THREE MEN AND A RIDDLE

Dr. Evil, Musician, Biker Boy. Those were the remaining three titles for the men themed cards I had to complete this weekend. After Lincoln, I wasn't sure if I had used up my creative quota, but I had work to do and so I brainstormed. Or at least it feels like my brain has been through a storm, but it may just be the Sunday dinner wine.


Who to choose as "Dr. Evil"? One popular choice comes immediately to mind, but my darker side kept chanting 'Hannibal Lecter, Hannibal Lecter". ("Silence of the Lambs" is a masterpiece of a psychological thriller and one of my favorite movies. Thomas Harris is a brilliant author and if you haven't read his books, you are missing out. But I digress.) I gave Lecter a try with a few different images, but it just wasn't happening. So I settled on my second choice and began to pull together a few telltale elements. Every piece of this card is a clue, so I won't reveal here who is "Dr. Evil". (Spoiler alert: don't look at my Flickr photostream.) No great mystery, I am not that profound. I just thought it would be fun to include a little riddle with this post. Sooooo . . . who is it? Theory holds that this individual was, in real life, a physician. Hence, I've got the "Doctor" part of the card theme covered. "Evil." His acts were grotesquely so. Read the fine print on the transparency. (Life advice: read the fine print on EVERYTHING.) The spatter, the neurological affliction that could only explain his behavior. The torn fabric, the razor (it is a safety razor, the kind you use for eyebrow shaping), the vintage paper that counts to the number six. And lastly, the twine, a miniature version of rope. No greater a dark figure in true crime history.

"Musician" was a much easier man to tackle. Not that I tackle that many men . . . but you know what I mean. I am a huge Louis Armstrong fan. "What A Wonderful World" is my all-time favorite song. Chokes me up every time. There are many, many images available of Satchmo, but this one of him in silhouette, standing on stage, reaching out to the crowd, is silently strong. I wanted to stick with that tone, so I did a simple, graphic card. The background is simply brayered acrylics. I did not prepare the background specifically for this card. It is something I had laying around for ages and was glad that I kept it stashed away for so long. Gotta love it when you have something on hand that fits the bill. The image of Louis is a contact paper transfer. I then attached a brass "L" and a fleur-de-lis rub on. The fleur-de-lis is a nod to his New Orleans roots. The card itself did not need further embellishment but it needed something. That ever elusive, dreaded SOMETHING that nags at you until you are satisfied. After some tinkering, I decided that it would look best matted against a jet black background. So I painted a mat board card with bone black acrylic, slightly trimmed the ATC and stuck the two together. Done and satisfied. Sometimes simple is the best.

Lastly, I had to come up with a biker boy. This gave me hell. No other way to put it. I tried images of Jesse James, Paul Tuttle, Marlon Brando from "The Wild One", etc., etc. and nothing worked. I have trouble using contemporary images in my cards. Nothing wrong with them, they just don't seem to work for me. So after looking and looking, I found this cool pic of a vintage motorcyclist and decided to give it a go. The background colors are crimson and payne's grey acrylics. I then collaged a piece of pattern tissue over the acrylics with beeswax. The image was then added with more beeswax and the whole piece buffed with a cloth. This really brought out the deep tones of the paints. The button was added to further the vintage theme and that is when the title of the card came to mind: "Slow Ride". I probably could have left the card as done then, but it needed another final touch. Gold leaf was added along the edges and top of the card by simply laying the gold leaf over the surface and running a stylus tip down the edges in a line. I got a little carried away at the top of the card and am not totally happy with how it turned out, but it was an experiment and next time I will be a little more precise with my placement. By the way, applying gold leaf to beeswax is not my invention. I learned this from the mega-talented Judy Wise whose encaustic work I absolutely adore. She was so gracious to share with me at Art & Soul in Portland how she employed this technique. If you have a chance to meet her, take a class or buy her work, do so. She is very gifted and one of the most genuine souls you will ever meet.




The boys have all been bundled up and shipped off to the UK for the swap. It truly was challenging to use men based themes. Certainly gave my mojo a kick start. Here's hoping it stays with me for a while.


Hope you all had a great, creative weekend and look forward to checking in on your blogs.


Ciao for now.


Shelly

HAPPY ACCIDENTS

We've all had them. Heck, stop and think about it . . . you may even have BEEN one. Know I was. Anyway, happy accidents are mistakes in our techniques that actually turn out to be pretty darn cool. Case in point: my most recent ATC, "The Madonna".

I started with an image transfer from a transparency. I've been using the 3M brand to do my inkjet prints, and while it is a pricey brand, the transfer quality is worth the price. My inkjet printer gives off some weird colors with the transfers, however, but since this was to be an aged-looking piece, the bluish tones were not so bad. I used Golden soft gel (glossy) to transfer the image to a piece of unbleached muslin. Everything went as planned. No happy accident yet. If you've done transfers, you know they leave spotty areas where the ink did not transfer. I like to burn things, so I got out my then-new Versa tool and lightly singed the blank areas to give it a grungy look.

Next was to stitch the image to a piece of text that I had dipped in beeswax. I love beeswax and look for any excuse to use it. It adds to the antiqued look of things which complemented this piece well. Part of the text didn't make it into the beeswax (bottom right hand corner) and that was okay, too. Added a nice contrast. Now, here is where the happy accident took place.

I needed to stitch the Madonna image to the beeswax-text background. Enter sewing machine. I am grossly untrained when it comes to sewing and rarely recognize an error when I make one. However, even with my limited skills, it became evident halfway through the stitching that the bobbin had not been wound properly. (This is sad, considering that I have an automatic bobbin winder feature on my machine.) Not one to scold myself for my snafus, I took the piece off the machine and was pleasantly surprised at the little loops that had formed over the Madonna like a halo. And there were more curly-loopy-things on the stray threads along the edges. I love stray threads as much as I love beeswax, so they stayed with the piece.

I finished the card by laying a piece of sheer fabric (can't remember what it's called right now - remember, I am new to this fabric art stuff) over the constructed card, snipping out the middle and burning the inside edges with the Versa tool. That smelled a little because of the synthetic fabric, so if you try this at home . . . beware !!! Toxicity alert. Having replaced the wayward bobbin with a properly wound one, I stitched the sheer fabric overlay to the card and attached the "every heart is loving" text (also dipped in beeswax) above her hands. The card was done and I was satisfied. Now if I can just go back and figure out how to improperly wind a bobbin, on purpose, to reproduce my "new technique". :-)

Ciao for now.

Shelly