I made these mail art Serendipity kits for two crafty friends. I recycled the packages from tea I found on sale at Tuesday Morning and the tea actually tasted pretty good. The packaging was Inspired by Lisa Vollrath's Plastic Bottle Mailgrams and the contents were inspired by Stampington's Serendipity Kits. Mailing them reminded me that half the fun of mailart is the pleasantly surprised reaction of postal workers. After two coats of gesso and two coats of heavy bodied acrylic I stamped the canisters with white chalk paint, which I then heat set.
Bookmark
Bookmark for Read a Book Day
Art Unraveled Fat Book Swap
Art Unraveled Mail Art Class
Altered postcards I made in Claudia Roulier's Mail Art class. I had three hours to do something I seldom do at home -- just play and experiment. Through trial and error that night I learned that the type of transparency I use for gel medium transfers really made a difference. It seems ink jet transparencies (I used Highland Brand 707 and no, I don't remember where I bought them!) with a textured surface are a lot more forgiving. Each of the Black Heritage stamps on the post cards are gel medium/ink jet transparency transfers. I used a regular slick-sided transparency to transfer the feather onto the Zora Neal Hurston post card. It slipped and slided and ended up looking like a blur instead of the feature I was intending it to be. The "Expressions of African Americans: A Cultural Diary" headings are from the note pad that comes with the diary. The Langston Hughes quotation stamp is from Invoke Arts.
Traci Bautista Classes
As much as I enjoy browsing through craft books, I seldom attempt any of the techniques or projects without taking a class first. In most things, I'm a visual learner, but when it comes to crafting, I need hands-on instruction. Traci Bautista's Collage Unleashed was no exception. I really admired the colorful freedom of the techniques and projects in her book, but I didn't try a single one of them until I took two classes from her last weekend at Las Vegas Art Stamps. This first project from the FIBERlicious aRt book class includes several paper painting techniques from Collage Unleashed using acrylics and gesso, foam stamps and materials from Traci's "texture toolbox" -- including sequin waste, lace, die-cuts and silk flowers. 
Using the processes described in Collage Unleashed we painted papers, created signatures (pp. 82-85) from a variety of papers -- kids' lined writing paper is my favorite! -- and bound them using the knotted fabric binding (p. 88). I first read about Commonplace Books in Shareen LaPlantz's The Art and Craft of Handmade Books. With all the pockets, envelopes and bags bound into my FIBERlicious art book, it will be a perfect place for storing all those tibdits of quotations that I'm always gathering to use in my altered books and visual journals.
Art Unraveled Fat Book Pages
Theme: I Pushed The Golden Envelope
Technique: Stenciled Modeling paste
On 140-pound watercolor paper, stencil with Golden Modeling Paste. Paint over with Golden acrylics mixed with Golden acrylic glaze. Iron gold foil over.
Workshop: Jacqueline Sullivan’s “Collaged Codex"
Art Unraveled Day 5
If you're a technique junkie like I am, you would love Jacqueline Sullivan's Collaged Codex class. This same project was featured in the May/June 2004 issue of Somerset Studio. I'm glad there's a picture of the finished project on the class website. I was so busy playing with all the techniques, I kind of forgot about the project. The techniques, as pictured from left to right -- patina copper and brass created with either vinegar or ammonia if you try this at home do it in a well-ventilated area and DON'T MIX AMMONIA AND VINEGAR!; aluminum foil textured with metal-working tools and mounted on watercolor paper with acrylics painted over; cheesecloth on watercolor paper with acrylics painted over; stenciled molding paste on mat-board.
Jacqueline is a mistress of media, who shares generously from both her font of knowledge and her loads of Golden acrylic media. This was the first time I'd used GAC. GAC 200 is what makes the acrylic adhere to the aluminum foil or any other non-porous surface. I've already referred to Jacqueline's 22-page handout full of color suggestions and four other techniques we didn't try in class. If you're a technique junkie and you ever have the opportunity to take a class with Jacqueline Sullivan, run, don't walk to sign-up and fill your toolbox.
Is any altered art ever finished??
Back from Art Unraveled. I've decided not to bury the pieces I did under a pile until they're finished. I'm posting the works in progress and maybe I'll get around to finishing them one day! I made this first piece in Jill Badonsky's "There's a Muse in the House" class. The door of the house is a miniature book. Jill is a fun and patient teacher, whose class is a lot like her book. When I asked her to autograph my copy, she seemed pleasantly surprised that it had been so well-read, almost altered with post-it notes and highlighting everywhere.