Herbarium

Hello Friends!
What a delicious mixed media treat we have for you today!
Sanda created the most gorgeous season inspired spread in her journal - I'm sure you'll find tons of inspirations in this magical Herbarium! Enjoy!

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“Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower.”
(Albert Camus)

Hi, guys,

Autumn is here, my friends, already displaying a lush range of colours.
This is the time of the year I enjoy taking long walks in the hazy, but still warm sun, collecting leaves, tiny twigs or seed pods that I will later use in my projects, or just arrange them around the house.

So, I’m back today, sharing with you an art journal spread celebrating the wonderful Fall Season, that I hope will inspire you.

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I started my pages by covering them with a coat of White Heavy Gesso.

When this was dry, I began collaging small pieces of cotton fabric using Finn’s Sculpture Medium – overlapping the fabric bits, creating wrinkles and then saturating the fabric with a generous amount of sculpture medium until I covered my pages completely.

I added a few more fabric pieces (for these ones I made a cut longwise, in the middle, to create an opening) and I pasted them with Sculpture Medium, manipulating the fabric to create organic shapes to resemble some seed pods.

While the medium was still wet, I added more texture with Finn’s Art Stones in all three sizes (the Sculpture Medium is also the perfect glue for this purpose). When I was happy with the result, I left the pages dry overnight.

Next morning, I started mixing the colours I wanted for this spread, using Art Alchemy Impasto paints, which I absolutely love, love, love! 😊 I encourage you to play and experiment, mixing your own shades, that best suit your project and believe me, it is a very rewarding process. 

I diluted the paints with water to an ink-like consistency and started painting the background, spritzing the paint with more water to help the paint move. When my pages were covered, I dried them thoroughly with my heating tool.

Next, I cut some cardstock leaves with my Silhouette machine and used them as masks, covering the space between the shapes with white heavy gesso.
Then, I removed the masks, dried the gesso and added more colour, shading and highlighting the areas around the leaves with water-soluble oil pastels.
When I was pleased with the result, I mixed two shades of green and added them in a few spots.

As a finishing touch, I put some highlights on the texture using Art Alchemy Sparks – these paints are soooo yummy!!! 😊

Here is my video where you can watch my creative process and see all the products I used.
Enjoy and have fun!

I hope you enjoyed my new project and you are ready to create your own lovely autumnal art journal…

Have a lovely day, my friends!

xoxo

Sanda

Materials used: