Silhouettes Art Journal Page

Hello crafters! It is a new month and spring is in the air. The weather changed completely in just a few days. Today I have a mixed media tutorial to share with you.

We have an Art Journal theme at the Simon Says Stamp Monday Challenge Blog this week. If you have never tried art journaling before, this would be a great time to do so. It is very freeing and fun. If you don't have an art journal, you can work on a sheet of paper. Since it is the first Monday of a new month, the team is showcasing products by a specific designer/company and this week it is Dyan Reaveley with her Dylusions range. You can see her fantastic products here. You don't have to use Dyan's products to join, but it is always fun if you do. 

We also have a new guest designer and during March, Sandra Rupp is joining us. Be sure to visit her beautiful blog SRpaperlove to see what she has created for you.

Both boys have their birthdays in the second half of February, so it is normally a time of celebration and parties. This year was a little different, but they were happy with their birthdays anyway. Last year, both of them had parties, and it was literary just days before everything changed because of Covid. Hopefully, by next year, they will have normal birthdays again. 

I made a double page art journal spread in my large Dylusions Journal to celebrate brotherhood. It's about 16.5 x 11.4 in. Sometimes it is fun to work large, but you can of course use the techniques for smaller sized projects too.

Coat the page with gesso and when dry, paint with watered-down Distress Paints. Mist with more water to help them blend.

I used Dyan Reaveley's Otis Silhouette stencil, which was perfect for my theme since it has two boys of different size. Apply paint with a mini round ink blending tool, starting with the lighter shade of blue and gradually adding darker colors. I used Dina Wakley's Ocean, Lapis and Night paints, in that order. The balloon got two layers of yellow paint.

The Otis Silhouette stencil also comes with masks, place them on top of the boys. Place Dyan's Martha's Mat at the bottom of the layer and mist with Dirty Martini Shimmer Spray.

Repeat on the blue areas of the background, but this time use white paint.

Place the masks over the designs and add a shadow, by dry brushing night and black paint.

Next, I added some pen work with a black pen and a white gel pen. 

Lots of sentiments were stamped on the background using Simon Says Stamp Because of You, Stronger Together, Anna's Flowers and Thoughtful Flowers sets. I also stamped the Circle Pattern with black ink and the Crackle Background with Deep Sea ink.

The Simon Says Stamp Circle Loops were die cut from Memory Box Frosted Glitter paper.

The Because of You set has really great sentiments.

The white gel pen highlights add a lot of life to the balloon. This sentiment comes from Anna's Flowers.

You was stamped repeatedly here and there, without reinking in between.

This 'you' was stamped with white paint. Remember to always clean your stamps immediately after using them with paint.

The simple white gel pen lines add movement to the silhouettes.

The shimmery spray is very shimmery, but it was hard to capture on a photo. This area, where the spray meets the turquoise paint is one of my favorite spots on the page.

When you stamp on a shimmery background, some of the shimmer will show through the stamping.

I really like the Simon Says Stamp You Matter die and die cut it from Frosted paper.

I hope you will join us this week in our Art Journal challenge. You have a chance to win a $25 gift voucher to do some fun shopping at Simon Says Stamp. You have until Monday 8am Ohio time. 1pm UK time, 2 pm CET to join in.

Do you use Instagram? If so please add #sssmchallenge so we can see your entries there too.

Thank you so much for taking the time to stop by here today! 

Happy crafting!

Anna-Karin

Supplies:

* Please note: the links are affiliate links, for which I receive a small percentage of sales generated by the link, at no extra cost to you.