Plein Air painting + my travel art journaling supplies

When I think of plein air painting, I think of the impressionists and my absolute favorite artist in the whole wide world, Claude Monet.

Water-Lilies-and-Japanese-Bridge-(1897-1899)-Monet

Water Lilies and Japanese Bridge, Claude Monet

Plein air is nothing but the act of painting outdoors. Artists would typically scope out the landscape, find an area of interest, set up their easels and start painting what was in front of their eyes. The colors, quality of light, interplay of shadows, everything was as true to the time of day and season in which they were painting.Continue reading→

Harness the power of water: 5 fun painting techniques

Over the last few days, we’ve talked about brushes and collage, creating abstract art and examining art deco patterns to gain some inspiration for our art journal pages. Today, let’s look at some fun ways to add paint to paper.

5 fun painting techniques

Drips: This is one of my favorite things to do. Use some watered down acrylics or acrylic ink, stand the journal upright, and watch the paint drip down the page. Take a look at the super short video below to see this technique in action.Continue reading→

#PocketFullOfArt: Approach this work with devotion

This simple, small little spread took me three days to finish, largely due to the lack of time.

I’ve been using my daily Tarot pulls as inspiration to create a small spread in my tiny art journal {almost} every day. The goal was to finish a page a day; however, I’ve come to realize that isn’t always possible, even though I am working small. And that’s OK.

The biggest point of the Pocket Full of Art initiative is to create some art everyday, in the pockets of time that we have available to us. To come each day to the table, open to the possibilities and the emotions. To express ourselves with paint and paper, or origami folds, or with a cross-stitch or any other form of art. Continue reading→

#PocketFullOfArt: A daily art challenge with a twist

Challenges seem to have become a thing around here – after the Mindful Break and Kindle Thy Spark, this is my most ambitious yet – a daily art challenge! But first:

Why a daily art challenge?

Because my one small regret from last year is that I did not make enough time for art, especially in the second half of the year. Moving to a self-hosted blog and all the tiny little tweaks I had to make to it ate up a lot of my time and attention. Setting up an online Tarot reading business took up another chunk of energy. And then there was all the time I spent dreaming about blogging and fun new ideas – like the two Instagram challenges mentioned above. No wonder that my art table felt a bit neglected! Continue reading→