Welcome! I’m Carolyn Dube – This colorful journey is all about the freedom of play!
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The Fine Print
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Impressables by Gel Press are a new kind of gel plate! All the fun of gel printing with a twist – they have an embossed pattern on them! These have just been released at CHA and will be shipping in the near future.
Like all gel plates, there is more than one way to use them. Here is my current favorite way to use the Impressables as I play with the Rose Mandala Impressable, designed by Jen Starr for Gel Press:
The prints began by brayering on a color. I started with the purple. Then, a second color is brayered on the embossed pattern. The teal popped against the purple. The only thing left to do is grab the paper and take a print!
For every one of these prints made in the video, I used the exact same paints and plate, yet each print is unique. That is the joy of gel printing for me – every print is one of a kind.
I never know what I will see when I look at a Spark of Art-spiration. Didn’t expect to have a rainbow caterpillar stop by but when something this silly pops in, I just have to see where it takes me!
What is a Spark of Art-spiration? It’s a free download that comes in my newsletters as a jumping off point for a bit of play. Use the button below the video to get this Spark sent directly to your inbox for some fun.
This Spark is a photo of part of an apron from the studio. All those smears of color were just too much fun to leave only on the apron. At first, I thought I’d go with more of a Monet type vibe but when I turned the Spark all the sudden a cute little rainbow caterpillar jumped out and said hello!
With the watercolor crayons, I drew his body. Why these and not Sharpie markers or paint or regular crayons? I grabbed what was closest so any supplies you have on hand can work with a Spark.
This wasn’t a space caterpillar floating through the cosmos. He needed some ground to walk on so I grabbed the white paint and created some hills for him.
How do I know that he is a he and not a she? After all, this happy face is very gender neutral. Could be a boy. Could be a girl. But it’s a boy.
I am sure it’s male because of the found words from a book. Whenever I pick a page randomly from a book, I can find the word or words that fit just what I’m creating. After all, I bet caterpillars would get a bit anxious with the big changes that they go through to emerge butterflies.
The final touch was a bit of journaling along the hill. One word of caution. If the paint is still wet when you use a pen in it, it is hard on the pen. The paint was mostly dry but not completely. I live on the edge some days and don’t wait for everything to dry but just know that is a tough life for pens.
What will you find in this Spark? Play along and use this Spark of Art-spiration in your play.
Just click the button below and the computer elves will get it to your inbox and get you signed up for my newsletters so you can get new Sparks to play with each week.
Making a mess is all about discovering what can happen. Sometimes, it’s more mess. Sometimes, it’s something I love. The fun is I never know which it will be when I start playing.
This wood panel began with layers of texture. No goal, no plan, no direction – just a mess of textures. Those mica flakes from USArtQuest attached with glue through my Arched Aqueduct stencil was the only part of this I liked. I really didn’t like the dark color or anything else on it, but that keeps the mystery alive since I never know what just one layer will do to it.
When I added the white paint using my Alternating Diamonds stencil from StencilGirl, suddenly I loved it. So much so that I added another layer in blue right on top of the textures along with a little white washing on the bottom.
Just one layer and what was yuck was transformed to something I wanted to put on my wall. Thanks to serendipity, there was just the right amount of space for the title of this, Discover using the Now is the Time stencil.
A bit of scribble journaling to capture the feelings of this play with a Pico embellisher completed it.
The adventure of going from ugly to something I want to hang on the wall is one of the many reasons I love mixed media play. So next time you have an ugly layer, just know that you may be only one layer away from something you love.
Here are the supplies I used. Some of these links are affiliate links which means I get a small percentage. It doesn’t cost you anything extra and you are helping me keep this blog and my videos ad free! Thank you- I don’t like ads any more than you do!
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