Sometimes I Just Stare

Good morning. Hope you've had a wonderful weekend. I was busy, gadding about and taking in some wintry walks. But I did have a little time for playing with my inks and pens. Therefore, I have another art journal spread to share. It was actually a much quicker page to put together than my recent ones.

I gessoed my pages first, as ink and paint had spilled over from the designs created on the other sides of the paper and I wanted a blank, clean slate to work from. I then went down quite a bold path and mixed up a dark colour using my acrylic inks, consisting mainly of Paynes Grey.

The colour didn't lay down as smoothly this time around but the texture it created was still pleasing, so I stayed with it. I took my bottle of Mister Huey's Calico white spray and unscrewed the lid. With the straw end, I flicked spits and spots of white over the entire spread, which gave the effect of a starry sky. Completely serendipitous and happy to go with it.

I wanted to try a different border to collage and doodling this time around and went with brushing a light grey acrylic painted stripe all around the outside with a cheap, broad-bristled brush. It gave the right amount of roughness.

I kept the collage fairly simple. I'd decided I wanted to place a large head on a smaller body but in my mind's eye there was a bigger difference in scale. Maybe next time I'll increase the exaggeration. I saw the image of the camera and felt I could incorparate it. The hands I cut out first before deciding where they'd go. They make good wings, placed behind the shoulders but that's been done many a time before. So they ended up as antlers. Finally chopping up the Qwerty keyboard on a blackberry image, made for a fitting crown.

Thankfully, black sharpie pen showed up on the dark background and the journaling was added. I was left with a lot of space around the bottom of the spread which I could have left alone but my gut instinct was saying 'fill it'. And when there's a space to fill, my default go-to doodle is that of swirls.

And there you have it. A less elaborate page than of recent but just as much fun to put together.

Until next time
h&k
Pxx