A Bit of How-To...

Well, for those of you who may be interested...

Firstly - I love working on wood blocks - it's so much easier to have a hard surface rather than one that 'gives' such as the stretched canvases. I still use them - they're easier to hang, but I really love the wood and the fact that it stands upright on its own.

So, I prime the wood block with some white Gesso. If painting directly onto it - then a light sand does the trick. But as I adhered paper all over it - I didn't bother about the sanding this time.

When the Gesso is dry, I just went through my scrap paper box with some scissors and cut up pieces of paper. You could tear as well depending on the look you want. At the moment I'm in a cutting phase! I use a foam brush from the cheapy shop and use Gel Medium (see photo) to glue down the paper and then also a layer over the top to seal it. I've used Derivan and Jo Sonja and they're both as good as each other.

After that I draw my figure on the block or canvas using a PITT OIL BASE pencil by Faber Castel - extra soft. Other pencils just don't seem to work over the shiny surface of the Gel Medium.

In these two pieces, I've applied a fairly thick layer of Texture paste with a pallette knife and then stamped images using a foam stamp. It comes out of the jar/tube opaque but dries clear so you can see the paper underneath. The KAiser TP is smoother and the Jo Sonjas is alot thicker - so you can achieve deeper imprints with it - although it's slightly more expensive.
Next paint over the exposed areas of skin with a white gesso to give a nice base for applying the oil paints later. And that's as far as I've come with these two, so stay tuned and if you like I can write some more how-to's later.
Thanks for stopping by, X Me