Frieda Oxenham: Art Journaling with StencilGirl® Stencils

The part of Ben Okri’s poem that I’m illustrating this month tells us: “So dream a good dream today and keep it going in every way”.  This is definitely not an easy task considering what life is throwing at us all and having positive dreams seems at times far too much to ask. But I still think that trying to find at least one good thing to concentrate on every day might help us with trying to have at least some positivity in our lives and is good for our mental health.

This page faces the one made for February’s project and here you see them together.

This is the tutorial for the right hand page:

1.      Cover the page (8 x 11.5”) with gold acrylic paint using two layers for good coverage. You could also use gold gesso.

2.      Stencil all over the page using blue acrylic paint and stencil L024 Damask, and when dry splatter with pink fluid acrylic paint (I used the one from Golden).

3.      Add more colour using transparent acrylic paint using a brush or your fingers (which is usually what I end up doing).

4.      Remove the paint with a baby wipe through the large stencil of the September 2018 StencilClub set.

5.      Glue on a face torn from a Stamperia rice paper sheet using matte medium.

6.      Add stenciling around the face using the same stencil as in step 4, with a mixture of titanium white and pale blue paint.

7.      Outline the stenciling from step 6 above the head with a blue Sharpie poster paint marker.

8.      Using previously made coloured papers (I used the leftovers from last month’s project) and the large stencil from the March 2020 StencilClub, mark out the flowers on the paper with a permanent black marker and cut out. Glue onto the page at bottom right, using a glue stick.

9.      Outline the flowers with a turquoise opaque paint marker.

10.  Write the words of the Ben Okri quotation using a Dymo writer on transparent tape.

11.  Glue on butterfly postage stamp as shown.

12.  Edge the page with large pink Posca marker and also rub some on the page itself.

© Frieda Oxenham 2021. To see more of Frieda's work, please visit her BLOG.