The Candy Carnival

The Candy Carnival is a fun paper assemblage I made with a character from my illustration "Candy In Wonderland". In addition I used a cupcake cup, vintage cake balloon and clown toppers, paper straws and embellishment wheels! 

This project is a great recycle project that can be created with birthday or party leftovers such as cupcake liners/cups, paper straws, toppers, crepe paper, party bags, party bag fillers and images from the invites and cards. Which makes for a great memory piece from that special day.  You could even use your child's image, your image or a friends.

Materials:

-Paper straw
-Cupcake liner or cupcake cup
-Cupcake sticks or bamboo grilling stick
-Cupcake/cake clown, balloon toppers
-Paper or party bag scrap (for banner)
-Chipboard
-Wood wheel or scrapbook wheel embellishments
-Pink party shredding (filler)
-Illustration, greeting card or invite images.
(I used an image from my own illustration)
-Glues: hot glue sticks, paper glue stick
-Tools: hot glue gun, scissors
-Other: white paper floral wire, scrapbook embellishments

Directions:

1. Cut image from greeting card or invite, layer onto chipboard or sturdy cardstock and glue using paper glue stick. ( This makes the image more sturdy )
2. Attach a small piece of a cupcake or bamboo stick to the bottom of the cupcake cup using hot glue. 
3. Fill the cupcake cup with pink party shredding using more hot glue. Then cut a paper straw in half and attach to each interior side of the the cupcake cup.
4. Insert a clown cupcake topper into the top of each straw, hot glue in place. Then insert floral wire into the balloon toppers and hot glue. Wrap the balloons in a groups of 3 around the base of the paper straws. (See project photos)
5. Wrap floral wire around the base of the left paper straw and extend the wire to the top of the right paper straw, hot glue in place.
6. Cut small square shapes from papers, party bag or invite left overs. Then cut a small triange shape into each end of the cut square. Make about 6 to 7 of these shapes, use to form the banner.
7. Insert the layered image into the cupcake cup, hot glue.
8. Finally add extra embellishments, lettering, found objects or glitter.

Tips:
-Use uncooked pasta wheels in place of wood wheels.
-Cut of words from your invites, greeting cards or ephemera and personalize your piece.
-Vintage clown toppers give your piece a more nostalgic look.

xoxo 
Lisa

Fantasy Fabric Blocks Art and Crafts!
I am proud to announce that I am a new artist on board at Fantasy Fabric Blocks. My illustrations are now available at Fantasy Fabric Blocks Art and Crafts. Now you can incorporate my illustrations into your fabric works from quilts, handbags, atc's stitched assemblages to fabric books, stitched jewelry and more!

The first set of illustrations I released are the Enchanted Carnival Collection of illustrations. The originals were created using Strathmore Watercolor paper, pen, ink, watercolors and tea/coffee aging, you can find that quick recipe and technique in my book: Altered Art Circus!
Each one of these have a rustic meets whimsical look and are inspired by vintage storybook images, The carnival/circus, parties, primitive art and Indie art all set in a whimsical tone. The aged backgrounds give the illustrations a distressed and prim look.

This series of images are available in the form of printed fabric blocks made from the highest quality, ready for you to use in your works. When you purchase these fabrics, I'd like to see what you do with them to put on the blog and showcase at Piddlestixs.

To start purchasing my artwork designs and other artist's designs on the fabric visit: http://www.fantasyfabricblocks.com

Magic and Joy, Lisa!

New Prim Glitter Illustrations!I have been working on a new series of paintings which I refer to: mixed media glitter prim! These paintings start on masonite board and are layered with either vintage piano paper, vintage receipts or scrapbook paper.Then I hand draw an illustration onto it using a pencil, then re-lined w/a darker charcol pencil, painted, re-outlined, glazed, glittered and re-glazed.In this picture I was inspired by Elizabeth Gordon's Butterfly Babies Book from the 1920's. I created a piece with cupcake chic colors, some brights, grunge and light distressing. I call her: Miss Marcy Moonfaires, whose a fairy from Starlight Gardens just outside Illuminaria City. Marcy is on her way to the Annual Butterfly Masquerade Ball held at the Beverly Wistica Conservatory at 7pm til Midnight, when the Celestial Sprites of Havenwood set off the midnight fireworks and special light show....
The next painting in this series is The Halloween Carnival! In this picture you will meet two girls named Lilly and Darcy, come join them as they enter the magical Halloween Carnival located on the grounds of Pennywicke Farms in Hollow Bridge. This year Lilly went as a Carnvial Wizard and Darcy as The Pumpkin Hatter, she is a huge fan of Wonderland and Halloween, so she mixed the two themes together. This year the Halloween Carnival will have a surprise Candy Land Parade which will start off with the dragonfly light show w/music by the Spider String Quartet!

This Painting I was inspired by a bit of folk art/country, mixed w/distressed prim and pastels, I call this one: Hollows Eve Costume Party!
Everything can happen on Hallow's Eve...That's why Maude and Tabitha are going together to the Hallow's Eve Costume Party at Waverly Hall. Rumors have it, that Waverly Hall is haunted by several ghosts, the most popular are Sophie Carlisle, a socialite whose family owned the property for 200 years and Percy the Wizard, who owned the land before the Carlisle's, his Wizarding family had it for nearly three centuries before losing it to Mr. Toliver Carlisle in a debt, or that's what legend has it. Rumor also states that Percy's family went into hiding as the Carlisle's...

