It All Started With A Paper Towel

When you begin to open your eyes and look beyond the usual materials you work with, some amazing things can happen. I think it really opens a different window in your brain.

At the crop I was at this weekend, we were working with inks, and mopped up the excess with some paper towels. While we were working, that paper towel dried out into such beautiful colors and designs. My friend Tiffany and I divided it in half to each try something with it...and what follows is my first sheet of paper towel.

I began by adhering the paper towel into my art journal with Liquitex Gel Medium, matte. I'd had a chance to catch up with Creative Jumpstart 2015, which certainly gave me some inspiration. I specifically chose the matte after listening to Nathalie Kahlbach explain how the glossy makes your pages stick. CJS2015 is such an inspirational online class, be sure to check it out here.

I am also taking May Flaum's class Finding the Art in my Journal, be sure to check this out also. My husband and I went out to the Coffee Planet on Sunday to listen to one of his music friends perform. My husband always take his sketch book with him and draws everywhere. A couple of his pens sat on the table, a napkin was there, so I thought, why not try the blind contour drawing exercise May asked us to do. So I drew three. My favorite is the one above that I did of my husband.

So, the napkin drawings and words went down next with the gel medium. Let that dry (somewhat) and took out one of Nathalie's stencils and added the dots with some Liquitex paint, oh yes, and splattered some white. Let it totally dry overnight, then added some circle doodles with a black pen.

Drawing of my hubby, "music" because that's why we went on Sunday.

My hand (even got the ring on the right finger!), and a stack of coffee cups on the counter, because of course I had to have a cup of coffee! "Drawing" because that's what we were both doing as we listened to the music.

Thanks for joining me through this exploration of my art journal, and thanks for the inspiration Nat and May!