Mixed Media Warriors

 Hi everyone! Here's an inspiration page for the Mixed Media Warriors Challenge Blog.  Come and play with the March Moodboard!





    I used almost all Shimmerz Paints on watercolor paper. The white in the background is gesso. 

To make this page I spritzed a 12 x 12 sheet of watercolor paper with water, I use an empty hairspray bottle because it holds a lot, and has a nice fine mist. I sprayed three colors of Vibez Shimmers Paints on: Jeni B Bleu, Blue Jeans, and Deep Blue Sea. I used about 4 spritzes of each color. I held the paper over the sink and let the colors run together, moving the paper around. Some of the paint and water ran into the sink. I dried it with a heat tool, but the paper warped. I then had to glue the paper to a piece of cardboard using mat medium, put clips on the edges, and put it inside a book with books piled on top, all to flatten it.  

   Next time I'll glue it to the cardboard first, and then put the water and paint on.

 I was very, very impressed with the quality and color of the paint, it dries with a beautiful pearly shimmer.  

I mounted the photo on watercolor paper. Here's the layers: photo, cardstock, foam core board, watercolor paper, two more layers of foam core. I use double sided foam tape except with the double layer of foam core, where I used Elmer's glue. With a pencil I marked on the paper where I wanted the photo and stencil to go. I applied a thick layer of texture paste using a Prima stencil and a credit card. I cupped my hand around the dried paste and sprayed on the same three colors of paint and let them flow into each other.  I misted a little water on and let the colors mostly air dry.

I put the photo on the page, then put gauze around it. I had taken a piece of gauze and dyed it with Shimmerz Teal the End of Time, and Blue Print Distress Ink Dabber. I dried it with a heat gun. The piece was about an inch and a half bigger than the mounted photo. I cut a cross shape in the middle of the gauze and fit it around the pic. You can see most of it is gone. I dry brushed on different blue colors of Shimmerz, I added micro beads and other things, then started sponging on gesso. It was kind of painful to cover up areas with the white, but things were just getting too busy looking. I needed the negative space. I dry brushed more color on on top of the white, just enough to pick up the texture of the things on the page. 

To add visual interest I added a number of things along with the micro beads: seed beads, swarovski crystals, a glass vial, shells, glass glitter, gold leaf, Tim Holtz rub ons, tulle, and a little stamping. I used chipboard from my stash, prepped with gesso, and topped with Shimmerz,then Clear Rock Candy Crackle. All the gold paint on the page is Finnabair's Steampunk Copper. 

The sand colored stuff is Ranger Linen color embossing powder that I poured over glossy accents I'd rubbed on.

Thank you so much for looking, and have a great week!