2023 Topic 7 : Art Dolls {by Asia Marquet} with Zinski Art stamps

Hi everyone, 

it's Asia Marquet with you today (Lemon Creation)

I don't really remember last time when I created something which isn't an art journal page. This is one of the reason why I choose the topic Art Dolls- I decided to make something more elaborate, off the page and with different embellishments. It helped that I always found the topic of Art Dolls very intriguing and full of possibilities. In this post you will find my own interpretations of this topic, a little bit surprising maybe, but I hope also a little bit funny.

So let me introduce you to free form ATC- that is: Dolly, Molly and Holly- my 3 very, very elegant, beautiful and  fashionistas sheep.  Are they really dolls-  you may ask. Why, of course they are! At least in my imagination! 

Let me explain you step-by-step  how I covered those funky sheep in fluff, put on them a truly beautiful make-up (lol!) and add some beautiful, transparent accents (I heard transparency is very popular in fashion nowadays!)

I am not very big on fashion, but this project definitely helped me to show my true clothing/make-up potential and I think this is something definitely worth trying. I had fun and I hope you will too :)

In general, when choosing project I am going to make, what speaks to me are at the very beginning are the stamps, then the colours. The sheep I choose to use are simply adorable! You can just look at them and you know you gonna have fun! Hence my stamp choice- 2 sets of stamp from PaperArtsy Signature designer Elena Zinksy: ZA21 and ZA26.

As for the colours- the choice was simple. I wanted bright, happy colours, but the only ones I could use were the ones which would match the flock I have at home (such a cool material, btw!) I needed: green, blue, turquoise and yellow and I've chosen Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylics simply because they are bright and happy and you can do so much with them in way of application or colour mixing. Here they are:  Blue Lagoon, Banana, Southern Skies and for sheep faces- Blah Mange.

So let's see how my happy, colourful sheep came to life!

To make project more interesting and of course more in synch with the main theme, I knew I am going to fussy cut the sheep and make free form ATC (Artist Trading Cards). Well, it wasn't an easy task as the sheep are full of really tiny legs and hands or whatever it is sheep have. But fear not- I got a solution for that, which I think goes really well with  Art Doll theme.

First things first- I stamped all three of my Ladies on a piece of mixed media paper with Versafine  ink (Onyx Black). I find it useful to stamp them at least in doubles to have an extra just in case. Then I decided which sheep gets which colour and what kind of embellishments I will give them. The names came at the very end, after I got to know them better:)

Once stamped, all they needed was a touch of colours. I used a round brush for that and to make them look more like sheep, I made sort of tap movements while applying the paints, which created a wool-like  effect.

After the paints were applied, I fussy cut the sheep, not paying to much attentions to limbs as I knew they will be replaced at the later stage. All the small,  stamped elements (lips, flowers, etc) were then coloured with Promarkers.

The last part of this stage was to cut out the hearts from one of the Ladies- let's call her Molly. I will be making a sort of heart transplant on her at the later stage.

My Ladies are already so pretty, but I need to accessorise them tiny bit better- with a new handbag, new hearts or some lip gloss. So let's see how that went.

It is true- I could have left my sheep the way they are, but I really wanted to beautify them a little bit more.  For a nice transparency effect I was hesitating between piece of acetate or vellum (tracing paper). I found acetate a little bit too boring- for a lack of better word. Fortunately I found in my stash coloured vellum paper and then everything clicked. There was one which was rose, and the other, turquoise. The rose one was perfect for Molly's hearts, the turquoise- for Dolly's handbag. Holly got nothing- it seems she is definitely not my favourite one! I stamped both sheep onto two pieces of acetate, this time with better and quicker drying ink- Ranger Archival (Jet Black). Then I fussy cut Molly's shape and Dolly's handbag.

It was quite easy to glue the hearts as I could add glue to large surface- the hearts were to be the layer underneath the actual sheep. Adding handbag was a little bit tricky- small element, with all the parts transparent is harder to fix, as the glue may be visible even after drying. I used fine glue applicator and tried to add it only where the stamped lines are, but I wish I could have add some 3D tape underneath to create a volume effect. Unfortunately handbag was way to small for that. 

