Mixed Media Art Techniques Archives - Page 13 of 21

The “FEAR“

This article is written by Cheryl Crane

There are many layers in this artwork, layers of thoughts, tears, imagery, and art materials. This artwork was inspired by the 911 attacks on the world Trade Center. There are 2 thoughts intertwined in this piece. One, Fear of death and dying; hopeful for a better life as we journey with the angels to a greater life without fear.

Below is a weaving of wisteria that inspired the imagery for Fear. Fear was created after 911 as a reminder of evil that lurks.

It’s a mixed media artwork that combines:

Stamps
torn newspaper with names of victims from the attacks on the world trade center
imagery representing death and dying.

The Angels on the face are digital imagery created from a painting. Green oil paint is used to complement the red and cause strong contrast.

The angels represent hope. Each piece of mixed media is painted on with gel medium.

This piece began as a large Reeves watercolor, paper and a lot of newspapers, stamps, and textured papers.

I first planned my imagery levels of fear…fear of death and dying. This imagery is collaged figures that are placed within the hair. Different textures/papers are torn and ripped then glued using gel medium. The 2 stamps represent the United States and the beginning of Fear when the atom was split and the atomic bomb fell on Japan.

There is also ripped paper from an old Japanese newspaper.

Also in the hair of Fear is a ripped black paper. If you look closely you will see the names of the victims who died in the attack. These names were posted in the Free lance Star.

On one half of the face is a cropped altered image of the Angels of Death.

This painting of Angels is an oil painting that hangs in Fredericksburg Baptist church in Fredericksburg, Virginia.

I took a photo of this painting and altered it using photoshop. I then glued it onto the watercolor paper using gel medium.

The overall color scheme was planned as a monochromatic scheme. However, I decided to add the greens and red (compliments to show conflict). I used water and oil paint in the background.

That is how I created my artwork – The FEAR. I hope you like it!

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Cheryl has been an art educator for 25 years in Stanford County Schools. She also teaches private lessons and sells art in her company Paint with Me. She is known as the Angel painter.

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Liturgical Representation: A Series of Mixed Media Pieces

By MMA Team 1 Comment

This article is written by Julie Anna Johnson

I’m a grandma who can’t knit, can’t measure, and can’t draw a straight line with a pencil between two rulers. I heard early and often that I was uncoordinated and untalented in the arts and was kicked out of band in third grade because I was “..’or-e-bley.”

After years of wanting to be an artist I came to understand that we are all called to be artists and found freedom in mixed media work. It is in the genre that I learned rules can be set aside and I can play in glue, paint, glitter, mod podge, clay, chalk, ribbon, stuff from the backyard, and magazines and get as dirty as I want.

Many of my pieces combine my love of art with my love of my perfect parent. The liturgical series is my representation of the liturgical year in the Episcopal tradition.

This series has allowed me to live each church season in a new and child like way after getting my hands dirty with it. It has impacted my preaching and teaching and my ongoing identity as both an artist and a priest.

Materials:

2X2 MDF
Acrylic paints
Pastels
Embellishments
Gesso
Mod podge
Acrylic inks
Chalk

Process:

MDF was prepared with gesso. On some pieces words were embedded in the gesso.

Once completely dry each piece was painted in one or more colors symbolizing the season.

Various embellishments were added symbolizing the season.

Finishing touches of color added to each piece with inks, pastels, or chalks.

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The Rev. Julie Anna Johnson attended seminary at The University of the South School of Theology and received her Master of Divinity in May 2008. While in seminary, she also completed course work in pastoral care, community outreach, and leadership development. She also spent two years reading Greek and was selected to attend the Excellence in Preaching Conference. Mother Julie attained her undergraduate degree in Liberal Arts with a concentration in Child Development at Humboldt State University in Northern California. She worked with the developmentally disabled for over twenty years before serving in parishes as a youth pastor in California and Indiana. She is currently the rector of a small church in a small town in Tennessee.

Mother Julie is married to Thomas, a conservation worker for the State of Tennessee Parks Department. They have three children and one grandchild and enjoy spending time camping, four wheeling, fishing, and kayaking. Mother Julie spends her free time gardening, reading, creating art, and gourmet cooking.

Her passion for ministry can be summed up in this prayer by St. Teresa of Avila:
“Christ has no body now but yours,
no hands but yours,
no feet but yours.
Yours are the eyes through which
Christ’s compassion must look out on the world.
Yours are the feet with which
He is to go about doing good.
Yours are the hands with which
He is to bless us now.”
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Filed Under: Mixed Media Art Techniques Tagged With: gesso, Julie Anna Johnson, Liturgical Art, Liturgical Mixed Media, Mixed Media Pieces

Mixed Media Mask Making

By MMA Team Leave a Comment

This article is written by Roger Adell

Here are my first attempts and the basic process. Actually I was pretty pleased with both the process and outcome. I followed the website instructions-

-blew up a balloon, cut strips of paper, mixed the paper mache paste I purchased from Dick Blick (Elmers Glue Paste), and put a layer of paste paper on the balloon. I placed 4 layers on the balloon letting each layer dry separately.

– I cut the balloon in 1/2 using a straight razor and now had 2 faces on which to work.

– cut holes for the eyes and mouth – build a nose out of aluminum foil ( I use that a lot) – paper mached the nose and stuck it on the face with my glue gun (Hobby Lobby).

