February Destination Inspiration - Arriving at Terminal One

Hello! Nikki here from Addicted to Art for our first stop on our February Destination Inspiration journey. For this months adventure I must use the following!

Product - Paint

Technique - Crackle

Colour - Black

Substrate - Tag

Quite a comfortable set for me - I have really struggled with the last couple of these posts I have done but this one was right up my street!

The first couple of photos here show 2 tags - as my original plan was to layer two together but this all changed as it often does. So first I painted my tag black (PaperArtsy Little Black Dress) before adding PaperArtsy Crackle glaze and left it to dry.

Once dry I added Deco Art Crackle paint... you can see the cracks developing below (left hand tag).

I die cut Spellbinders (Seth Apter) Stardust die and painted black before embossing with Stampendous Frantage embossing enamel in Aged Black.

I used the same embossing enamel to create speckles on the crackled tag and the jagged top and bottom borders....

I decided to add a solid star under my die cut and so stamped one of Seth's star stamps from PaperArtsy (same size - yay!) and cut it out.

Yes it was going to have text on originally - but in the end I just painted it black.

To complete the tag I added some punched stars and added a little sparkle to them and the borders with crystal glitter glue.

Last Friday we started a new challenge - 'Melt It'. If you missed all the inspiration do head over to check it out, we would love to see your creations.

Nikki

Addicted to Art

Introducing a very (very) special guest - Seth Apter

Hi everyone, Nikki here with our monthly invited Guest Designer post. It is my great pleasure to welcome and introduce

  Seth Apter

 I am sure he doesn't need much introduction as his style of mixed media art has captured so many of us over the last few years. I have had the pleasure to meet Seth a couple of times and attend his workshops in the UK and not only is he an amazing tutor but fun, charming and genuine.

Seth is a designer for PaperArtsy (stamps and paint), Spellbinders (dies), Stencil Girl (stencils) and Impression Obsession (stamps). His artwork is frequently displayed in exhibitions and he also published author.

Seth is a master of layers, texture and paint. His mixed media style often incorporates found objects - so who better to provide a masterclass on Altered Art - our current challenge theme at A Vintage Journey.

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Hi everybody. Seth Apter here. I am thrilled to be a Guest Creative Guide at A Vintage Journey. I have always loved the work shown here and am now happy to be a part of the family.

I am a mixed media artist from New York City with a passion for found object art. I love giving new life to old things. In addition to making art, I spend my time teaching mixed media workshops and designing art and craft products with a number of different companies. My work has been seen in multiple exhibitions, books and magazines. You can learn more about me at my website or my blog.

One of my main activities is searching for supplies to use in my mixed media art. Although anything goes, I tend to favor older, distressed objects. I feel that they already have a history, which automatically becomes part of my artwork. So many people (myself included) work to create a vintage look on new items but there is truly nothing like the look and feel of actual vintage.

COLORS FOR CHINA

This piece, Colors for China, began like most of my work - with an object. Or in this case three objects. I have been hoarding holding on to a grouping of very old test tubes filled with paint made for china. 

These became the focal point that I built the entire piece around. I knew I wanted to add an actual frame around the tubes as a way to highlight these beauties and symbolically turn these vintage objects into art. I added one copper and one wooden frame, both vintage. 

Nearly all the materials in this piece, with the exception of the wood panel and a few metal embellishments, are salvaged. Some have been in my studio drawers for years, patiently waiting their turn to be used in the right artwork.

To me, creating found object art is like completing a puzzle. While many wrong answers are tried along the way, you ultimately have to find the right pieces, many of which are not meant to work together, and place them in such a way as to make one seamless creation.

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Amazing! What a fantastic creation full of history, detail and texture. I count seven layers that Seth has taken and salvaged or altered in some way and then worked his magic to generate this perfect composition. 

You can see more of Seth's artwork on his website - The Altered Page

Seth - thank you so much for being our guest this month! 

We are back again on Monday with the next Destination Inspiration stopover. There are a couple of weeks left to join in our Altered Art challenge - with your chance to win a Simon Says Stamp voucher or to be selected as one of our Pinworthies.

Have a great (and hopefully crafty) weekend

Nikki and The AVJ Creative Guides

xxx

Destination Inspiration Terminal 1

Hello dear friends and fellow travellers, - this is Astrid, delighted to start you off in this our birthday month with our first Destination Inspiration post.
Like always, we have some wonderful goodies in our travel bags this month:

Substrate: Canvas

Colour: Turquoises & Teals

Product: Acrylic Paint

Technique: Layered Stencils

So here is a little canvas I put together to share with you:

I started by choosing a selection of acrylic paints in the two colours, it's a mix of Paper Artsy and Distress Paints.

 I put  them down in pretty random fashion, just adding some yellow for a bit of contrast, drying carefully between colours to avoid mud.

Next I selected a few different stencils, a couple of Tim's Layering stencils, a stencil by Seth Apter and the word came from a Crafters Workshop stencil. As March is the month when Spring starts here in the Northern Hemisphere, I decided to give my canvas a Springtime feel.

I used a mix of products to stencil with. This is what I love about layered stencils, there are so many different options. I used paint, Archival Inks, Distress Crayons and even some Distress Inks for a subtle effect in the background.

Below some close ups of different corners:

Time to start working on the foreground. I decided to work with Tim's Wildflowers, both the stamps and the dies. I stamped the chosen stamps on tissue paper, always a good trick when you want to add more than a bit of background stamping to a canvas.

I went around the stamped images with a water brush, this helps to tear around the stamping and creates a feathery edge, which helps to merge the stamping in the background. I adhered them to the canvas with matte gel medium.

Next I die cut a selection of the flowers and painted them in a very dark teal (Paper Artsy Inky Pool)

Then all that was left was to put it all together.

I added a strip of tissue wrap around the bottom of the canvas, to anchor my flowers a bit. Wrapped some twine around, including a bow, a sentiment (cut from some scrapbook paper) and a few metal elements for a bit of additional interest.

A little fussy-cut butterfly to add to the Spring Time feel.

Some subtle background stamping, I never seem to be able to create a project without a little bit of that, usually using a text stamp or two.

And of course on a canvas, you cannot forget about the edges. I went around all the sides of the canvas with some Hydrangea Archival Ink, just to frame it a bit and add some subtle shadow effect, and that was pretty much it.

Well, that was the first stop of our Destination Inspiration this month. Hope you'll come back next Monday to see what one of my teamies has made, and of course we would all love you to play in our birthday challenge too!

Have a super crafty month and thanks so much for your visit today!

xxxxx

Astrid