Blue Without You by Denisa Gryczova

Do you realize how lucky we are living in such peaceful times? I know it´s not like this all over the world  and lately there have been some awful terrorist attacks all over Europe but I´m happy to say the place where I live doesn´t struggle with such disasters (so far). Looking back to the history of my country it wasn´t always like this.

In my today´s art journaling episode I was dealing with such cruel times a lot of families experienced during WWII in Central Europe. Many families were separated with no mercy. Desperate parents sending their beloved kids over the ocean to foreign places, just to save their lives. Knowing they might never meet again. Just a thought of such terror sends shivers down my spine.

Here´s a brief description how I made the spread. I started off by applying a random coat of heavy gesso on the paper. When dry I did some stamping with archival ink and glued down some bits of tissue paper using soft matte gel. When dry I painted the entire surface with heavy gesso again and let it dry.

Now comes the fun part. I grabbed ecolines, mists and various sprays just to drop the paint on the paper , spray it with water and let the drippings do their job. Do not forget to dry the piece after each colour used. As I was adding more and more colours, stamping and stains, the spread got its desired depth.

I wanted to illustrate the long distance between the poor family members so I went for tiny city stickers and glued them down. When I was happy with the background I attached two focal points. These are the vintage pics of one torn family. The wire I used symbolizes the family bonds and the damaged circle stands for the broken family one.

Hoping to make you stop, think and realize the luck we all have and bring some inspiration for your art journaling.

Happy crafting!
Denisa

Mixed Media Place supplies:

Unbreakable

Sensational texture, amazing composition and stunning colour choice. You will love this piece from Anai... feel inspired, grab some art tools and enjoy creative process !

Hello my lovely creative friends :)
Today I wanted to show you another piece of mixed media art I created recently. I'm still experimenting with different techniques and styles. I feel inspired by textures, geometric shapes, distress look, abstract art. I wanted to create something completely from scratch - without any scrapbooking/paper products. Just texture and different kinds of paints.
It's amazing how calming and satisfying it can be - many hours spent on just creating different elements. Bringing it together piece by piece. This time I had quite vivid idea on my mind and I wanted to recreate it in the reality :)

I'm quite happy with the final result.

The first part was to create the texture. On the white canvas I used gesso, stencils with a molding paste and some 3d gel medium to create different shapes, wrinkles and crackles. I knew I want to divide the whole piece in thirds. I knew exactly where I want to put the colors, so I tried to stick to this idea.

Then I started adding colors - light liquid colors first - here come Glimmer Mists and Lindy's Stamp Gang mists. Not just one layer of them. I like to put one coat of mists, dry it, and then add some more. It's a good way to create this kind of distressed background with different kind of stains.
Then the black color. Black chalkboard paint from Prima is still my favourite kind of black :) It's very opaque and matt so it gives a great contrast to the shiny medias like mists or Silks paints.

Blue vertical lines are made with Silks paints in 3 different shades. I like them, because I can achieve different effects with them. More opaque if I use more of the paint, or more transparent if I use only a little.

And the final step was to use white gesso to highlight all of the texture.

I put a lot of effort and a lot of my private emotions to that piece. I hope you can see something more than just a texture and some colors. But from the other hand - everyone is allowed to read art in different ways. I cannot tell you what you should think about it, but I hope that you can "feel" it :)

 
Products from Mixed Media Place:

Have Less, Do More

We have such a special treat for you today!

Not one, not two, but three gorgeous art journal spreads created by Riikka. + some really interesting concept behind them. :) Enjoy!

The start of this year was exceptional for me. I got invited to Norway to teach. It was magnificent and I only hope I lived up to the challenge!My workshops were a part of a weekend long crop there and during the evening, after my classes, I also got to participate.

As my luggage was full of workshop materials I had quite a limited amount of personal supplies with me. It gave a challenge to me but also provided a great inspiration.

With just few things with me I needed to use materials in new ways and think outside the box so to say. Here are three journal spreads I made during that night.

The green spring spread was the first I did.

For that I used Glimmer Mists, pieces of product packaging, a doily I got from the site and double sided tape sprinkled with Art Sugar. There are also a few Glass Beads in there and epoxy stickers.

As I only had black and grey ink with me, I used the mist also to stamp with to get more color choices. 

The second spread continues the same spring and blooms line.

I guess you can start seeing what I had with me and what we were using in the workshops – mists, Mica Powders, Glass Beads, Mechanicals and pens.

The background in this one is again made using the mists. I sprayed a few colors to the book, shut it and looked how the colors had spread.

The blooms are made using Mechanicals as the base and then decorated with an epoxy sticker turned around and brushed with Mica. The bigger bloom also has the Glass Beads in it.

For the third spread I was inspired by Britt Sviggum’s art. She was sitting beside me and she also was one of the arrangers of the crop. She was doing a lovely little painting to her journal so I decided to have a go at drawing as well.

I used mists like watercolours and also added touches of stamping and Mica to the page.

So if you ever feel stuck and uninspired, limit your choice of mediums!

Give yourself permission to use only a few supplies and see what you can come up with! 

Materials from Mixed Media Place: