Collage Tree by Tam

Good morning creatives.

Tam here today to share my Art Journal Page for the current 

'Mark Making and Gel Printing Challenge'.

For this one I used my large Dylusions Journal.

I had so much fun, firstly creating the leaves on my Gel Press, and then putting down all those marks to make that tree.....

LOVE LOVE LOVE the colour....

So let's take a look at where I began....

I have so much fun and surprises when I create with my gel press, but to be honest, I'm a little overwhelmed by it, I feel unsure of what I'm doing, so I usually need a little push to get it out.

Love that this challenge did that.

So firstly, I created a whole heap of papers using PaperArtsy Paints and a few different stencils including TCW Botanical Dream 12x12 and TCW Blooming Garden 12x12.

Two of my favourite 'go to' stencils.

I also used a Texture Plate by Carabelle called Lines and Circles.

Oh and of course my brayer, and gel plate.

For the Paper Artsy paints, I recently visited Vicki at the gorgeous Scrap Matrix store and she opened a Paper Artsy Order whilst I was there. I snaffled up some of the gorgeous new Paint colours and a few that were missing from my stash.

The colours I used were 'China', 'Deep Sea', 'Weathered Copper', 'Dirty Lime', 'Limelight' and 'Bouganvillea'.

Above are my fave prints from the session. 

As I knew that I wanted to create a bunch of colours, and cut them out into leaves, I went for quite a few of the blockier prints. 

As I said before, I sometimes feel a bit unsure with my gel prints.....that whole

'I have no clue what I'm doing' feeling.  

The beauty of this one was it didn't matter, I knew I was gonna cut them up into smaller bits so that seemed to give me freedom, and a 'let's just see what happens if I do this' attitude.

And I was happy with the results.

See that second from the right print? See that cat paw print??

Yep my Maisy must have walked across my gel plate....I didn't notice it until I pulled it up. Lol! 

It's actually a pretty good print. 

Will definitely be using that somewhere.....

Ok, stop rambling, time to cut out a whole pile of leaves from the prints.....

Aren't they gorgeous?!?!?

All that colour!

To a few of them, I added some painted marks - mainly dots and little dashes.

Time to get on with the background of the Art Journal page.

I selected paint colours that reminded me of the sky.....'Aqua Duck Egg', and 'Aquamarine'.

I painted them all over.

Once dry I added some white paint over the top.

Then whilst the white paint was wet I wiped it off through the TCW Ocean Window 12x12 stencil with a wet nappy wipe.

Here's what I was left with....

I then painted in a tree using 'Snowflake' paint.

I just free handed it.

I then went in with a black paint pen, adding swirls and doodles.

Time to adhere the leaves using 'Soft Matte Gel'.

I then added a border with a few scribbles....

Just love that glorious colour....

I then added a quote in the trunk of the tree

"Can you paint with all the colours of the wind"

Ta-da!!

I had so much fun making a collage....it reminded me of being a little girl.....sticking and pasting.

When's the last time you got creative?

We'd love you to enter our 'Mark Making/Gel Printing Challenge'.

Just head to our Scrap Matrix Shares Page and add your creation, and let us know what products you used that are available from the Scrap Matrix Store.

I look forward to seeing them and I'll be back a bit later in the month.

Luv Tam

xx