– I then added more paper mache building up the face to show character.

– I then added all sorts of things- twigs for eye brows, larger lips, big ears out of aluminum foil and paper mache, earrings, a rolled up cigarette in his mouth, a beard from drier lint.

– I then painted it with acrylic paint–done.

Since my first mask I have made at least 100 more- all using found objects once I have the basic form from paper mache. I incorporate masks of all sizes on boards with other found objects and paintings and collages.

Materials-

– anything and everything I can find including-

– broken glass, bottles, shells from nuts, coins, fabric, used fabric softener sheets from the drier, plant leaves, party favors from tables, nails, screws, nuts and bolts, wire, hats, keys, yarn, found pieces of animal skulls, egg shells wrapped in paper mache used as eye balls, palm fonds, candle wax, drift wood from beaches, shells, tequila bottle stoppers, crepe paper, grapefruit and orange pits, stuffing from old pillows used for beards and hair, milk cartons as forms for heads, packing material, flattened soda cans for noses, found metal pieces from junk yards, spoons, knives and forks used for noses and ears.

paper mache Mask Making Ideas

Where the journey has taken me since-

– Once I got comfortable experimenting with paper mache I started to make life size figures which started looking like ET invaded my studio- I covered up all sorts of life-size materials such as discarded pinyatas, used paper towel rolls, large wadded up rolls of newspapers and Walmart bags, etc.

– Once I have the figure made I go back to my roots and cover it in paper mache and found objects and a new process I am enjoying- melted candle wax from old candles just lying around. I have also been known to “borrow” old candles from friend’s houses when I notice the wick gone. I save every broken glass from every dinner party my wife and I give or attend. Mas Tequila sometimes does that. I have also applied melted candle wax (with old brushes) to boards mounted with painted masks and the effect is wonderful.

Things that you can create from scrap materials

Create masks

– I have started making large mixed media pieces on wooden boards I get from the Carpenteria across the street- Much cheaper than canvass and just as effective- the boards also handle candle wax very well. I use an inexpensive electric hot plate to melt the candles (outside in ventilation is best). Candle wax for my purposes is fine and much less expensive than an encaustic process, which I still wish to learn.

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Roger Adell has been a B and W film photographer for 40 years (until now) and wanted to try some other types of expression. Roger loves faces and one day he checked out a book on mask making at the Santa Fe public library (He is residing in Mexico for the past 2 years). When he saw some of the mask creations he thought it would be fun to make some of his own. Not knowing what to do. He “googled” mask making and a lot appeared including how to make paper mache masks with directions and materials. That day, 4 years ago, he started creating masks.

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Filed Under: Mixed Media Art Techniques Tagged With: Masks, Masks Making, Mixed Media Mask Making, Roger Adell

Inkjet Art

By MMA Team 1 Comment

This article is written by Francesca Albini

When my inkjet printer tells me that my cartridges are empty, what it really means is that it’s time to buy new cartridges, although there is still a lot of ink in the “empty” ones. My first attempt at recycling the ink for my art was unsuccessful: I tried to open them. I don’t suggest you go down that route, unless you know what you are doing (please let me know if you do). What I do now is I rub a cotton bud over the spongy bit, where the ink normally comes out. If I want to use the ink in a painterly way, I then rub the inky cotton bud over an old CD jewel case and then I pick up the ink with a wet brush, as I would with normal ink or watercolour. If I have more than one cartridge, then I can mix the colours on the jewel case as I would on a palette. (I use the jewel case technique also to paint with any kind of water based markers – just rub the tips on it.) For a grungier effect, I can draw directly with the inky cotton bud.

In the first two works, I was also experimenting with backgrounds for this inkjet art. I love testing pens and trying different marks. The result is usually a quite colourful scrap of paper that sadly gets thrown away. So I wanted to see if I could rescue it, by perhaps scanning and manipulating it with a photo editing programme. The result I liked the most came out looking like some kind of camouflage design, and that prompted the idea of adding a soldier, painted with magenta and black inkjet cartridges (that’s all I had).

I continued experimenting with more manipulation of the pen testing paper, using a pattern-making plug-in. This second background reminded me of vegetation, perhaps a dark, lush jungle, so I added some flowers, using gesso for the petals and inkjet inks, applied both with a cotton bud and an old dry felt-tip pen. I found the felt-tip pen a bit tricky.

The last piece of the series of inkjet art is just one of my doodles done with a cotton bud. As the character looked a bit old-fashioned, I decided to give him a vintage background. I happened to find a 45 vinyl record on the stairs (yes we live like this in this household!), scanned it, copied it on different layers using different blending modes, and that completed the scene with the right atmosphere for this funny looking guy.

Next time you have to change a cartridge, try one of these techniques or discover your own. Inkjet inks and art are wonderfully bright and vivid.

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Francesca is a visual artist using pretty much everything she finds around her to record and relive feelings and memories of places and emotions. She collages, paints, draws, photographs. Francesca loves mixing modern technology, such as mobile phone apps, with the simplest of tools such as glitter glue, crayons and other children’s art supplies. Read her blog at http://franjournal.blogspot.com/

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Filed Under: Mixed Media Art Techniques Tagged With: backgrounds, inkjet inks, recycled art

The “FEAR“

Liturgical Representation: A Series of Mixed Media Pieces

Mixed Media Mask Making

Inkjet Art

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