Donnerstag, 29. November 2018

Stars - Art Elements monthly challenge!



This month's theme challenge at Art Elements was chosen by Laney - Stars! My first thoughts were that this would be a wonderful versatile theme: From simple drawn stars to complex galaxies, from nightskies to the sun itself...


And with shapes it is always so easy to transfer them to different mediums! But.. I only managed a few of the ideas on my idea list (yes, doing those, especially during boring meeting ;) ). One coud argue with a lot of deadlines for grant application, a lot of work to do since so many people were (are) at work, with christmas so close around the corner...


...but in the end that was not the reason. I simply still struggle with the change of the seasons. It is dark when I get up in the morning, it is dark when I come home. Maybe I see a little bit of light through the windows at word but otherwise it is all dark and grey. It takes me a long time to adapt to the missing light. My body just feels tired and we have an argument about sleep on a daily basis (since I agree with him but not the rest of society, it is even more exhausting). So my energy level is non existent.

 

You can find stars in my work all the time. Above I showed some simple ceramic pendants (some from last year, some from this year). I make them for simple and fast children workshops using christmas decoration as stamps. 


I also love to make small ear studs with polymer clay in star shape. They always look so lovely and I am filling up my stash for the christmas market at Werk II in Leipzig. The glass cabochon earrings are from last year but I just had to show them to you! Made with pages from an old encyclopedia britannica and still some of my favorite ever "view stars"!


I love to make colour swatches from any kind of colour. This really helps me later to decide what I want to use (or buy if it was a sample) and in itself it is so relaxing. Seeing the mainly blueish colours I thought it would be a nice idea to add silhouettes and add some stars! Still working as colour swatches but even more fun to create!


As I wrote above, shapes are always wonderful to transfer to different media and of course I wanted to make some christmas cards. A super simple idea is to cut stars from textures paper and use them to create texture on a gel printing plate (I use Gelli Arts and GelPress). I like to enhance the contrast / contours with a pen. Maybe I will also add more contrast on these cards... 



Another super simple idea that I think is wonderful to make with children or simply if you want to have a project idea with (or for) friends. I have a lot of small pieces of my gel monoprints. They are to beautiful to throw away so I keep them all (even the tiniest piece could be used for earrings)!
I added double sided tape on the back, drew a rough star (don't go for perfect!) on the backside and then cut them out.

There are your star sticker!


I glued some stars on small cards with printed background I had at hand (at every time you will find way too many work in progress pieces on my table). Any kind of paper / card would work for this. 

But seeing the images now, I think, I will enhance the contrast of the stars (and incorporating them better to the background) with some pens. Either with acrylic paint pens or with polychromos (they work wonderful on acrylic paint).


Of course I kept the plastic backside of the tape! That are wonderful masks for gel plates! (You can guess my problem now, or? Why I have way too much stuff... because you could use everything sometime ^^)


I had more of the small cards with colourful printed backgrounds and only added a neutral, warm colour on top (stone grey from Schmincke Akademie).



Love them! I need to make more of them!
 

Thank you for joining us for this month's theme challenge at Art Elements! I can't wait to see what everyone made and hope you will have a look too!

Guest Artists
 
Cat 
 
 
Art Elements Team
 

16 Kommentare:

  1. Love all your starry interpretations, especially the pendants

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  2. Stars, stars, stars! All of them are beautiful, but I really love that first picture with all of the charms together, the little deer, the trees, the stars, perfect!

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  3. The pendants and earrings are really beautiful, I love studs that are visible (not the tiny ones you have to get close to see, no matter how expensive they are). Those colorful prints are amazing, one idea - limitless variants. The "view stars" studs are top of my list - so unique!

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  4. Your charms & pendants are beautiful. Hopefully when you look at these bright beautiful colors it helps the dark winter doldrums. Love those little glass cabochon earrings! Your color swatches are amazing!! They are little works of art all by themselves. I certainly wouldn't consider them sample swatches at all. I love the Christmas card ideas. I would love to make my own but there never seems to be enough time.

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  5. LOVE your ceramic stars and your color swatches are wonderful! I love them! I also love all your star cards! I hear you on the winter doldrums - I am really feeling it this year worse than any other year. Hope you get to feeling sunnier! Go to an island!

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  6. You really showed an array of options with using stars! I love all the papercraft uses too.

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  7. I love all of your work Claire, those little earrings are really cute, I can see why you love them. Your ceramics have to be my favourite though, the glazes on your charms are gorgeous!

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  8. Those ear rings steal my heart! I love them! I love your star cards too and glad i am not the only person that keeps every single little piece.....

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  9. I love your polymer clay star earrings. I bet they sell well. I always enjoy seeing your prints. The last star print has such energy. I love it.

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  10. Claire, I love the starry clay earrings best too. And the colors!! When I first went over to France I suffered from the Winter Drearies ... for many years. Even while raising my babies. The fireplace installation helped immensely and I guess I just learned to work and live around it. I hope your December is a little better in that aspect. Alysen

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  11. Your pendants and earrings are beautiful! Winters were bad for my energy too when I was in the US, especially with the daylight savings time change, but your colorful gel prints are greatly cheerful! I've started playing with gel printing recently, and I agree - I don't want to throw anything away, lol! Thank you for sharing your ideas - using a pen to enhance contrast of shapes is definitely something I'll try. I like the tiny paintings on the swatches as well - very creative and much fun.

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  12. "I have way too much stuff... because you could use everything sometime" I really laughed when I read this line as I too keep a lot of stuff because it has some use. I love your view stars earrings for it is really quirky. Come to India sometime to bask in the heat, you will get recharged for sure.

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  13. Your work draws my eye. I love the colors and textures to your clay work as well as your paintings. I keep thinking that I cannot wait until the days start to get longer again. Someone mentioned it was not even "winter" yet and it made my brain tense up and repulse the notion. I hope you get some sunshine soon!

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  14. You are talented in so many media and your voice is evident in all of them. I especially love your water colors.

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  15. I always enjoy seeing what you're up to for these challenges! I'm really drawn to your little silhouettes on your color swatches... so adorable!

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  16. whoah this weblog is excellent i really like reading your articles. 온라인카지노

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