Secretly She Always Wanted...

It's been awhile since I showed you some of my faces..... My faces began as a challenge I started when I was doing art in the morning in the van before work about two years ago. Since then my ritual for drawing faces gradually found their way on to my daily morning pages which I write between 430-5am every morning. Many people have commented that they like the way the writing shows through under the faces but they cannot quite read what was written and was it my intention. Morning Pages, as some of you know, is a tool, in which Julia Cameron has written extensively about. Most of us were introduced to this concept in The Artist's Way, but she carries it on in many of her books after that. Morning Pages, is a steady stream of writing.. writing what ever comes to mind. I have always kept a written journal, but, I have done Morning Pages for at least the last ten years pretty consistently. I have had all kinds of journals for this. Hard bound, blank paged journals, lined journals, fancy covered, wire bound notebooks and cheapo composition notebooks, which is what I have been using for the last several years. When I write I am in a sort of half awake, half asleep state, pillows propped up, pen in hand and I just begin to write." Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. God! I so do not want to get up this morning. Must be it's going to rain today as my head hurts. Blah, blah, blah, Damn neighbors were playing their music so loud blah, blah, blah." As long as I can keep the blah, blah. blahs coming, the pen will keep moving........although sometimes I am aware that I am nodding off in the middle of the sentence and I will write," keep the pen moving or what was it I was complaining about when I felt myself falling back to sleep with my pen in my hand?" You get the picture. I will fill the page and then begin writing on top of what I have already written. The idea is not necessarily to come back and read what I've written or for anyone else, necessarily to read what I've written, but that I feel like I have "dumped" or "poured" or emptied what ever I needed to get out, onto these pages. I've whined, complained, dumped, cursed,spilled my guts, emptied my fears and/or anxieties all over the pages. And some how, it feels right. I feel right. If I don't do my morning pages, I feel something missing. My day doesn't quite feel right. I go get my coffee, come back to bed where I begin to draw these faces on top of these pages. I don't know where the faces come from. They just appear. I am sure that often times the faces will reflect some thing in my mood or state of mind on any given morning. Lately, I have been amusing myself by naming them because they seem to have personalities. OK. I better stop. You may think me really off my rocker at this point. (lol) I give myself another 30-45 minutes of playing with pan pastels or water colors with my faces before I get up and hit the shower. This is how I start my day. This is how I get in my creative time and this is what makes me feel good even if my faces aren't good. It wasn't my intention to talk this much about this, however, I found I had to explain where the writing underneath all the faces came from. On another note........... the ICAD challenge goes on. The bunch I'm showing you were made with the gelli plate to make backgrounds but also the tape transfers. I added my hand carved stamps and washi tape. I hope you like them. This has turned out to be a long post. I hope you enjoyed your stay today. Thank you and please do visit again............. I'm headed over to Glue It Tuesday in hopes I haven't missed the deadline and Carolyn Dube's place for the gelli print party.

Worth the Wait

Ok. So a couple of days ago I showed you the transfers on to clear packing tape with the gelli plate. Last night I did some more playing and I took pictures with each step. I came out with better results. I started with this. The grid, mesh- like material is called joint compound tape, if I remember correctly. I then started my first layer of paint and made some marks with a stamp I made from foam glued onto a piece of card board. There was an index card laying nearby begging for some attention. No, that's not right. The stamp I made on the piece of cardboard was not foam, but rather an experiment with a hot glue gun. I drew the petal shapes on the cardboard with a hot glue gun. Moving on. I removed the masks- the joint compound tape. and started adding more layers. Now, remember, I have very little patience in letting things dry, but I did ok by working on other things. The little fan on the table did help. Out came the stencils. Pretty soon I found myself just using the gelli plate as a canvas. Why not paint right on it with a paint brush, not just the brayer? I decided after the last layer that I would go to bed. Five minutes before I was out the door this morning I had to go check it out. I peeled off one section. When I got home from work I finished it. And here's the index card. In between layers of letting the paint dry, I used the scraps of deli paper I used to get paint off my brayer and I tore them up and glued them to a couple of index cards. Then took them to the sewing machine and added some stamping and few marks here and there. So. There you have it. You can get all the info on transfers to tape if you go here I think the possibilities are endless. I'm going to keep playing. Thanks for stopping by............. .........I appreciate all your comments.....................Jo

Here an Icad. There an Icad. Everywhere..an.........

OK. Sorry for the corny title but I get tired of thinking of grabbing titles....After I posted last night's post I returned to my studio and started another print on the gelli plate. I meant to take a pic of how I left it overnight but I forgot. This morning I removed the paint with clear packing tape and this is what I got. Instead of laying the tape down horizontally I laid it vertically. Yesterday, I had laid one of the strips on a piece of aluminum foil which made the blank areas look shiny silver.(obviously.) And today I spray painted a blank card so see what a different colored background would look like before transferring the tape. I then used the tape as collage and added to what I already had. This is the outcome. Kind of interesting. I am thinking how cool these strips of tape would look on a journal page or on anything else for that matter. You can find the info on doing this here Finally, remember that large piece I was working on? Here it is at this point. . I have to get moving - gotta do some things I don't enjoy doing like house cleaning, laundry and grocery shopping. I hope you have a good day.. Thanks for stopping by........................................jo

