A Decorated Box Using Mixed Media
Trash can become a treasure
It was only a small cardboard box but I wanted to take it to the extreme. There’s something extremely satisfying in taking trash and treating it like a treasure. Many times when I draw I miss working with 3-dimensional objects. This time I wanted to enjoy playing with the box and use all its’ sides. Mixed media was the driving factor here too.
Preparation
First removed all the extra tapes from the box surface. Then I covered the box with white gesso. It would give colors better background than brown cardboard.
Inside
I painted the inside panels yellow. It is one of my favorite colors and I often use it when I want to add light but do not want to do that with white. As you may know, I am not a big fan of white!
Plain yellow surface looked little bare so I added some collage elements. These were made by coloring pages from children’s books with color pencils and then randomly cutting circles from the colored areas. I glued the circles with gel medium.
The bottom of the box needed something different. I decided to crochet a piece that would fit inside the box. I began with a small square and crocheted around it using a couple of colors. Finally I finished the pice by embroidering a flower.
At this phase the box reminded me about the sunflowers in the end of the summer. Then I began to decorate the outside of the box.
Outside
I continued with crochet. I made flowers and a long chain which I used in the outside bottom. It feels great to lay the box onto the table when there’s soft wool in the edges!
The I wondered how to attach the decorations like the crocheted flowers and various buttons to the outside edges. They were pretty heavy. Golden Fiber Paste was the perfect stuff! It created the textured surface and attached all the little pieces securely.
The end result is unusual looking but perfect for my indian ink bottles!
Designing a Tattoo
Last spring my friend asked if I could design a tattoo for her.
A tattoo! An image that you can’t remove, at least not easily! And so personal one. That really is a challenge, I thought. I should not do it. No. Yes. I should try to!
It was my friend’s first tattoo. She had been wanting it for years. She told me she wanted a tree or a branch. That’s where the design process began.
I drew sketches and asked questions. Should it be strong, edgy, round, feminine? Full of leaves or bare? Ornamental or simple? And so on. I knew I had to trust on the design process and let each of the phase take me closer to the end result.
When the process went on, I began to draw sketches on computer. Adobe Illustrator is a great program for this kind of work.
Between computer work I printed the design and continued with handdrawn details. Finally every little detail had been finetuned with computer and the design was finished.
The finished design was presented to the tattoo artist. She changed the thinnest lines stronger so that they would last.
The tattoo is located on the arm. I am glad my friend loves it and I like it too. It represents a lot of her style but I can still recognize it to be my work of art too.
What an exciting project!
Folk Bag with Imagination
I finished this bag in the summer but have been saving this for blogging. Now when the autumn has come to Finland, showing this feels appropriate.
When making this my goal was to create something based on my own style so I created everything myself. All the patterns and ornaments are my own designs.
This bag is inspired by nature in the way many folk style objects were. It also represents the design process where wild plants change to stiff ornaments.
I named the bag after another of my work. This is called Dancing With Imagination because it is so much alike than the art journal page that I made a while ago.
Dancing with Imagination – Mermaid Illustration
The reason why I have been practising by drawing millions of circles, again and again, is this: I want to express myself through illustration. I want to put my imagination into work and make my toughts and dreams visible.
And I have more dreams. You might remember that I painted icons when I was a child. It led me to dream about painting new kind of icons: images that are not connected to any particular religion but which have the similar uplifting effect.
Now I have understood that I want to dance with the imagination, go beyond, not only religion, but also reality. I want to illustrate imaginitive stories, fairy tales, and use them to uplift myself and hopefully others too.
I have found this through art journaling. I have made many ugly pages before I have realized: I can take any direction I want with my art, with my thinking.
I want to cherish the power of imagination and welcome you to do so too!
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