Be Fearless

Today I'm sharing a project that I created during a class with Dina Wakley, which I attended last year.  The focus of the class was on understanding color, an area where I struggle with when it comes to art journaling, which makes me giggle since I have no issues with this when it comes to card making.  I think much of has to do with me being so darn excited about creating journal pages that I grab way too much stuff and struggle with knowing when to stop applying color, design, and layers!  WooHoo!

During the class, Dina talked about the color wheel and using colors that complimented each others and those that were on opposite sides of the color wheel (if you don't have a color wheel, get one, it's really a helpful tool!)  We created a bunch of color combinations in the beginning of the class before we started working on the journal pages.  We created two pages and this one has become one of my favorites...I love the background color and contrast of the deep blue.  Hey, I did it...two color families and a neutral!  Yippee!

 

We started by using deli paper (get some of this stuff, it's awesome!), paint, and stencils to create a sheet of patterned paper.  Once that was dry, we cut out random shapes; since I'm a fan of circles, that's what I went with.  Then we created the background of the journal page, using a contrasting color.  (Orange and blue are on opposite sides of the color wheel).  I used only colors next to each other on the color wheel to create the background colors (yellow, red, orange).  Once the color was dry on the page, then I added the deep blue/purple circles (again, colors that are next to each other on the color wheel).  Then it was time to add additional designs and neutral colors.  Black is my favorite neutral as it really pops on a page.  I used paint in a bottle with a pointed tip to draw the fern image and write the words "be fearless" and a watercolor pencil to draw around the circles.  I then cut out text paper to fill in the leaves.  Lastly, I just added some stenciling.  Again, using black and my background orange color.  (Oh, and I added some tiny white dots 'cause I like dots!)

This was a really fun project...learning to play with color is great stuff!  Grab a color wheel, art journal, stencils, and some paint and experiment...be fearless!  (Product supply below)

Supplies:
Dylusions Art Journal
Acrylic Paint
Classic Words Stencil (from Wendy Vecchi)
Various Crafters Workshop Stencils