Guest Designer Frieda Oxenham

Sometimes all it takes to start a page in an art journal is a line read in a magazine. In this case the line “ahead of the curve” coincided with the arrival of the recent  StencilClub stencils for November.

Here is the tutorial:

1.     Using an 8 x 10” gelli plate add one or more colours of acrylic paint to it and take prints on copy and deli paper. 

2.      Add more acrylic paints to your plate, then add one or more of the stencils named below to the plate, take prints onto the papers made in step 1, and then remove the stencils, take more prints onto other papers from step 1. Here are some examples. L901 Map Pattern,  L885 Connection, S899 Rippled Water, L969 Squiggle Doodle.

3.   Keep overprinting like this using all the above stencils (and more) on your already printed papers. 

4.     You will end up with far more papers than you’ll need but it is good to have lots of choices and anyway, we all love a good painted paper stash, right!

5.     Working in your choice of art journal (I’m using a huge A3 (11.7 x 16.5”) one) start collaging on the page without gluing anything down yet. Simple select a rectangle from one of your favourite printed pages, put it in any of the corners (I started top right) and take it from there, based on what looks good together, varying large and small pieces and balancing the colours. You have plenty of papers so cut or tear them to your heart’s content. I used a metal ruler to tear my papers. Keep playing around till you have an arrangement that you like.

6.     Now glue down the pieces but first take a quick picture on your phone to remind yourself of your arrangement.

7.     Once you have this background glued down start adding smaller pieces as the next layer.

8.     Using one of the stencils form the November 2023 StencilClub and white acrylic paint add circles to the page as shown.

9.     Using the other stencil from the November 2023 StencilClub, stencil the bicycle with red acrylic paint onto deli paper, cut it out and glue it to the page at bottom right.

10.  Using the same stencil as in step 9 add small circles to the page with red and metallic bronze paint.

11.  Glue on your chosen text, cut from magazines. Mine reads: “Find your imagination, ahead of the curve”.

12.  With light blue paint and the same stencil as in step 8 add more of the large circles on the page.

13.  Using a mix of Stabilo All black pencil and water soluble oil pastels, outline the large circles, bike and text and scribble randomly with the pencil. 

©Frieda Oxenham 2024

Carol Ponsford - April StencilClub set

Hi everyone, Carol Ponsford here working with the April StencilClub set designed 

by Mary Beth Shaw and Mary Nasser to create colorful paper you can use as collage fodder, 

mixed media work, or a background for greeting cards. These stencils offer so 

much variety with their linear and organic shapes. I wanted to show you a third way 

to create a mash-up of those shapes. 

I worked on copy paper but this can be done on any weight paper of your choosing, I laid 

down the stencil with the wavy shapes first and then laid the organic shapes on top of that stencil.

Using Daniel Smith Gold Gesso I applied the gesso through both stencils at once with a 

sponge applicator. Finding that the alignment left some areas of white larger than I wanted, 

I removed the wavy stencil and through the organic stencil I 

added more gesso in the open areas until I got the effect I wanted.

I let this layer of gesso dry completely before proceeding.

After the gesso was dry, I brushed water over smaller areas and then 

introduced a variety of watercolor paint into the water soaked areas.

After the color had been applied and allowed to sit for a minute, I dabbed off the excess 

water and let the piece dry. Due to the paper choice I made the paper wrinkled quite a bit 

so I will need to address this by weighing it down with heavy books or perhaps ironing.

The pictures below show a couple of ways I used this piece of collage 

paper to create a birthday card and a collaged panel. The panel is a work in progress but 

I wanted to show you how I integrated the collage paper into the background

(On the card I used Rae Missigman's mask from stencil L952)

 

I hope you find this a helpful technique to expand the use of all of your stencils and 

create an undetermined amount of patterns you can create with your existing 

stash of stencils. Thank you StencilGirl® Products for providing me with this free 

StencilClub set so that I could play in advance and share what I create each month 

with you. Enjoy playing with your stencils and I will see you back here next 

month to show you what I create with the May StencilClub set. 

Join StencilClub by April 15 to receive these exclusive stencils and accompanying video 

tutorial with PDF (both downloadable!), and 20% OFF STENCILS EVERY DAY!!

Happy Creating!

To see more of my work please visit my Instagram page.

Introducing Irish Aerials by Mary Beth Shaw and Mary C. Nasser

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.

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. Email Us with a list of which previous StencilClub sets of stencils you would like to purchase and he will provide you with a bill through PayPal.

• 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, shipping is included!

$35 USD - International, monthly, shipping is included!

