"The Awakening of spring" - Earrings

Pantones color(s) of the year 2016 is (are) "Rose quartz and serenity". They are not really my favorite choice or to put it in a more positive way, they were a real challenge. So you may understand why I am so proud of this earring pair! Beautiful artisan lampwork nuggets, small czech beads, hammered copper and some tiny copper spacer... so surprised how much I love Pantones choice now ;)

You can also find them in my shop here :)

ATC - "Explore more - expect less"

My second ATC for the challenge I was to late for ;) 

The house parts are really simple: I used polymer clay, impressed them with texture cut out the rought shapes, baked and painted them!

I also had to use more of the iridescent acrylic paint from Pebeo ;) I have some house parts left but not sure if I want to use them. Even though I like the result, this is also not me. But I am so into the background, that is definitely me! ;)

Also made with my new tiny dot stamp made from craft foam!

ATC - "I see you"

Paper collage from magazines and printes, combined with stencils and texture paste. She looks more beautiful in person than here on my blog but just let me tell you: I love my little warrior! 

A warrior not because of actual fighting with aggression but rather by not turning around, by not being blind. To be seen and recognized as human beings is often more important than a lot of people realize.

ATC - "Home with you"

As promised yesterday, here is one of my ATC cards for the topic "houses" - not made in time ;)

I like this one but it is not really me. One of the reasons why I enjoy playing with different material and styles so much (also in jewellery). Just to think about it is something quite different from doing it. I know what I'll take from this one with me and also what not! ;)

ATC - "Catch the moment"

The idea of creating artist trading cards (ATC) was started in Life Book 2016, or rather the arrangement of an ATC exchange. No, I am not showing you any of the ATC I'll send across the world since this should be an surprise but one of the many I started creating (also no in any order except they were all done in the last few days ^^).

I want to start with this one because I made it for a blog challenge over at Paper artsy. The topic is fabric. Actually I also made two for the last challenge (houses) but forgot the time so when I wanted to upload them to my blog I realized the deadline was over for... roughly two hours? *sighs*

I'll show you what I made in the next days but I thought rather start with the ATC for the actual challenge since I am really, really good in "forgetting the challenge time". 

I used stitched flowers from an old vest. The back of the vest was a beautifully woven fabric that will end as a pillow in the near future but I started cutting out some of the flowers. I thought they would go well with my little face and indeed they do! The doll face is made from polymer clay. The phrase is actually from a special edition "Tempo" tissues. Just sued matte gel medium to glue it on and cover it and that work surprisingly well!

The background are drawn marks, some acrylic paint and ink and pen...

"Timeless" - Small polymer clay earrings that should have been for a blog challenge...

....but were finished way to late! This happens quite often to me. There seem to bee weeks or even a whole month of time ahead and I am full of ideas. But never ever in time... (or rarely, I may overstate this a little bit for the dramatic effects)

I am still proud of these little ones. Surprisingly conceptual for me but it worked! The zigzagged lines, the colour scheme, the way the colour blends and blurs the lines...!

So the idea worked, but just not for the time frame set for the challenge (or inspiration) ;)

Winged crocodile - Playing with mixed media (Wanderlust 2016)

There are another year long mix of mixed media classes I had to join: Wanderlust 2016. A different kind of atmosphere compared with Life book 2016, but both are special and both have parts I am not into. But they are so minor, otherwise I really enjoy both! Most of the time I don't have to do the shown project but rather take the inspirations. I love to see other people work, how they use their material and how their creation process is. Together with the small tips and tricks that can't be shown with only pictures and text.

This lesson was from Finnabair and actually the reason why I joined Wanderlust (a little bit late but since you can watch the videos whenever you want, that is no problem). A mixed media collage with all the pieces you can find ;)

If you would know my crafting room (and the rest of our flat) you would know that this is not a problem at all! A piece of cut wood was the basic and on top are lace, plastic wrap, glass, pepper corn, metall, wood and a lot of polymer clay pieces I made and was not happy with (for whatever reason).

