I’m so glad I posted the beginnings of Wednesday, cos all trace of that pink ricey start are now hidden beneath layers of acrylic dots!
Wednesday’s page started out with the results of playing with dye and rice. I poured rice onto the puddles of dye that’d spilled onto the page
As the rice absorbed the water in the dye, the concentration of the pigment outlined the grains.
I’ll post what happened to this page later…
As the cut out shapes from Sunday echo through the pages, Tuesday bore the same linear curves and disconnected egdes through which a glimpse of Thursday…
Much coloring, inking, paint splatting later, the page evolves through different color groups and combinations. A journey of a day! 🙂
As Sunday’s cut-out page was backed with card, turning over to Monday’s page, meant incorporating two big rectangles of card bang in the middle of the page. I often follow the adage If you can’t hide it, make a feature of it, so this page was destined to be layered in a chunkier fashion than before.
Collaged into disguise with layers of dyed paper, bits n scraps of leftovers from old projects (those swirl shapes keep on coming back!), unified with layers of tissue paper.
After accidentally modpodging too far over the edges, as an exercise in ‘let’s see what happens’, I brushed modpodge over the card, then red ink. Scraping back when it was nearly dry revealed the shiny gold again.
When I was doing the paper dying thing I was using future pages of sketchbook to catch the drips.
Today this page came round. Pleasant in itself, but that was then. The nature of this is to be ephemeral, fleeting, evolving. This page belongs to today: time to change.
Skipping over the stages I forgot to photograph… then came the inky bit
What’s with white ink, then? I know, like dilute white paint. Just concept of ‘white ink’ doesn’t sit straight in my head. Anyways, white ink can be a bit milky, but dripping onto wet colored ink gives this effect. Can’t always guarantee inky splodge is dragon shaped 😉
The dragonyness left as he dried. But I think the idea of the shape got stuck in my head as I remembered I hadn’t done any cut outs for a while…
Back with the metaphors this book throws up: Y’know when the events of one day echo and reverberate, the memory creeps into the next few days? Such will be the next few pages!
More ink, sprayed, dripped, smudged…
integrating the stark whiteness from underneath, and stenciling its negative onto what will be next Tuesday’s page.
As the colors warmed up, it seemed to be wanting some gold. Metallic card stuck to the back of the page shines through.
…and photographing it!
As I type to you the final drippings and runnings of this page a doing their thing, which give me the chance to show you some more bits of page.
After scribbly ink and doodles I wanted to knock back some of the busy color and detail, which I did with a mix of acrylic and guache. Sliding and scraping with palette knife.
I wanted to liven up the texture, so used coarse pumice gel and – what’s to hand? – aha! leftover dyed rice! Then a swish of spray ink…
Only drying time will tell if the rice sticks, but even if it doesn’t, it’ll leave some nice rice-scars behind. Happy either way!
I love the way the wet media allow the pigments to travel, gather, collect together in bands. In these colors it reminds me a little of malachite
Embarking on a project like a page a day, without an aim in sight, more a stretch of the journey traveled in a new fashion, has to be done without expectations.
I’ve doodled and made art since before I can remember. Habitually, obsessively, because I love the process, and because (probably like all artists) I have to.
This is a different approach: One book that daily documents my trials and tribulations of the moment in color and shape, tone and imagination. Day in, day out. And then spilling out the results out into the interweb.
Having pondered if the pages might soon look samey, I’m starting to realise the range and variety of imagery that can be created.
By observing small slices of each page on screen, perspective changes. Fresh ideas emerge.
The inspiration from something touched upon days prior can be reignited afresh when a blank page beckons.
And an unexpected bonus is to be blessed by the delightful and encouraging words from folks who join along the way, Big thank you! 😀
When I began this project (a month ago today) I had no idea how long I’d stick with it. Or how easy/difficult, much fun/much of a slog, it would become.
Or for what reason I wanted to do it.
But I did want to.
So I began.
Ingredients:
That’s it, no rules.
Just one page at a time. One day at a time
(With maybe a little to-ing and fro-ing in between, but with the majority of today’s page being created today.)
Day 1: 16 March 2012. A Friday.
Home from work with the whole evening set aside to arty things, with the possibility to spill out over the weekend.
And wow did it spill! Everyday is painted, collaged, drawn on, doodled on, written on; dripped, splished and splatted on.
(I’ve posted previous pages if you’re interested here, here, here. And here n here!)
There are days that I’m more pleased with the result than others, but isn’t that a metaphor! If I find something really wanting on a page I’ll go back and add it. Using my sketchbook as a work surface (no drips of color go to waste in my world!) means some ‘new’ pages will begin with splishes and spills of color. S’okay.
Today ‘s page looks a lot like a page with inky paper towels stuck to it.
That’s cool. Cos I’m not so interested in what the page as a whole looks like.
These are the bits I like.
The miniature landscapes,
The inter-mingling of inks and dyes,
The light and the shade cast by wrinkles and dimples.
I love the crinkles formed in tissue paper when it gets wet n painty.
and the rivulets of ink, dabbed in a semi-dry state, neatly outlining themselves and marking their dribbly paths
doodles run around inky tidemarks, colors blend and merge the disparate 
layers piled high, paper takes on a feathery appearance, ruffled.
Not starting out with a ‘plan’ to how a page will take shape is liberating.
It’s not a piece of art it’s a page in a book.
It’s just for today. I offer no judgement.
Free to let the colors and shapes just happen.
it’s been over a week since the last round up of daily sketchbookery, here are some of the last week-and-a-bit’s additions…
Scraps of dyed paper are beginning to crop up
I’d been hunting through old magazines for some silhouettes to use, I’ve a feeling these might make a few appearances in pages to come.
The faces were cut out from some over-printings (more on this later)
If I had to choose a geometric shape, I would choose the circle.
These doodlings are a form of meditation.
the words themselves are unimportant
The pen walks around, and my bitty thoughts are released.
I’ll add some more later 😀 Thanks for looking
Mixy's Art Blog 