Layering and Sanding

If you have been over to my Facebook page, you'll see that I'm working on pieces that make use of what I'm calling "extreme layering". I build up layers of collage (using Utrecht Matte Medium), and also layers of Sandable Hard Gesso, sometimes mixed with paint, and then sand down the layers with an orbital sander. I use a lot of other techniques as well, but this sanding offers such great surprises!

The above are all 14"x11" on Blick's Bristol. I think wood panel would be a good substrate too, but if you begin with a layer of gesso and then about four layers of collage, this bristsol is sturdy enough. I am using a lot of magazine papers as well as painted and printed papers. I have the benefit - thanks to those of you participating in my collage challenge! - of SO many different collage papers.

When I have explored this process sufficiently, I'll do a workshop on it.

Resistance - Resists

As many of you know, this month's theme on the Sketchbook Challenge is "Can't Resist This". So I thought I would share one of my favorite techniques that makes use of a resist. In this case the resist is gesso, but you could use any kind of acrylic medium.

First I coat the sketchbook page or paper with a thin coat of gesso and let it dry thoroughly. Then I fill the page with acrylic color, in this case some reds, golds and purples. While the paint is still a bit wet I spritz on some water from a squirt bottle, and tip the page to get some drips. Let it dry a bit more (the water is still wet!), then blot with a paper towel. If I don't gesso the paper first, then it absorbs the paint more and you don't get the dramatic effect.

For a second kind of resist, I cut out a shape (in this case, a bird) in freezer paper and ironed it to the painted page. I learned this technique from one of our sketchbook challenge participants, Laura, who posts on our flickr site. Then, I painted around the freezer paper mask before removing it. Just a sketchbook page, not a finished piece.

Laura said she got the idea from a tutorial on the Sew Daily newsletter, in which they were making freezer paper stencils for quilts. Click here to view the article (Thanks, Laura, for the link!).

Here is my own video tutorial on the "Gesso Resist", or "Spritz and Blot" as I prefer to call it. I did include my own version of the freezer paper technique as well.



If the video doesn't work, click here to see it on YouTube.

Here is the piece from the video, stage one:

And after the freezer paper masks were removed and I'd painted over areas of it. Just an experimental piece, but I learned a lot from this experiment!


Thanks for visiting!

One More

Just wanted to share one more background. I applied gesso to muslin, which had been ironed on to freezer paper for stability. Textured the gesso as before, painted with acrylics, scraping and wiping it to add more texture. THEN... after it was completely dry, I scrubbed some parts with rubbing alcohol to remove some of the acrylic paint. I forgot about that technique. Maybe I'll do a little video demo on it, since I need practice with the video camera. Click on the image to bring up a full size version. I left it big so you could see all the detail.
This is just a quick post. No links, only one picture. But thanks for visiting!