you for dropping by and let me ramble on about my college experiences, I do appreciate it.

Take care

Jackie x

Well Hello there......

I have been a bad blogger! :( I haven't updated my blog in SUCH a long time and I apologise unreservedly for that.

I do have some pretty good excuses though, I've been caught up in a lot of general 'life stuff' AAAAND I have started a college course as well, it's a full time NC Art and Design course. I've only been there a couple of weeks but boy have I been hammered with homework already, so I haven't really got a lot of free time for crafting just now.

Anyway....part of this course includes "Media and Software skills" i.e. Photoshop and 'stuff' ! lol...Now without boring you all rigid with the techy stuff I'll just give you a quick overview :-

Basically we have to try out 3 different graphics packages - Photoshop, Inkscape and GIMP....we have to just explore these packages and basically find out which one is best for what purpose! doesn't really matter if things a re right or wrong, it's all about 'experimenting and learning!

Now for those of you that know me you will have gathered that I'm not exactly a 'genius' when it comes to computers lol...... but I had a go anyway, not quite sure if I've achieved the 'brief' or not but hey ho! I'll have a word with the lecturer on Wednesday!


So here's what I did....


I started out with a piece that I had drawn in art class, A red pepper done in chalk pastels with an oil pastel background textured using a fork!!

NOT the best artwork but I have got to start somewhere lol...



I then opened that in Photoshop and played around with some of the filters and other stuff and ended up with this image below

Of  all the programs I used I MUCH prefer this one despite the fact that it's the professional version of Photoshop and it is supremely technical and complicated it seemed to be the easiest of all of them to use in the end! Whether or not that was because I briefly touched on it last year in the access course I don't know!



The next program used was Inkscape!! Now heaven only knows what happened with this but boy did my PC throw a hissy fit!! It practically ATE the memory for lunch!! lol.... I absolutely loathed this program....it just seemed a struggle from start to finish....I just don't know enough about it to really pass much of a comment I'm afraid, but everybody I have spoken to about it seems to be of the same opinion! ..... the image turned out....well....erm... see for yourself....lol

I have no idea what happened (or didn't for that matter lol) but looking at that image that program looks like it would be great for large text stuff..... IF I ever get it to work properly I might have another play!



And finally GIMP ... the one my teenager loves!! He thinks it's great and I suppose it is but I haven't used it much either so can't pass comment....it did what I wanted it to and the end result is alright I suppose ...

I must admit to rather liking the filters i used for the texture on this... it has a fantastic canvas look to it....it's turned out not TOO bad but I'm still leaning evermore to the dreaded Photoshop!!


I am going to make a 'paper' version of this project.... fancy putting all the images in a journal along with lots of notes on what was done and what I liked and disliked....think it will make things a LOT easier when I need to find out the best program to use for whatever project I will be working on!


Sooooooo.........on that note I will bid you all goodnight!

Thanks for dropping by and reading these rambles, just wish i knew more about the programs to give you all a better idea.

Take care

Jackie x