Once again- for more transparency I wanted to add to the project, I used Ranger Glossy Accents. Which was just a perfect choice for not only embellishing some of the elements like flowers, but also for creating lip gloss effect or accentuating the eyes or cheeks- just look at Holly below:

And Molly:

Here is the fluffy part- to make the sheep resemble sheep even more, I added to each of them a little bit of flock. I got it in one of my local craft shop and I haven't use it for a long while, waiting, it seems, for this particular project. To adhere the flock to the paper I used Ranger's Glossy Accent again, covering the parts I wanted to add the flock to, i.e. ears, hat, parts fo body. If you look closely at the picture, you will see that my poor Dolly was covered, by accident, with the same flock as Molly- the blue one. I realised at the later stage that she supposed to be turquoise, so I fixed the problem then. Mistake will be fixed and Dolly will be happy.

The very last thing left for me to do was to fix their legs and hands. Since they are Art Dolls, I needed to make them a little bit interactive, hence the wire. There was a moment when I thought about using elastic or thread, but finally I decided on something more. You. can still play with it, bend it or make the sheep hold each other's hands. I coiled the wire to make it look as similar to the stamped limbs as possible, pierced the holes where the legs and hands started to be able to put the wire through them and then I attached it at the back with tape. If you don't want. the messy back to be visible, all you have to do is to re-stamp the sheep again on. apiece of thick paper, fussy cut their main body and glue them at the back covering this way the visible wire and tape.

The project would have been finished at this point, but yes, there is the question of adding incorrect colour to one of my sheep. I could have leave her like that, but I am sure she would not be happy having the same sheepskin as her friend. Since the first layer (the bad one) of glue and flock were dried already, I could easily add another one with more glue and this time correct, turquoise colour of the flock. 

However before adding the flock, I decided to add some heart-shaped buttons to her legs and hands. As you may remember- she din't get any vellum embellishments, so I felt guilty. On the actual stamp image (ZA26) this sheep has small hearts instead of feet and hands. Luckily I remembered having tiny heart-shaped buttons in my stash, so I decided to embellish her tiny bit more.

Even though on the photo you can't see it too well, my other. sheep, Dolly got  hairy legs and hands. To get this effect I added a little bit of glue to the metal wires and dipped them in the jar of flock. 

My Sheep Ladies are done and it was a real pleasure. So let me introduce you to Molly:

Dolly:

and Holly:

Here is the whole, happy and beautiful, and very, very fashionable gang:

 

Well, it was truly a fun to work on this project. My very glamorous ladies are happy and so am I. True- they were a little time- consuming and working with such a ladies requires to have  attention to detail, but otherwise it was just one of this projects which you never forget. It's easy to work with such stamp designs- you can easily add colours, textures, embellishments and create your own and unique set of free form ATC. Or a small journal entirely dedicated to sheep or animals in general. The important lesson I took from this project is this- if you work with funny/ funky images, your imagination goes wild and you are relaxed and believe me- laughing  a lot in the process! This is, to me, priceless. I enjoyed this project so much so I gave the sheep names and I made few medium quality jokes here. Or at least I tried :)

So if you are stuck in your creative process, or feeling a little blue, create something funny and you'd be surprised how happy it. will make you!

Happy crafting!

Asia

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2023 Topic 02: Tetradic Colours {by Autumn Clark} with Zinski Art Stamps

 

Hi everyone it's Autumn Clark from SewPaperPaint here with you today.  I've had a lovely time playing with paints lately. This Tetrads topic was a new concept to me and I had to Google it, which led to some fascinating discoveries. I would urge you to do the same and take a second look at the Introduction Post HERE, which shares such a wealth of information.  I decided to break out my new collection of Zinis, Elena Zinski's darling house stamps, and I am looking forward to sharing with you how I combined the two.

With each color wheel progression, the PaperArtsy bloggers have been encouraged to experiment with different primary shades. This was a real challenge for me! My very literal brain had trouble selecting non-pure primaries, but I switched up a little with PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic - Haystack (FF02), a warm and rustic yellow, PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic - Captain Peacock (FF110), a turquoisy blue and PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic - Bougainvillea (FF93), a deep pink. I was pleasantly surprised by how these colors still made for a somewhat traditional color wheel in the end, with all the classic colours identifiable.