The crocodile was from a Kinder surprise egg and the wings were originally polymer clay pendants I made.

Sorry for the little bit blurry images of the creation process. But I just remembered last minute to take at least some pictures!

On top of black gesso I used: Reeves acrylic paint in copper, bronze and gold (in this order) and afterwards a lot of different Pebeo iridescent acrylic paints. 

So difficult to capture the shimmer and shine but the end result is: Bettle wing colour! ;)

I went a little bit overboard with the colours but sometimes one just has to! Maybe the next ones will be more subtle...

Or maybe not....!

All the tiny dots - another craft foam stamp

Again a very simple handmade stamp to show! I already made different versions of stamps with these tiny dots but needed a new and bigger one. They won't hold forever but in my hands I was able to use them for several years. So that is good enough for me. Also it makes a difference whether you are just using stamping ink pads or also acrylic paint. Acrylic paint will reduce the life of such a craft foam stamp since it will stiffen the foam over time. I still use both and love also how the texture changes over time due to use. But if you only use stamping ink this kind of stamp will be useable for much longer (don't know how long because even my first ones are still working for years). 

I used a piece of scrap wood. Since I am a member of the Makerspace Leipzig which has a wood working space and a big bin with wood scraps, that is not a problem anymore for me ;) I drew a grit on top to know where to place the craft foam dots.

In theory they are craft foam sticker. But a lot of them are not really holding well may also be due to the fact that these stickers are for years in my stash. For this kind of project I like to use UHU max repair since it is really strong and flexible. Yes, a little bit expensive but you don't need much. 

I am not only using the dots but also the "surrounding" pieces. They also make cool background texture.

I also made one stamp with the tiny wee dots. For this I glued some paper with a grid onto the wood since this was easier than to draw all the lines by myself. I just enhanced the lines I wanted to use as guidelines.

Now I run out of the small craft foam dot stickers. Any ideas where I can get new ones?

"Penumbra" - Romantic and rustic earrings

After all the paintings some earrings again! I love the colour combination, bold and bright and still... with a dark gothic feeling :)

The czech glass beads and the tiny metal spacer are from Rebeccas "The Curious Bead Shop" and the lampwork beads are handmade by Sue Robinson.

They dangle of course! Earrings have to have some movement for me! ^^

You can find them in my etsy shop here :)

Formentera - This time some mixed media...

We were for one week in spain... back where I feel at home more than anywhere else: Formentera. I always take something with me and over the years I made a lot of things there. Not too much at a single holiday but always a little bit. 

This time I worked on a collage inspired by the Life Book 2016 lesson "make it shine". I had a magazine that I used to cut out the boy and some backgrounds as well as the trees and started to paint over it, layer for layer...

This is how the table looked like! 

The gold is really glowing and reflecting the light beautifully. Just so damn difficult to catch on camera. Here I tilted the paper a little bit so you can get an idea about how beautiful the effect is!

I worked with a limited colour palette and am surprised how well this worked for me. Of course it could also be that it was due to the place, everything could work for me as long as I do this at Formentera ;)

Life book 2016 - Inspirations to play more with the background... and strange perspectives ;)

I already started to get more layers and more depth into my backgrounds but in this painting I even got one (or more steps) further. The end result is actually strange. I love the extreme contrast and how the red of red riding hoods fabric seem to glow! But I paint while sitting in a low position before a low table. Therefor my view is not straight but in an angle. That actually lead to the effect that the perspective of the trees is really good from this angled viewpoint and a little bit distorted if you look at it directly from the front (like now ;)). 

I think it is funny because a friend of me realized this perspective without knowing how I painted it! So if you can tilt the monitor a little bit, you may see the effect... or I'll try to take some photo trying to capture the effect.

What I take from this one? Use colours, love colours, be bold and bright! There are never ever enough background colour. Never ever forget perspectives (especially) while painting (I also changed the red fabric several times).

And I even took pictures again of the creation process :)