Stencil Inspiration - A quick tutorial for gorgeous miniature art journals to keep or gift!

I have little notebooks everywhere. All of my purses, bedside table, in the car…I love them and always want to be ready when inspiration strikes or a to do list needs to be written down. Yeah, I know, I’m kind of old-fashioned that way, but I love a list!

Here’s a quick look at couple of ways that I have used my latest stencils to make a few journals.

These started out as small kraft paper blank journals from Moleskine, I like these for the paper quality and size but any little notebook will do. The paints and gel medium I used are from GOLDEN Artist Colours.

1. Start by painting your journal covers - I kept these plain and used Cobalt Violet for one, and Quinacridone Magenta mixed with Fluorescent Pink for the other.

2. After the covers were dry, I mixed some heavy matte gel with the same paint colours I used for the covers.

3. Position your stencil (Pretty as a Peacock Mini) on your cover and using a palette knife apply a thick-ish layer of the paint/gel combo over your stencil, kind of like icing a cake. It’s pretty obvious I think, but I used the fuchsia paint mix on the violet background and the violet paint mix on the fuchsia background.

4. Lift the stencil up without sliding and you should have a brilliantly clear raised impression of the stencil on your journal cover.

5. CLEAN your stencil! When you are using any of the heavy gels or pastes with your stencils it’s important to clean them off right away.

6. Wait, and let the cover dry. Because we added the heavy gel and applied a thick layer it’s going to take a lot longer to dry than before. Ideally leave it alone for a few hours.

7. Once completely dry, I just added a little bit of washi tape at the top and bottom of the stencil to add a little more flourish.

You’ll see the same technique shown here but with a different colour palette and on a mini hardcover journal I picked up at my local art store.

Last one with this same stencil. Here a plain white background is used, the stencil is painted with GOLDEN copper mixed with their Coarse Pumice Gel instead of the Heavy Matte Gel. After it’s dried some golden paint is applied with a paintbrush and a black Micron pen to further bring out some of the details.

I have four mini face stencils and any of them would work great with this technique. Have fun making your own mini journals! Here’s the link to StencilGirl if you want to check them out :)

New Face Stencils!!!!

So excited to announce my new line of stencils with StencilGirl. I have loved seeing the incredible creations that people have come up with using my last series of stencil designs, and I can't wait to see what you all come up with next! Most of these designs came right out of my sketchbook and are heavily influenced by my love of both faces and street art. Here's a quick overview of what they look like: These are the 7 new designs for 6X6 stencils...(click on any of the designs to be taken to the product page)

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....and one more 9"X12" design to add to the collection:

I'll start off by showing you a few examples of what I've done with these in my journals and my artwork and then link you to a tutorial I designed for these stencils as well as a few workshop links where you can find out ALL of my stencil secrets. 

In Your Face Workshops - Mixed Media Faces Using Stencils!

I've had so many requests from students asking how I get all of the effects that I do with my face stencils (available at StencilGirl and in the workshops) that I decided to create a one class to go through all of the various techniques. 

Here's where you find the "In Your Face" Workshops:

Random Arts - Saluda, NC - May 21st

 Art is You - Minneapolis, MN - Sep 17-20

Art is You - Stamford, CT - Oct 7-12

Workshop Description:

"Every portrait that is painted with feeling is a portrait of the artist, not the sitter." ~Oscar Wilde

In this fast-paced class we are going to explore a variety of different techniques for creating unique and expressive portraits using stencils. Combining collage, paints, inks, oil pastels and markers you’ll learn all of the subtle tricks you need to create portraits that capture the essence of everything from pop art to dimensional artworks. Truly inspired by many of todays street artists we’ll be creating our engaging portraits through the use of multiple layers of materials as well as layered stencil effects. We’ll be using a pad of mixed media paper for all of our experiments, the best of which will be ready to frame and hang on your wall.