Faced with an uninspiring host's response to the Messy May prompt word *courage*, I took a more abstract approach and indulged in some contemplative painting.
Tag: acrylic paint
Road markings
The third piece based on one of my photos and another possible submission for the Twitter Art Exhibit. I love textures and details, both natural and man-made, and so these layers of road markings and mendings caught my eye when I was out for a walk. As with the previous postcards, I've continued using this… Continue reading Road markings
Pink rose
When I did the watercolour rose page for Wanderlust earlier this year, I had a spare rose left over and no idea what to do with it. It ended up floating around my craft room for ages and every time I came across it I would have another think about what I could do with… Continue reading Pink rose
Winter solstice trees
A card for a friend who doesn't do Christmas and who really appreciates the turning point that is the winter solstice. I too am glad that the shortest day has passed and, although it will take a while to be really noticeable, the light is returning. I tried to make a similar design to this… Continue reading Winter solstice trees
Green & gold abstracts
I was tidying up a bit and found three strips of paper left over from another project (from cutting the paper into squares for the Woodland abstracts). Rather than put them away and continue tidying, I turned them into this abstract triptych with acrylic paint, alcohol and gilding flakes. The tidying still isn’t finished… Apologies… Continue reading Green & gold abstracts
Woodland abstracts – oak
I showed you the final results from taking Judy Woods free stARTs class last week, and I thought it might be interesting to see how one of the paintings developed from start to finish. The class was very much an exercise in letting go and trusting in the process; we only knew what that day's… Continue reading Woodland abstracts – oak
Jungle butterfly
The only plan I had when I started this was to use up the bits of paper left over from cutting out the warm-up pieces, especially the butterfly outline. I stuck all the pieces down without too much thought — other than the positioning of the butterfly — I just wanted to get some texture… Continue reading Jungle butterfly
Wanderlust: colourful landscape
Series: Wanderlust 2021 #32 One of the favourite pieces I made during Wanderlust 2019 was in the inspired by an artist theme where we had to draw influences from two artists. Similarly, this piece draws on another artist's style, but it won't be counting in my favourites from this year. The idea was to look… Continue reading Wanderlust: colourful landscape
Gold mask
This card mask has been floating around my craft room for an absolute age, waiting for the right idea to come along. My first thought was to create a green-man-styled mask with lots of foliage, but that never got past the thinking about stage, though I still think it could work nicely, especially now I… Continue reading Gold mask
Wanderlust: collage 3 ways
Series: Wanderlust 2021 #08 This was a lesson in three parts demonstrating some of the different ways you can balance collage and paint in mixed media art journal projects. The first is pure collage, no paint at all. There are areas of this that I really like but the overall effect is a little busy… Continue reading Wanderlust: collage 3 ways
Artful Academy journal – November
Series: Artful Academy 2020 journal #12 The prompt I chose for this page was boundaries. Walls, fences, hedges, doors and gates have always interested me. Even here, in a very urban environment, the sheer variety in the walls and fences separating the houses from the pavements just on a single road is remarkable. Boundaries are… Continue reading Artful Academy journal – November
Artful Academy journal – October
Series: Artful Academy 2020 journal #11 Just as I got all caught up with the free art journalling challenge from Artful Academy, the rest of the year's lessons were cancelled. 2020 messed with everyone's plans and the last three months' prompts were another small thing that fell by the wayside. After a brief moment of… Continue reading Artful Academy journal – October
Butterfly drips
When I made the butterfly grid, I had a few squares and butterflies left over. I decided to make some simple panels with them which could either be framed as is, or turned into cards with the addition of a sentiment banner underneath the painted square. The kraft squares were looking a bit too clean… Continue reading Butterfly drips
Butterfly grid
Back in October I joined in with the Lifebook 2021 taster sessions. I wouldn't take the full course because there is quite a focus on mixed media portraiture and figure paintings — something I'm happy to have the occasional play with but it's never going to be my go-to subject matter. But there were some… Continue reading Butterfly grid
Patchwork painted leaf
Another leaf. After the success of the first leaf, I decided to have a go at painting another of the pressed leaves in my stash. This time I changed up the style, dividing the leaf into blocks and choosing some brighter colours. I had a vague memory of there being a rule about the minimum… Continue reading Patchwork painted leaf
Crafty Rat 