Adding a little color

This is a new piece I'm working on. I originally meant it to be monochromatic - but gosh, look what happened! I guess because the day was so grey and gloomy outside, I was attracted by my Carandache's and just went a bit wild. This is still in progress. The main image will be inside the large arch. I think I"ll paint it again following the original concept - then compare the two. I like this one well enough not to paint it out to go back to the pale subtle color palette. Some of the pages in my practice book are what brought me to making this work.

Practice Book - and more

Mushrooms were appearing everywhere. The one facing the fairy is really a biscuit. That spread was just too sticky sweet for my taste so I used other images to liven it up. The Wizard of Oz page was done because I had that little scrap lying around, and decided to use it, which meant it needed a yellow brick road and a witch. And as I was still working with mushroom, I added them as well. The joy of making an art journal or practice book is that things don't have to make any sense. They don't need to follow a theme or be in any order. Just a place to play and use up materials you have at hand.

Practice Book - more views

These pages were done with the continuing mushroom theme. I kept finding things that were shaped like mushrooms, or that I could manipulate into mushrooms. Perfect place to play around in a practice book.

Practice Book - new views

I've been working and reworking some of the pages in the art journal/practice book. Here are some pics. I'm showing you this spread because you can compare the final with the preliminary stage. In a way I actually prefer the early version, but this is just a practice book, so if I screw it up - only you and I will know about it. Right?

Skydivers an image

This is the image I created to illustrate the poem "sky divers" which I wrote to celebrate the season. After painting on the body and gluing on the head, I took a photo and then layered it over a photo I took in my back yard. I talk more about it on my other blog if you care to read more. I will probably use it some way in a new very short altered book.

SkyDivers
Who dressed you in your bright colors?
Who taught you to float in the air?
Who chose a crisp autumn morn
tapped you on the shoulder and said "jump"
to launch you out into space?

Who showed you the way to drift?
and pointed you to my back yard,
so I can enjoy your beauty
before I blow you into piles
and bundle you off to the dumpster?
Copyright Janene Ford 2009

Practice book or Art Journal

Some of my good friends are enjoying making art journals, and never wanting to miss out on anything that sounds like fun artistically (up to a point) - I have started one myself. It is much like a practice book - but I 'm not trying any structural things in it. I am using a composition notebook I covered with fabric, just like covering a board book as in the tutorial given earlier. I had no particular plans and was sort of wondering where to start, so I thought I'd follow what some of my art pals do, clean off your table and use the scraps. I had a folder sitting there with images and some poetry I wrote prior to doing the Mushroom book. These were rejects for that project - but they are good enough to save, so I started with them. Here are the first few pages. Thanks Roberta, Jackie, Pat, Sally, Krissi and the rest of you who have inspired this activity. I think this is something I can work on at the Sr. Center instead of carting paintings back and forth.

Practice book - a new page - Thanksgiving

It is so close to Thanksgiving and many of us are thinking ahead about our menus and our families and coming together. We are also thinking about the many blessings we have in our lives. So, let's take a 2 page spread and make it about Thanksgiving. What does it mean to you? You might want to do this in a journaling style, with writing out what you are grateful for. Or you might want to use your family recipes for the favorite holiday dishes. Or, thinking more globally, what are you thankful for. Our troops, our religion, our planet. Thanksgiving pages can be as personal as you like. Photos of your family might go here. Or drawings of them. And if you are lucky enough to have a grandchild around, or a young child - why not have them trace their hand in your book for one of those handprint turkeys. you probably have some rubber stamps with the word thanks, or thank you on them. This would be a good place to use them. I haven't done my Thanksgiving page yet, but I'll share a pic of the little dogs I'm so thankful to have in my life. They are thankful for that last little spot of sunshine on the couch on a cold morning.