Abstract Junk Journal Spread Inspired by Rocks - w/ LauraMixedMedia

Hello! Laura Dame, here. 

Recently I have been very inspired by the Stone Stack and Pebble Path stencils from Jane Monteith. 

I love the round, rock shapes, and the stencils go so well with the abstract kick that I've been on. 

One of my favorite ways to use the stencils is by applying paint to my journal pages and then rubbing it off through the stencil with a baby wipe. It gives a cool, grungy effect to the pages which I love. 

I've then added my own rock shapes by making imperfect circles with paint.  

Where the pages go from there all depends on how I'm feeling. Many times I'll add some scribbles and just make a mess. But this time I also added some more stenciling, collage, and marks. 

Check out the video of the process below! I hope you feel inspired to make your own grungy abstract spread!

Stencils: 

Stone Stack

Abstract Rosette

Supplies: 

Junk Journal

Liquitex Basics Gesso

Dina Wakley Media Acrylic - Marine, Sage, Turquoise 

Amsterdam Acrylic - Titan Buff Deep

Golden Heavy Body Acrylic - Titan Mars Pale

Stabilo All Pencil - Black

Liquitex Matte Gel Medium

Collage Papers

Find me on Social Media!

Instagram

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Kirsten Varga - June Stencil Club

Kirsten here with a recycled box book made from a cream cheese box! Are you ready to go on another bookmaking adventure with me? 

Using a food packaging box can be a quick way to create a cover for a book. The thin cardboard is easy to work with. The folds of the box will dictate the size of your covers and spine. Just cut the inside pages to fit in the cover and you are good to go.

Carolyn Dube's fun designs for the June Stencil Club stencils were great for creating a variety of visual textures on my painted papers. These were perfect for the cover of my book.

I used the super simple 3-hole pamphlet stitch to attach the seven signatures into this little chunky book.

Check out the video below to see how I created it!

Happy Creating!

Find me on Instagram: @kirstenvarga

Join StencilClub by June 15 to receive these exclusive stencils and accompanying video tutorial with PDF (both downloadable!), and 20% OFF STENCILS EVERY DAY!!

Stencils used:

Other supplies:

cream cheese box old dictionary paper drawing paper faux leather ribbon acrylic paint PVA glue Beacon 3in1 Glue thing Velcro adhesive dots Awl Japanese screw punch bone folder needle and waxed linen thread ruler/pencil/scissors

New Art Tutorial by Frieda Oxenham with StencilGirl® Products

StencilGirl® Products has a wonderful selection of stencils to choose from and today’s project was inspired by a set of stencils that themselves were inspired by tiles. They are all sized 6 x 6” and designed by Laurie Mika. They are gorgeous and I used three of them in today’s art. Here is the tutorial:

1.     Take a sheet of A3 sized (11.69 x 16.54”) watercolour paper and brayer on white gesso. My sheet was by Crawford and Black

2.     Spray the sheet with a variety of spray paints. I used mainly Lindy’s Starburst sprays for an extra bit of sparkle

3.     Stencil randomly through the text stencil from March 2023 StencilClub using Titanium White acrylic paint.

4.     Using a variety of colours stencil randomly over the sheet using a cosmetic wedge and stencil L921 Japanese Tulip Oriental Rug.

5.     Repeat step 3.

6.     Repeat step 4 but using different colours of acrylic paint and stencils S933 Lisbon Tiles, S932 Douro Valley Tile and S931 Cascais Tile.

7.     Using black acrylic paint and stencil L281 Bold Flowers, stencil on flowers pointing towards the centre of the page. To make this easier I cut the stencil into individual flower parts. I used 3 different sizes of flower.

8.     Add white text to the black flowers by putting the stencil pieces you used in step 7 on the black flowers and then adding the text stencil from step 3 on top of that and then stencilling with Titanium White acrylic paint using a cosmetic wedge.

9.     Using stencil S931 Cascais Tile and crimson Stencil Butter paint, stencil the tile twice onto black paper.

10.  When dry, cut out the two tiles and cut one in half. Glue onto the sheet as shown. I used double sided tape, but gel medium will also work.

11.  Using the small alphabet stencil from the April 2014 Stencilgirl® Club and a red Posca (or other) permanent paint marker stencil on your chosen quotation onto black paper, cut out and add to the sheet as shown

12.  Using a white Posca marker, outline the tiles and the text.

13.  Add a black frame of approx. ¼” around the sheet with a black Posca marker.

©Frieda Oxenham May 2023

Follow the Path with Our New StencilClub Exclusive from Carolyn Dube.

The Pathways collection for this month’s StencilClub set was inspired by various sidewalks, walkways, and promenades that hold a special meaning for me. Even though many feet walk over the same ground, our journeys are unique. We each have our own path.

The stencil on the left was inspired by the mosaic walkways of Corinth, the oversized stepping stones of Pompeii and the shifted cobblestones along the promenade in Ephesus.

The stencil on the right had a more playful source of inspiration, watching kids use big buckets of sidewalk chalk to turn plain cement into works of art!

