2015 #19 Flora {by Kim Dellow}

 2015 Topic 19: Faces

Hey Guys, Kim Dellow here for the first time on the PaperArtsy blog!

Thanks for the invitation to come and join in the fun, particularly this week as the theme is right up my art-street. I am a born again face drawer/painter/sketcher/collage-maker! 

Ok, so perhaps I should start at the beginning. I’ve never really been that into drawing faces, mainly because I didn’t think that I could, well not to a point beyond a four year old with a crayon that is.

Then one day, on a whim, I tried to paint a face in my art journal. No Idea why, I just went for it and what a shock when it actually turned out looking like a face! You can see that attempt on my blog, it links in well with today’s share as it uses the same JoFY stamp set, JoFY 32. 

Since that surprising attempt I have been actively encouraging others to give it a go (go on you know you want to!). I now run a weekly community share called Show Your Face and it fills me with genuine joy that both veteran face/portrait artists and people who, like me, had not tried it before, link up and share their amazing work every week, there is so much inspiration!

Step One: To start my make today I’ve used Fresco Acrylic Paints South Pacific and Autumn Fire to build a background. Add the paint in a line at the top of a canvas board, spray with water, lift the canvas up vertically and let the paint drip freely down the canvas board. Allow the paint to dry then drip more paint onto the canvas from above.

Step Two: Once the background is completely dry, draw in the face with a pencil. I’ve used a grid system to help place the features of the face and to help with the proportions.

Step Three: The next step is to go over the pencil lines and I’ve used a fine paint pen for this task then let it dry completely before moving on to the next stage. Once dry I’ve coloured in the eyes using Fresco Acrylic Paints: South Pacific, Snowflake and Little Black Dress.

Step Four: Now for a bit of stamping. I love stamping in paint so I spread a thin layer of the Little Black Dress Fresco Acrylic Paint onto a piece of plastic and dab the large flower stamp from the JOFY 32 stamp set into it and then stamp on the canvas. I repeat this for the butterfly from the same set. Just make sure you wash your stamps before the paint can dry on it.

JOFY32 

Step Five: Now I use Fresco Acrylic Paints South Pacific, Orchid, Snowflake and a touch of Autumn Fire to colour in the stamping with a brush. This is also a good time to add the highlights in the eye and a bit of shading to give a dimension to the eye.

Step Six: Again let the paint dry then use the same paint stamping technique from Step 4 to re-stamp the JOFY 32 flower and butterfly with the Little Black Dress Fresco Acrylic Paint and use the paint pen to touch up the stamping where needed. Finally I went over the negative space around her head with Gesso.

I really hope that this week on the PaperArtsy blog will encourage you to get into faces, or if you are already a devoted portrait artist I hope it inspires you to the next level in your face art. I’m looking forward to seeing all the shares and don’t forget to link up any of your face artwork at Show Your Face if you don’t already do so.

That’s it from me, Kim Dellow.

You can find me at my blog kimdellow.co.uk or under my name on any of the social media outlets you can think of…Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, G+, I think I’m pretty much on all of them!

Welcome Kim! This is a great post for all those novice artists looking to try there hand at Faces. I love the minimal but striking use of colours. The proportions/composition is fab and Jo's stamp compliment your art perfectly. Thanks for sharing your creativity with us. ~Gillian

We would love you to join in with challenge #19: Faces If you are inspired by any of our guests who blog with us over the fortnight, then please join in and link up your creativity HERE. 

All links go in the draw to win a voucher to spend on products of your choice from the PaperArtsy online store. The Faces link will close 17:00 (London Time) Sunday, Oct 25th winner will be announced 2 hours later at 19:00.