I knew when I first saw the Elena Zinski release post HERE that I wanted to create an exploding card box. I was waiting on the perfect opportunity to create such a box. Originally, I designed a larger box, but had to scale it down to better fit the stamps. I cut a sheet of watercolor paper to 11x9" then scored on the 11" side at 4" and 7". I scored on the 9" side at 3" and 6", then cut the corners away and the longer sections into points as shown. I cut a roof for my box at 4.5 x 3.25" and scored along the 4.5" side at 2.5". 

Here are the latest Zinis from Elena Zinski's Art, ZN 49 to 56. It's hard not to fall in love with this selection of stamps with so many quirky house designs. I love that just one house could be colored a different way and look like a totally different stamp!

I purchased a new palette, as my smaller, older palette only had 10 sections and it's easier to work through the printable color mixing wheel (which you can find HERE, in the Files section of the PaperArtsy People Facebook Group) with a 12-section palette. Next time I think I'll stick to a paper plate because I found this larger palette to be cumbersome on my small work table.

I noticed my mixed colors lent to some pinky oranges, a "perfect" purple and really lively greens.

I chose a square tetradic palette as I felt like I could go in any direction with it. I painted the three possible square combos in columns and decided on the center one because I really liked how the pure PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic - Haystack (FF02) brightened up the palette. The finished colors are represented in blocks 1, 4, 7 and 10.

I was trying to decide on the best way to use my mixed colors to decorate the many houses, so I added them to my gel printing plate, as shown, and pulled a couple of prints.

One of my prints didn't pull very well, so I took a paint brush and blended some additional color onto the paper. I decided at this point to lighten things by adding in a touch of PaperArtsy Fresco Finish Chalk Acrylic - Cloud 9 (FF149). I always try to add a touch of black and white to most projects for balance.  This gave me a stampable, precolored surface for my houses.

I painted the front of my house box, intentionally omitting the blended Bougainvillea color so that that color would really pop when the box was opened. I added some water to lighten areas during blending.

And you can see the color does really pop inside!

l incorporated the Tracks theme into my project by creating a row of stones as a path around the garden inside of my box. I sponged Cloud 9 through PaperArtsy Stencil 102 by Sara Naumann (PS102).

I stamped the tiny flowers from (Elena Zinski) Zini mini stamp 54 (ZN54) along the edge of the grass and stones.  I also stamped and cut out the trees from Zini mini stamp 52 (ZN52). I cut a small strip from my gel printed paper and rolled it into a circle with some small flaps to adhere it to the center of the garden. I added stamped shrubs around the adhered trees.

 

I ran into an unexpected complication of needing larger flowers to fill in the garden. I chose PaperArtsy stamp set by Tracy Scott (TS069). You can see here the color variation from the gel prints.

Now it was time to get my houses arranged! I used my stamping platform to repeat stamp the images onto my gel prints, for a super vibrant black outline. I used Zini mini stamp 49 (ZN49), Zini mini stamp 50 (ZN50), Zini mini stamp 51 (ZN51) and Zini mini stamp 56 (ZN56).

 

I had glued some scallops to the edge of my roof to hold the box shut. I used plain black cardstock for this and wanted to add some additional detail in the background, so I stamped PaperArtsy Mini stamp 122 (MN122) in the coordinating ink color for each side panel and in embossed white. I chose this stamp because it mimicked tile or brick and flowed with the Tracks theme.

As a final touch, I painted the house windows white to tie in with the embossing and gave the roof a splash of watery Cloud 9.

I gave the inside of the box a splash of the same and a second splash of Haystack.

I don't always use bold colors in my creations and was challenged by the vibrant colors I had mixed. I think the addition of white and black helped balance the rich color. I've seen exploding card boxes and thought the house box idea would be a unique twist. It turned out to be very simple to work out. I would have liked to have some floating or pop up elements inside the box and think next time I could use acetate to make hidden hinges or floaters. Our goal as bloggers is to encourage you to try an idea and we hope that you will take it to the next level. Mine was an experiment and yours will be a triumph! I hope both this color wheel and project idea have inspired you today and your mental "Tracks" are kickstarted.

xx, Autumn

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