A bit of Abstract Art

Hi.  First of all I hope you are all enjoying the lovely long weekend. April is almost gone so Happy May to all. This year seems to be racing by so fast it'll be Christmas before we know it.

I’ve never been a fan of abstract art in the true sense of "art".  I really didn't understand it, or should I say until now I’ve never been a fan of abstract art. But I must say I’m seeing quite a bit of abstract art journaling around at the moment and I'm loving the randomness of colour and design, and by adding elements and sentiments, takes it to a whole new level for me. What really inspired this page is something I saw on You Tube. but I took the technique in a whole new direction.  I must say I'm happy with the result and I could never, ever get this look with a paint brush or a brayer.

Gelli plate printing is a bit of “hit and miss” for many people, you're never sure what you'll see when you turn the paper over. I usually pull quite a few prints and most times there’s something I like and there are many, many ways to "dikkie" up the prints you don’t like, but that’s for another blog.

There are many. many different ways to create art with a Gilli plate. Some of them complex and some very simple. This is relatively simple but the effect is really lovely.

I removed the plastic cover on the Gelli plate and loaded up a few blobs of acrylic paint.  I used blue, magenta, yellow, lime green and a bit of white.  I personally thought there was just a tad too much yellow on the plate so I carefully removed a bit and the print was fine. In hindsight I would be more careful to stagger the blobs so that they aren't in such a straight line.

So now for the big technique ………. I used the cardboard inside from a roller towel cut down to about 10 cm to drag the paint down and across the Gelli plate.

When you try it don’t cover the whole Gelli plate, leave some empty gaps. 

I added some blue circles to the Gelli plate with my finger and then placed photo copy paper onto the plate, rubbed gently and pulled my first print.

Sorry but I forgot to take a pic of this step but I have a pic of the result. 

I added a little more Magenta acrylic paint to the Gelli plate, placed a small circle stencil over it, put my print on top of it and rubbed over the stencil and pulled the second layer of the print.  I lifted the stencil and pulled another print from what was left on the Gelli plate. This is the result of the first print.

 
I put a thin layer of white paint onto my craft mat; well truth be told not my craft mat because I couldn’t find it, so onto the desk went the White paint.  I used the inside of the roller towel I had been using, to stamp an outline around the large blue circles, and the lid of a spray ink to outline the Magenta circles.

Then out came my most favourite stamp of all time, Stampotique Kate Crane mixed media cube. There are four stamps on the cube and they are really awesome. I stamped the inside of the circles with the grid stamp using the White paint, and the lines stamp here and there.  I was careful to wash my stamp immediately. I also cleaned up the desk and its as good as new. Well almost. My desk has seen a lot of action in its time.

I have some very nice small alphabet stamps that I use often in my journaling and I recently bought the Tim Holtz alphabet foam stamps.

They are also fast becoming a favourite. I just can’t leave them alone at the moment.  I stamped the words “YOU ARE” in a small Upper Case font  using Black Archival ink [I had to go over the letters with my Black Posca Pen as they didn't stamp too well]. Then at the bottom of the page I stamped the word “enough” using the Tim Holtz alphabet foam stamps.  I like the contrast between the small and large stamps.

I stamped the Finnabair butterfly stamp onto a scrap of Gelli print using Black Archival ink and fussy cut it. 

Instead of gluing it down I stapled it onto the top circle.  I ran my Archival black ink pad around the page and then glued it into my journal. 

I'm never sure where I'm going when I create.  I very seldom have a plan and things evolve as I go along, so needless to say after everything was complete and the page glued into my journal, I wound some black cotton into a circle and glued it onto the page. It gives the page another layer and I think it draws the eye up to the top of the page and then down.

I will definitely be doing more abstract art journaling in the future and I hope you will all try it too.

Supplies

Gelli-Arts Gel Printing Plate

Acrylic paint- various brands in blue, magenta, yellow, lime green and a bit of white
Cardboard inside of paper roller towel
Wet Wipes and roller towel
Copy paper
Glue
Small capital letters alphabet stamp
Tim Holtz “Block lower” foam alphabet stamps lower case
Lid from ink spray bottle
Some black thread
Stampotique Kate Crane cube mixed media stamp
Black Archival Ink
Black Posca Pen