Artjourney Retreat Part 2

My first workshop was with Traci. I was really looking forward to this as I am becoming more and more attracted to bright colours in what I do, but haven't been confident about how to incorporate them. Traci taught us some great techniques for making our own background papers and then using them in our work. I was happy with a few of the backgrounds I produced and made one collage I really liked though it is as yet unfinished. I'm hoping to get some time soon to really play around with this technique

The following day our class was with Misty. I enjoyed this one just as much but really struggled here. My transfers just wouldn't work properly even though I've never had any trouble before. I think it must have to do with the particular printer ink and water colour paper combination, as I hae never used this paper before. As a result my transfers were far too light to successfully paint over and still have enough outline to work with. I ended up trying to draw in a lot of the outline and I have almost no drawing ability. Misty was a great help and and pic shows she does great work!! Somewhere in there is something of mine but the lips and jaw outline are definitely hers. I just couldn't get it right! I did pretty good hair and my face colouring was not to bad though Misty really contributed there as well.

About halfway through the afternoon my upper back really started to hurt. I often get this when I have my head at the same angle for any length of time. I was in too much pain to continue with the painting so I packed up and lay on the floor!! Not a pretty sight! Still I was lucky we were in a larger class room and there was space at the back for me to do so.

The last workshop was with Nina. Kathy and I attended a workshop with her last year and knew what a great teacher she is. Having been planning this for 12 months I had collected a few things on a trip to Turkey and Egypt last June/July and had some other bits and pieces collected on other trips or which reflect something about my travels. I am pretty happy with the necklace so far even though it isn't finished and could certainly be improved. The nature of the piece does mean, however, that it doesn't have to look neatly and evenly finished.