Just Look For It! Go on a Treasure Hunt!

I stand firmly on belief that much of what I want for my art-making is already on hand.  My job is to find it!  The motto?  "Just look for it!"  It may be somewhat disguised but it might be there in your stash awaiting you!

Anyone remember "spin-art?"  I've checked to see whether that term is a registered trademark. From my internet browsing I gather that spin-art is a generic term so I'll use it here, starting with this old example from my (overflowing) paper collection:

I'm showing the above finished piece of spin-art because it's still intact, having not (yet) met my scissors for a customizing session.  Another of my old spin-art papers has already been cut down to the shape you see below.

My last blog post featured art created by my friend Judi Kaufmann, who to my delight sent me a greeting card made using her gel plate and my 9" x 12" Twinship L268 . Above:  I so  loved the cover of Judi's greeting card that I experimented with building a collage around it.  The radiating spokes in this print match the spin-art design, both in design and color combinations.

Spin-art prints had been in my collection for years; all I had to do was "just look for" this print that marries so beautifully with Judi's card face.

Before cementing down that collage-start, I experimented with a different combination....

Clustered Leaves print by Claudia Holland

Above:  The spokes in that piece of spin-art triggered another idea, so I tried pairing that art-scrap with part of a print made with my 9" x 12" Clustered Leaves L433.  I wish I could remember the name of the artist who so well deserves credit for having made this print (which I have cut down from its original 9" x 12".) That artist did a beautiful job creating this print; I was so keen on it that I used part of it on this greeting card cover of mine.  Once again, the spin-art's spokes seem to visually be a continuation of the lines branching out from the centers of the clustered leaves.

I have yet to decide which of these two options will end up cemented down to help build up a collage.

Below is my greeting card without the scrap of spin-art:

Clustered Leaves print by Claudia Holland

In first assembling this collage-style card cover, all I did was cut out some leaves from the white-and-blue print and glue them to a deep-blue folding greeting card blank.  To that, I wanted to add bling!

I decided to "just look for" a convenient source of bling already on hand -- and I found it.  Tucked into one if my supply cabinet drawers were sheets of decorative self-adhesive stickers from Paper Wishes.  I'd originally bought these stickers (below) to decorate Christmas cards, but when I went looking for bling, these stickers offered up a bonus.  However, I've come to see that they are the source of other embellishments that are on hand but "in disguise."

The strip shown above is now truncated -- because I've cut off embellishments that came with the Christmas stickers. Not only have I cut off its outside borders, but I've also used some of the tiny embellishments that remain on backing paper after stickers are lifted off.  

 Most photos don't show it well, but these stickers -- and their "disguised" bonus goodies -- aren't merely a foil-shiny blue; they glitter, too.  Below is a close-up of an edge of my greeting card, Photoshopped to better show off that embedded glitter.

There are are also small bling-dots on the blue and white stencil-printed leaves; these dots came from the same sticker strip (they're what remains on the backing paper after Christmas stickers are pulled off) --

Used in making today's art samples:   

9" x 12" Clustered Leaves L433

9" x 12" Twinship L268 

Thanks for taking time to check out my blog today!  And a triple thank-you to Judi Kauffman for sharing her art (Lots more of Judi's art-treats will appear here later!)  To scroll thru the pages of my stencils and masks at StencilGirlProducts.com, please start here.