Border stencils that I'd created in the past -- L220, L221 and L222 -- are still working fine. (For me, they work best when I cut them apart to get 3 separate strips from each of the three 9" x 12" stencils.)
But I've discovered that some other masks (or stencils) volunteer to be used for creating borders.
After I'd cut off the top of the frame of my 4" x 4" mask Carnival m340, I saw that it works for borders, when I use only the upper part of the mask....
Above: Using the top of this new 4" x 4" mask along with opaque white acrylic paint and a sponge applicator, I created a border around a print I'd made recently using two of my masks from the kelp series. (The 4"x4" mask in that kelp series had been cut free from its original outer frame. It had been the mask used for the topmost layer of yellow veined in purple. The barely-visible bottom paint layer was created with the 9" x 12" mask of the kelp series.)
Besides playing with borders, I've been playing with the speckled look -- with an approach that veered in a few directions....
Above: This print was made before I scissor-customized my 4" x 4" mask Carnival m340; it still had its top border.
I started with mixed-media paper, a sponge and the mask.
After that black-and-white print had dried, I used a brush to cover it with heavy body light blue acrylic paint.
While the light blue paint was still wet, I sprayed it once with water using a spritzer bottle.
I waited less than a minute before placing a facial tissue over the surface, patting it down to get all-over contact, and lifting the tissue.
This kind of spatter effect can also achieved with liquid acrylic paint. My choice however was heavy body acrylic paint, because I like its resulting speckled look better.
The print below was also started with a black and white print, then painted, water-sprayed, and blotted. Looking closely, you can tell that the spatters worked better on the lavender areas. This happened because the light blue acrylic paint was given too much time to dry.
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| Made with my 6" x 6" mask Champagne s960 |
Above: Again using my 6" x 6" mask Champagne s960, I created a speckled look the easiest way, spattering a finished print with sprayed paint. (Any time I use sprayed paint, I test the spray first on scrap paper.)
Below is the same print after I mono-printed it with acrylic paint and matte medium. (This mixture was a leftover on my palette paper, at the end of a different painting project.) That new acrylic mixture added depth and interest to the overall image.
Today's last art sample was created, yet again, with 6" x 6" mask Champagne s960 -- and it's the result of an adventure that I took, just to see what results I would get. Those results have a speckled look, so I'm including it below.
I started with a page cut from an old book. Over that I brushed some leftover black acrylic paint; but, since the brush held very little paint, a mottled look was the result.
Later, I repeated that step using the same paper, again swiping acrylic paint (peach in color) from my brush.
After the peach-color paint had dried, I placed the mask over it and applied zinc white acrylic paint with a sponge. Since zinc white is translucent, it allowed the colors below to remain visible.
The result had a speckled look because, when I'd swiped the paper twice with leftover paint, both brushes were already at the "dry brush" stage, containing very little acrylic paint. So my swiping laid down erratic smears of color, rather than solid layers of paint. |
| Another way to describe this art sample would be to say it has "a painterly look". |
All of today's papers have what's called a painterly look; it's a carefree, lively finish that old-timers might call "sloppy" since it doesn't aim for perfect results but rather shows the beauty of random applications of paints.
I use stray pieces of paper as "catch-all" papers, meaning that when I'm finished applying a certain color in a different painting project -- usually a very large project on stretched canvas -- my brush sometimes continues to hold some leftover acrylic paint. I could place the brush immediately into water to keep it soft while I finish painting projects for the day. But then the water would go down the drain, taking acrylic paint with it. That's bad for the environment so I empty any excess paint from my brushes onto these papers, before placing the brushes into water.
Thank you for stopping here at my blog today! To scroll thru the pages of my masks and stencils at StencilGirlProducts.com, please start here.
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