Art Sisters - AOTM

I was invited to join another Yahoo Group recently called Aust_ArtSisters and they have an Art of the Month (AOTM) concept, which I quite like. How it works is whoever registers to play for the month each makes one piece of art to send off to another person who is randomly chosen.

So for my very first time playing I received a piece of art from the lovely Kasha Rolley and I was to make something to send to Gaye Todd.

Kasha made this gorgeous wall hanging on a piece of wood, which is painted, stamped, has images of a bird and children, some flowers placed in the tree with tacks (I think) as the centres (I like it) and some bead work ... it's a beautifully made wonderful addition to my Art Wall.

Wall hanging by Kasha Rolley

I made Gaye an ATC using a techique that the talented Kyla de Ruiter taught me the other day. Start off by gluing a serviette onto the background, then place a Heidi Swap stencil onto the serviette and paste over the top of it with impasto - remove the stencil whilst impasto is still wet. Allow the impasto to dry overnight then fill the grooves in with alcohol inks (might I suggest not doing this part whilst a little tipsy or drunk ... very difficult to keep within the lines ... hence the rustic-ness of this piece!!!). Paint over the top of the whole piece with crackle medium and once dry rub alcohol inks across the top to enhance the cracks and rub off straight away. I added a few flowers to the branch, a bead for an eye and rubbed Timber Brown StazOn around the edges of the whole ATC.

ATC by Diana for Gaye

"There can be no happiness if the things we believe in are different from the things we do."
~Freya Stark, 1893-1993, British Travel Writer~