Art Journal Prompts: Week 2 - Texture

Good Morning All

Time for another journal page.

From where I have posted this picture on Facebook it seems to have been very popular so I am going to try and put together a step by step guide of how I created this page.

This is the final completed page that I created:

As you can see it has loads of different types of textures all through the piece.  My one of my inspirations for this piece was Sheena Douglas who created a similarly textured art work on a canvas.

As before I will give you a list of the materials used before I go into the step by step detail.

This will be mostly how I created this work but it should give you some ideas and techniques to create your own works of art.

Hobbycraft Buttons
The Range Seed and Bugle Beads
Poundland Nail Art Crushed Seashell
The Works Coloured Raffia
Finnabair Art Basics 3D Matte Gel
Finnabair Art Basics Heavy White Gesso
DecoArt Black Gesso
Pebeo Fantasy Prisme Paint - Marina and Pearl Violine
Pebeo Studio Acrylics - Blue Green, Blue Black, Green Yellow
Ranger Stick It Embossing Powder
Pebeo Cerne Relief Paste
Imagination Crafts Alchemy Wax - Sherbet, Coral Reef
Treasure Gold Wax Gilt - Renaissance
Tsukineko VersaMarker
Honey Doo Crafts Gilding Flakes - Earth Canyon

Squeeze a small amount of the gesso out onto your page and spread it completely over using an old credit/gift/loyalty card.  This will help to give the page a bit of body when we start adding other mediums on top.  As its such a thin layer it should dry relatively quickly, but you can give it a quick heat with your heat gun if you cant wait.

Lay out your buttons in a pattern pleasing to your eyes.  In my case I laid them out over the page to divide it into two sections.  It gives a much more interesting result if you have buttons that are different sizes and shapes.  When you are happy with your pattern, then glue the buttons down using the 3D Matt Gel.  As this will end up being a reasonably thick layer under your buttons it will take a good few hours to dry properly.  You will be able continue on to the next section though.

Apply some more of the gel to the corner of the page, and sprinkle on a selection of beads (make sure that you press them into the gel to stick them).  I used a some small seed beads and some smaller bugle beads.  Again here using different sizes and shapes of beads will create interest and greater texture.

In the area adjacent to the beads apply another layer of the gel (make sure to leave a gap between the edge of the gel and the buttons) and sprinkle the crushed seashell to cover, again making sure to press down into the gel.  This will ensure that the shell is firmly adhered and wont come loose when you come to paint the next layer.

Apply some of the gel through a stencil of your choice (I used Cracked Stone stencil by Dusty Attic).  Make sure that you get a good even covering before you remove the stencil, and when you have immediately go and wash the gel of your stencil or it will set hard and be impossible to remove.

For some reason I didn't take a picture of the next step but all I did was to take some raffia, cut to size and glue down with some tacky glue between the buttons and the stencilled area.

You will need to now leave everything to dry completely before we can go on with the next step.  Depending on how thick you laid the gel down this can take several hours to dry.

Once everything has dried apply a layer of black gesso, try and make sure that everything is completely covered.  You may need to let this dry so that you can see if you have missed any areas.  If you have just go back over them with another layer of gesso and allow to dry.

Apply a thinish layer of the Blue Black acrylic over the whole of the page, you don't have to be too careful  about covering absolutely every single millimetre but you want a decent layer.  As you can see from mine there is still some of the black gesso showing through where I stencilled.

In the area where the beads are, do a heavy dry brush of the Blue Green acrylic (if you're not familiar with dry brushing then check out this video on YouTube). Continue by adding a lighter layer of the Blue Green over the buttons, finally finishing up with a light layer of Green Yellow over the stencilled area.

Heavy dry brush over the buttons with the Coral Reef Wax, followed by a lighter dry brush of the Sherbet Wax.

Using you fingers add a light layer of the Treasure Gold over all of the ridges, try not too have too much on your fingers or you'll end up getting wax where you don't want it.

Using the Pebeo relief paste completely outline the area between the seashell and the buttons making sure to catch the edges of the page.  Use the same paste to seal the two ends between the raffia.  The idea here is to create a contained area to flood with the primse paints.  Allow to dry completely, you will know it's dry as the paste will turn from white to clear.

I'm sorry I missed a picture here too.  When the paste is clear add the prisme paints to the wells that we created (making sure that they are thoroughly mixed before doing so).  Be careful not to overfill the wells or the paint will spill out onto your work.  Again wait for this to dry completely before moving onto the next step (this will take a few hours depending on how much paint you added).

Once the paint has completely dried, take your Versamarker and lightly draw it over the stencil marks that you made at the beginning.  Quickly pour the sticky embossing powder over and shake off any excess.  Heat the power to make it sticky and while it's still tacky rub your gilding flakes over.  Use a firmish brush to remove any excess flakes and return to the pot.

And that is it, you now have one completed mixed media textured canvas.

Id love to see your comments so feel free to leave a comment below.

Good Bye Until Next Time