Joining StencilClub means you have access to the coolest stencils around. Stencils that aren't sold anywhere else except to club members. Artist designs, made especially for club members. To get an idea of the past offerings, just scroll down and check out the pictures!

Each month, you get the following:

• Two 9" x 12" EXCLUSIVE Stencils. 

Always Artist Designed

Sometimes there will be 2 designs, other times there will be multiple designs on two stencils.

• An EXCLUSIVE video for MEMBERS ONLY provided by the designing artist. It's a class in itself!

• A downloadable PDF with basic instructions to go along with the video for that month

• Entrance into a SECRET Facebook group for MEMBERS ONLY! A place to share, inspire and talk all about stencils!

• Plus, as a MEMBER, you are eligible to purchase ANY past month for the membership price. 

• StencilClub members receive a loyalty coupon code each month good for 20% off stencils in the public collection. It can be used more than once.

StencilClub is only:
$25 USD - United States, monthly 
$35 USD - International, monthly

Join StencilClub Today. 

Tina Hois ~ Stencilled layers & feathered friends

Hello creative friends!

Tina here and I am so happy to be sharing a quick journalpage processes that I use quite often.

The weather has finally turned ~ the sun is now a regular day fixture, flowers are blooming and feathered friends are calling my yard and trees their summer home.

This is such a special time of year and  I truly enjoy sitting outside with a cup of tea listening to natures music. 

I wanted to honour this feeling in my journal and found the perfect stencils to accompany my vision.

I love me a multifaceted stencil and the Collage Textures, Patterns & Leaves by Gwen Lafleur is perfect for a multitude of applications,

The pattern portion is great for backgrounds or select bits of it and add raised texture with some modeling paste.

The botanicals are fabulous for both backgrounds and focal points on cards and art journals.

The Tall Birds stencil by Terri Stegmiller is another stencil that inspires ideas for me.

For this project I used only the body portion of the birds and that’s ok✨

The birds are perfect fodder for journals, cards and tags. What I really enjoy is personalizing them ( as I did below)

Last but never least is the Broken Line Columns stencil by Cynthia Silveri.

I use this small but mighty stencil all the time.

It’s a perfect mark making design so therefore fantastic for layers and can also be used alone to create gorgeous abstract patterned backgrounds.

Enjoy & Let's get started!

Supplies:

Stencils: 

Broken Line Columns

Tall Birds

Collage Textures Patterns and Leaves

Acrylic paint

Gel Plate

Brayer

Tissue paper

Gel pen

Sponge

Scissors

The Process:

Apply paint to gel plate and pull the print- this will be the bird colour.   You can also simply stencil the birds. 

With the Tall Birds stencil trace only the bird bodies and cut

With the Collage Textures Patterns and Leaves  stencil random patterns and berries on the birds - set aside

On a gesso prepared and dry page ~ and with altering sponge pressure (so that there is varied paint textures) using the Collage Textures Patterns and Leaves apply the first layer of the backgroundand ~ dry completely

With the brayer add a layer of paint to your page ~ this is a soft tranperant layer which allows the first layer to show through as well as the gesso ( a sponge or paint brush can also be used)

Here I used two colours to add interest

Dry completely and set aside

Stencil the Leaves on to the tissue paper and set aside to dry.

With the Broken Line Columns stencil add the next layer with random marks around the page

Cut the tissue tree branches and with matte medium or modpodge adhere to your page

Grab our feathered friends and glue them down on the branches

Enjoy the process and your feathered back yard friends.

t.

Let's connect!

  tinahoisart  

Sketchbook Play- by Kate Yetter

Hi Everyone, it's Kate here with you today.

Lately, I have been inspired by sketchbook tours to make my sketchbook more of a practice place. If you are like me, you want every page in your sketchbook to be as pretty as the flip-throughs on Youtube, but in order to make the pretty stuff, you need to practice and experiment. Gouache is one of those mediums I haven't yet tried and I thought this would be the perfect place to give it a go.

Garden Botanical Mask

I started off by stenciling my image onto a page of my sketchbook.

Not knowing what I was doing, I started with gouache on the leaves in several different colors.

I chose a palette that I thought would go together and started painting.

At this point, I wanted to fill in all the white space, so I added some foliage and a background.

And I added some more. At this point, I was unhappy with the flowers. I worked them and re-worked them. Even though this is my first time working with gouache, I love that it allows you to paint layer upon layer until you are happy.

I love the look of ink so I added black outlines but not to everything.

I finally got the flowers the way I like them.

I love the way it turned out. I would have used more stencils but my page wouldn't allow due to size. Now I am thinking about all the possibilities with my other flower stencils.

Imaginary Botanical Mask

Eucalyptus Stems Mask Small

Chinese Garden Plum Blossoms

If you haven't used stencils and Gouache, give it a try. You can cover up all your tracing lines with paint and work it until you are happy. So pull put those stencils and your sketchbook and have fun!

Until Next Time,

Kate