Joggles Art Journal Adventure - Week 15 - For the Birds

Hi everyone! It's Week 15 of the Joggles Art Journal Adventure and it's Barb's turn to choose the prompt. This week the challenge is called For the Birds and she wants us to include a bird in the focal image for our art journal page. I decided to do that using a Carabelle Studio stamp as part of a collage and also one of my favourite colour palettes: blue from the summer sky, sand, and greenish blue for the sea.

I had previously played with the wrinkle free technique to add colour to my page although this time I used spray inks plus water to dip the card into. Lindy's Stamp Gang Buccaneer Bay Blue and Van Dyke Sepia Moon Shadow Mists as well as Heidi Swapp Ocean Color Shine were spritzed onto my craft mat along with a little water. I dipped several different types and sizes of paper into the mix, repeating until I had the coverage I wanted. This particular index card had a lot of white space left untouched. It was adhered to the 6 x 4.75 inch watercolour paper which is the back of an earlier page.

The collaged focal began with the stamping of Carabelle Studio Post Card Collage image onto coffee dyed cardstock using Jet Black Archival Ink. The post card was then torn around on all 4 sides and inked with Coffee Archival around the edges. The little bird was lightly coloured with Pan Pastel and Prismacolor pencils to achieve more of a tinted look. Scraps of coffee dyed parchment paper, stamped vintage book paper, and brown wrapping paper were edged with Coffee Archival Ink and layered under the post card so that bits of everything still showed. Once the post card was adhered over this cluster, coffee dyed cheesecloth and a folded, inked, and stitched strip of music paper were added across the bottom of the cluster, adding wonderful texture.

 I added still more texture to the background using Coffee and then Jet Black Archival Ink with Paper Artsy Splotches Mini stamp, making sure I added it over the collage paper layers, too. Then because I wanted a subtler (calmer) look, I pounced white gesso over the dots to knock them back. Stars were punched from book text as well as black cardstock. These were layered up and adhered in opposite corners of the page.

A black doodled border was added around the outside edge as well as inking with the Coffee Archival and black Big Brush Pen. Three black enamel dots were added to the lower left corner of the page and balanced with a black cardstock photo corner on the top right. The clip at the top left of the page was already there from the previous page's design.

Thanks so much for joining me and my little birdie friend today. We both appreciate that you came to visit. I had a great time creating this response to Week 15's prompt, For the Birds. I love creating collages. I hope you will join in the fun at the Joggles Art Journal Adventure Facebook group. I'm excited to see what people create :)

Life is good; so is art.

Bonnie