There's Always an ICAD

I tried something new this evening, something new to do with that Gelli Plate. I made some transfer prints on clear packing tape with the gelli plate. This has to be done in layers making sure the paint is dry in between each added layer. That was hard for me because I was very impatient in waiting so I put a little portable fan right on my work to speed up drying. You make marks, whatever you want to add layer upon layer. But the coolest part is laying the clear packing tape across the gelli plate and lifting off what ever was on the plate and seeing it now transferred to the tape. Of course you know where those transfers got transferred to. Index cards, of course. You can view the video posted on 5/24/13 here . I did not have some of the items that was suggested on the video(like Perfect Pearls, but still was fairly happy with my outcome. Here are two more ICADS making me current. I just love washi tape. It's good for saving things in a hurry.I rather like the outcome of this one. In the next several days I want to share some pictures of my friend, Patty's garden. When I went to see her last week, she again took me on a tour, as she does every time I have come to see her. So many things to draw and sketch. So much eye candy!! So, stay tuned for that in the coming days. Thank you for spending some time here and thank you for all your many comments. I hope you are well...........Jo

Seven Days

I was a week behind in my ICADS until this evening. Now I am caught up. Whew!! Here are the last seven days. And when I was on the train to Philly last week to visit my friend Patty, I worked on altering a book I had gotten from the Dollar Store. It was one of those hard, glossy 4 page children's books that I sanded and primed with gesso and then threw down on the gelli plate one of my Gelli Plate sessions. So the background was already done. I just added more collage and faces. I painted the front and back covers with black gesso. I will link this to Glue it Tuesday over at Artsyville since there is a lot of gluing going on there and here, as well as Carolyn Dube's Gelli Print Party since there is also a lot of my gelli prints used here. Thanks so much for visiting. I hope you're not bored with seeing these ICADS yet. I may get behind again, but, I did meet the challenge of catching up.......... please come back to visit.........Jo

North Bound

I'm going to visit my dear friend Patty tomorrow. Patty and I have a friendship that spans thirty eight years to be exact. We were college roommates. I learned how to "raise some ruckus" with Patty. You gotta remember I was a "preacher's kid" so I didn't really get to goof off much til I left home. Patty and I share our love of anything creative, of painting and journaling, of composing songs and just plain goofing off. She is an awesome painter with water color and an avid gardener. It's been five years that we sat up late with wine and snorting-through-our-noses-kind-of- laughter. I am so looking forward to this trip. And I am taking the train, so guess what I'll be doing? I will check back with you in a few days.......... In the meantime, here is today's ICAD. Thanks for visiting............................ jo

One More Card

As I made my way through the house last night watering all the plants, I for some strange reason took note of the other art I had done on index cards and actually put in little cheapo frames. I'm pretty sure some of these were done before I started the ICAD challenge,as I recorded the date as 2011, but they probably were sparked from reading Tammy Garcia's posts on creating art on a index card. I thought at one point it would be cool to frame bunches of them and set them above all the door frames in the house. I haven't done it yet. And this trio was done in last years challenge and hangs in my kitchen. Here is today's card. I took gesso and made marks in it while still wet, and then put watercolor on top. Added some washi tape and my own carved stamp, made from an eraser from the dollar store. I kind of like this card. I like the contrast of black and purple. Thanks for popping in. Until tomorrow....... ...........Jo

The Beat Goes On

In 2011 I stumbled across Teesha Moore's art and her video for making her "amazing" 16 page journal. I like her style of collage/journaling. I ordered the required size of 22 x 30 140 lb hot press Fabriano Artistico water color paper from Dick Blick. Remember this is two years ago. This very large cardboard box was delivered. And it sat. And it sat some more and then it got moved from the room I deemed my art studio when children moved out and then it got moved again in to the new studio I deemed Studio B since MY MAN allofasudden decided he wanted to paint and wanted a studio and so I graciously granted him my studio A for a larger studio B.(It's joke between us.) And it sat and got hidden behind picture frames and other clutter tucked between the wall and the old dresser which houses art supplies. I never seemed to have enough free space large enough to tackle this project until recently. It does help when MY MAN has been away so I can use his art table in his studio which is what I did last weekend. I had forgotten I had ordered two pieces of this paper and so I did make two journals, running up and down the stairs each step(no pun intended) of Teesha's intructions. I didn't take any photos of the process because you can see it all on her site but I did get to the point of painting all the pages and have begun to lay down the beginnings of borders. Here is yet one more ongoing project to add to many others in progress. I have to be working on lots of things at one time. I can't work on one thing but for so long before I need to move on to something else. That way, when I do return to it I can see it with different eyes. I may see something I didn't see before. ICADs are moving along but I have a like/not so much love relationship with them at this point. I think I am bored with what I am doing with them. Perhaps I need to throw them on the gelli plate again, or the sewing machine or maybe both. I feel I made a commitment with myself to do them so I shall see it through. Perhaps I/they need a change of scenery. :) Here is today's ICAD. And look at what was on my table one year ago on this day. This became the picture for my blog header. Thanks for stopping in and thank you for your comments and support. It's what keeps me coming back, too..JO