Walnut Inky!

Recently I spent a lot of time completing a special project (sorry, can't go into to details, since it is in the process of being published). Anyway, I mixed up a batch of walnut ink for this project, and I wanted to use most of it up before tossing the excess. So, I went crazy, walnut-inking many different kinds of papers: heavy card stock, watercolor paper, sketchbook paper, music sheets, paper doilies, even a couple pages in my art journal. I think sometimes brown is underrated, it's a good color!

Altered Art - Bottles

I love altering objects, I enjoy taking an everyday, ordinary thing and jazzing it up! The bottles are about 12" tall and flat on each side.

The beach bottle on the left has torn mulberry and collage papers on the sides, tags with shell images around the bottom, skinny jute and real shells glued around the neck.

The shells bottle on the right has a paper doily and some shell print paper on the sides, plus spiral clips and wire with beads. Around the neck is more wire and beads.

Enjoy the sights and sounds of summer!

Paper, Paper & More Paper

Hello,

We all know about the fabulous papers available to use today - collage and scrapbook papers, many types of specialty art papers, and lots more. The ones I seem to forget about are the papers not always associated with art.

Tissue papers, both solid and printed, add depth and texture to a project. How about pieces of magazine pages, wrapping paper or greeting cards? Grocery bags, envelopes and shipping tags are other possibilities. Remember to look through your mail for more ideas: all sorts of junk mail, plus postage stamps and postcards might be there.

Papers don't need to be fancy; bits of ordinary lined paper, ledger paper or self-stick notes might be just the thing for your project. Maybe pattern tissue, an old label or a ticket stub would be "just the ticket"! Paper is all around us, we just need to look at it with new eyes!

I put the collage at right together last night. Over an acrylic background, the clip art girl has an outfit cut from magazine/catalog pages. I got inspired to cut shapes using magazine pages from Teesha Moore's journaling ideas on her website. (This collage needs something, I don't believe she's finished yet!) Take care!