Orly Avineri Blog Hop

Welcome to the Orly Avineri Blog Hop with StencilGirl Products!  Orly has designed a new line of stencils available through StencilGirl beginning today! :)

For my project,  I started with a background of deli papers, paint, and napkins.

I began making marks and using stencils.  The one below is Orly Avineri's Splats, Blooms, and Bones stencil.

I used Heidi Swapp's Color Shine spray in mustard and blocked off the edges so only the stencil would have spray.

I continued adding color and drips and marks and layers of stencils.

I finally decided to turn the board this way and began my composition.  Since I have been struggling with Balance in my life, this became the theme of my piece.

I used Carolyn Dube's Uplifting Words stencil to stencil my word, borrowing letters from the other words to spell the word I wanted...BALANCE.  I used a hefty amount of molding paste so the letters would pop off the canvas.

Using Orly's stencil again, I repeated the theme of flowers from my background with floral portion of her stencil.  I gave my piece dimension by scraping Golden Molding Paste through it.

More Close Ups

Using some mesh from my stash to add texture and molding paste with Orly's stencil:

Using Carolyn Dube's Jumbo Vintage Type Letters stencils...

And my final piece after a coat of resin:

If you enjoyed this tutorial, be sure to check my other free tutorials on my website at

  Kirsten Reed Designs or just follow me on Bloglovin' and get them delivered to your inbox!

***STENCILGIRL GIVEAWAY***

Make sure you leave a comment because EVERY comment on EVERY blog is an entry to win FREE stencils on StencilGirl Talk!  

Five Lucky Winners will be chosen to win one of Orly's new stencils.
Giveaway will close Sunday, June 29, 2014 at 11:59 pm CST.  Remember to keep hopping along with those artists listed below and the more comments you make the more entries! 

Good Luck!

Blog Hop Order

StencilGirl Talk

Orly Avineri

Mary Beth Shaw

Seth Apter

Carolyn Dube

Mary C. Nasser

Kirsten Reed You are HERE

Gwen Lafleur Go here next!

Linda Kittmer

Janet Joehlin

Maria McGuire

Poem, Paint & Paper Towels

Yes, this is all about poems, paint and paper towels!  How in the world?  Well, I keep a paper towel close by me when I am working on a painting. I like to swab the brush on it before I rinse it in water.  This way the water doesn't get dirty as quickly and the brush gets cleaner.  

Because I often leave my mess (when in progress) over night, I came to my studio the next morning to find a beautiful paper towel all colored with my marks.  I couldn't throw it away and immediately set it on a 6x6 canvas with gel medium and molding paste through Lizzy Mayne's Bali Doily stencil at StencilGirl Products.

Now it sat there in My Lonely Tribe of Backgrounds for weeks.  But recently I pulled it out and painted some doodles on it.  I only had time to create something small ~ so it was perfect.

Around the same time, I was journaling with words from books and decided to take some words as my focal point for my beautifully abstract painting and I wrote a little poem

the glitter

exhaled an atmosphere of

soul

from my lips

I sprinkled in some glitter ...

and set the painting with resin. See my previous post here on trying resin on your art.  This is the kind I used.

Here she is! Can you see the shine from the resin coating in the upper left corner?

Have a glitter-filled day!

To Resin or Not to Resin?

Recently I have found myself using a hi-shine acrylic spray on several pieces of my art work.  Most of my artwork is happy and colorful and I love the brilliance the acrylic spray gave the colors.

I have seen resin used on art, but I have been a little hesitant to dive in myself.

Until this week...

I bought some self-leveling resin and mixed it up and poured it on a couple "itty bitty" (4x4" and smaller) pieces of art I used as my guinea pigs.

You can use torches, industrial heat guns to dry and get the bubbles out.  Since mine were small and I was "testing" the waters, I just used a stick to move the resin around and eliminate bubbles.

Here are my thoughts on resin after this experiment.

7 Take Aways on Resin

(1) Easy to Mix.  I was pleasantly surprised at how easy it was to use.  I literally poured a 1:1 ratio, mixed it up and poured.  I actually mixed up too much and had quite a bit leftover.

(2) Dries quicker than I thought. ~ easy to waste.  I finished up another "itty bitty" and decided to pour resin on it about an hour after I poured the others. I went to pick up my container of unused resin with NO LUCK.  The resin was hard as a rock inside the cup.

(3) Must pour exact amount ~ excess resin can cause messes. The instructions say to let the resin cure for 48 hours, but as I went to bed, it was dry enough to pick up and was not tacky.  I had poured with wax paper underneath my art.  The resin had created a clear pool around each art piece I then had to cut off with an exacto knife.  In the process I cut the sides of two canvases. :( UGH

(4) Fumes = Yuck.  The smell was not so overpowering at first, it was like a slow burn.  By the time I had poured resin on my last piece, my lungs felt like they were burning.  I was working in a ventilated space and had doors and windows open.  I moved the pieces to another part of the basement so I didn't have to breathe it any more. But I didn't like that I felt that way after using it.  Can't be good, right?

(5) Great Protection.  When the resin dries it is hard. I mean, like teflon hard.  It really truly protects the painting underneath.

(6) Loss of texture.  I paint with lots of texture, often using molding paste in my work.  After coating the resin on these pieces, I definitely lost some texture. These flowers were completely popping off the canvas prior to the resin.  After the resin, you can see little peaks, but not the eye-popping texture before the resin.


 

(7) I {heart} the look of resin on my art.  It just really makes all my layers of goodness and texture look beautiful.  I really like the look of my art under resin.

Overall, I felt there were enough cons for me that it won't be something I use on a regular basis.  But being a visual person, I really do love the different look I get when I use it and I won't kick it out of my studio for good!

Hope this was helpful ~ what are your thoughts?