ARTplorations: MIXED MEDIA BACKGROUND by Susanne

Hi, everyone! It's Susanne today and I'd like to show you one of the ways I create backgrounds for my mixed media projects. Today's background was used for this ATC with one of lovely birds from the SmallBirds stamp set:

STEP 1

I started with a orange and white oil pastel and draw some images. Then I used my Inktense Blocks and colored my surface by adding water. I used the Inktense Blocks because they are waterproof when they are dry. I added some doodling with a black Pitt Artist Pen and some stamping with jet black archival ink and the gorgeous STAMPlorations Artsy Border Maker stamps.

STEP 2
I did some stenciling with the ARTplorations Leaf Prints, Showers of Flutters, and Tulip Prints stencils. I used the Marabu Mixed Media spray inks (carribean, lemon, chilli). They are also waterproof after they are dry. Most of the time I use my stencils in both ways first time as a mask and then as a stamp to use the remaining ink on the stencil.

STEP 3

It's now time to add some gesso randomly. I used a palette knife.

STEP 4

For more contrast, I added some more stenciling with black and white gesso. I used the ARTplorations Dots and Dashes, Leaf Prints, and Botanical Lush stencils.

STEP 5

I added some black Neocolor II watercolor crayons to add more interest. Voilá: Here is the finished background.

I used some templates of an ATC and a tag to search for the perfect image to work on:

Finally I ended up with one tag and 3 ATC backgrounds. I also keep the rest of this background sheet to use it for other mixed media projects.

I used pink and green uniPOSCA markers to add some doodling, as well as the circles from Artsy Border Maker and, as I told you at the beginning, one of the SmallBirds stamps. The sentiment is from the Subway Art Builders: Create.