Join by April 15th to receive this set!

City Love Pin Board - by Claudia Neubacher

Hi and servus, everyone! My best wishes for a creative and healthy 2023! 

I am no longer a huge fan of new years resolutions I have to admit, but I find myself still passing one or the other...this year I decided to put up a pin board in my studio to help remind me of collected (and hoarded) bits 'n pieces that I have been keeping to put them on later projects. But keeping them in boxes and out of sight mostly means I sooner or later (rather sooner I'm afraid) totally forget about them. And then cool stuff keeps piling and not getting used...not exactly what it actually is meant for, isn't it? 

So here's this year's try on making better use of my hoarded treasures by keeping them in sight on my studio wall: 

When you take a closer look at it, it reveals some scraps from older projects, one of Mary C. Nasser's awesome stencils I haven't yet used but wanted to play with asap (this one), two rolls of Washi tape that I re-discovered in a box where they definitely didn't belong at all, a printed out sheet with labels for Halloween potions, a left over gold Dresden Scrap, various tags, a copy of a vintage photograph, some tickets from a very inspiring trip to a beautiful wildlife park,...and all these treasures are being displayed on a pin board with a city travel theme - a reminder by itself to restart visiting awesome cities in Europe after all the Cov-19-lock-down-madness and my last year with mostly being ill. 

I love maps in general - so using some of the awesome StencilGirl stencils designed by fabulously creative Mary C. Nasser for this project was the only reasonable option for me, as she actually offers a wide range of gorgeous map stencils to choose from. 

I used these three gems for my self made pin board: 

City Map Mask

Map Mask Stencil

Map Pattern Stencil

I love how these three vary in scale and style, yet still they are all three typical map designs, which was important for me, as I knew the visual map characteristic would suffer as soon as I would randomly "throw" stuff on top on my pin board. 

I experimented happily (and a happy mess it was indeed that I created on my desk) with various spray inks and paints I had in my stash, trying them out on different substrates like heavy white aquarell paper, sturdy Kraft paper and black cardboard. 

I started with some white Dylusions spray ink on the black cardboard. Then I used the left over wet ink on that same stencil to pull a print using Kraft paper. 

This way I got two results from one spray action and none of the spray ink was wasted. I continued with Distress Spray Stain, Canvas Corp Brands spray paints and Aladin I-Zink dye spray. 

I layered prints...

I misted the white map on the black cardboard with some transparent neon green spray ink in some spots...

I used the nozzles of the sprays to create splatter and drop marks for a slightly weathered look (as weathered maps tell stories of adventurous travels, don't they?)

I sprayed, printed, splattered, layered and misted away until I had a lovely collection of map papers to choose from (and more papers for future projects, which is always a nice and inspiring thing to have). 

Time to mount six of these beauties onto an A2 sized sheet of thick grey board! 

I roughly cut the papers to size (on my cutting mat using a steel ruler and a small carpet knife) and glued them in place. Then I turned over the grey board and cut off any excess paper along the edges. 

For the City Love quote I used thin black paper and a soft pencil. As I had no compasses at hand I used a roll of masking tape to draw the "C"-outline and then just eyeballed the inner circle. The other letters were drawn using a ruler to make sure they were all of the same width and height. 

I played around with the heart shape until it was narrow enough to fit with the style of the other letters but still "round" enough to stand for an "O". The white cut out heart you can see in the picture was my mask that I used on one of the other map papers I had made. 

When laying out the letters I made sure to not use same distances between them as that does create a poor design that has nothing to do with a good visual typographic rhythm. Letters with round shapes or open spaces to their sides like L, V or A, can be interlaced with their neighbours to form a visual union. Letters that are straight like I, N, E,...need more space between them when standing side by side. So I moved the C slightly closer to the I than the T for example. And the L and V very close to the heart shape. This way I also made sure both words had the same width in the end. 

As the maps' designs were a bit distracting, I used my ruler to make sure my words got glued in position exactly. 

Et voilà! 

As my pin board is very light weight I simply fixed it to my wall using four small nails with wide heads. 

Here are some close ups of the lovely map designs I've created:

And once more the finished pin board in its new spot: 

I hope you like it! When was your last city travel? Where would you like to go next? Ahhh...so many cool places to visit.... 

How about making a pin board to display your latest travel tickets and snap shots on? It's so easy with all the fabulous map stencils you can find in the StencilGirl Shop! Or maybe use them on cotton bags to take with you on your next travels....oh, the many possibilities.... ;)  

Stay healthy and creative! 

Claudia 

xxx