Stay tuned for the tutorial and supply list on the art glitter blog this week http://artglitterblog.blogspot.com/

Happy, Healthy and Magical Easter!

I just wanted to wish everyone a Happy, Healthy and Magical Easter! I hope each of you had a day filled with Easter Sweets and Treats, Celebration and Family, Friends, creating new memories and magic!

Enjoy a mixed media and watercolor painting I did awhile ago called: Tippy, The Bunny Bee. It's a mix of themes revolving around some fave's, LOL, Bunnies and Bees. The base is Watercolor paper, washed with coffee and tea, outlined in pencil, colored in with watercolors, inks and oil pencils!

Magic and Joy!
Lisa!

Turn Illustrations Into Mixed Media Projects!
Mixed Media Painting is the trendiest form of art right now, everyone, everywhere wants to learn how to illustrate and create mixed media masterpieces, honestly its really very easy to do, and a way for self expression, but mixed media painting/illustration isn't limited to just paper, paint, and canvas, try clay painting or turning your illustrations into 3-D projects such as an embellishment on an atc, create a mixed media crown, doll or book.

In this following image I drew a crown shape on a large piece of water color paper, added scrapbook paper, and started to paint onto it using acrylics and crackle mediums, then on separate pieces of watercolor paper I painted candy and a sweet fairytale face and bunny ears, cut out and glued to my crown, followed by cut-outs, paper punched flowers, crepe paper, lettering and glitter. This crown was my swap crown with Susie Scott!In the picture above, is a set of atc's I made for the mermaid atc swap I was hosting on the faerie zine, I photocopied my illustration and placed on a piece of chipboard atc size, and embellished.In this picture I turned an un-finished shadow box from AC Moore into an Illustrative Assemblage filled with mostly hand-drawn and painted pieces cut out and attached. The fiji mermaid face is from one of my watercolor pieces which I photocopied and cut out to use as the new face on this mermaid for the assemblage. In May I'm teaching The Illustrative Assemblage at the Summit Visual Arts Center! Hope to see you there.
Here is a primitive and sweet piece I made called: The Primitive Sugar Pop Crown, with a posterboard base, cover entirely with my love: Model Magic, which I used plenty of times in my art book: Altered Art Circus, Just love Crayola, don't you? The tinsel is from Tinsel Trading, The crepe paper is vintage and the rest is paint, glitter and more.Here is yet another crown I made from recycled bits, pieces, flocked velvet paper, and hand sculpted bird doll, and hand painted/glittered candy lollipops, along with satin ribbon and the new faux rhinestone embellishments in my etsy store.Here is the handcolored atc I made a few years back called wicked: Using an old faded pictured, prismacolor pencils and paint thinner, along with glitter and distressed inks from Ranger Ink. Today I'd recommend Ranger blending solution, for less smell, a tip from Patti and Debbi at Ranger.These Royal Queens are from an art card pocket I made awhile back and were published in Artitude Zine. They were painted in using acrylic paints and gel pens.Here is the cover of that pocket which I called: The Queen of Hearts Chronicles, here I made a peapod using acrylic paints, liquid starch and glue, to sculpt the watercolor paper. I love stretching and sculpting water color paper, so many possibilities, you will learn that in The Illustrative Assemblage too!

Here are just a few illustrative examples, I hope you start branching from mixed media paintings into mixed media painted projects soon and I hope these inspired you today!

Have a magical filled day!
Lisa!

Mixed Media Clay Painting: LuLu's Carnival, Finished!

Hello All,
I finally finished LuLu's Carnival, the mixed media clay painting I had been working on, as you know I've been experimenting with various clay recipes that I have been making from a variety of materials, until I finally found one that can work as a bisque paper clay, mixed with paints, air drying and watered down to form a paste which can be adhered to canvas, 3-D sculpted and turned into what I call Clay Paint!

To see the first 10 stages of this mixed media clay painting scroll down the page to the original post.
I added more paints to the background of the piece, drew a few carnival doll performers using scrapbook paper for the legs, paints and crackle glaze, then outlined with a pink glitter gel pen.

On the balloon I drew an L on it, then filled in with the clay paint mixture and clay dots, and glitter. For the hat I embellished with a small pompom and new distressed stickles from ranger ink. Then I had to add some small stars which I hand drew and colored in with 2 different colors of stickles. The border of the canvas was distressed with broken china distress ink from Ranger, applied using my fingers.

Again the background paper is used from an old book, that I recycled. This piece is filled with cucpcake chic colors, a 50s meets modern color palette. When creating something new remember if you love your piece, and believe in it, everyone else will. My works aren't picaso's but they are my artful masterpieces, just as the ones you make will be your artful masterpieces.


Learn Mixed Media Clay Painting in my workshop of the same name where you leave with a medium to large sized canvas art piece and a new way of painting!
Here is an image of my hand molded/ hand made doll heads. I molded one for this piece for LuLu's hair barrett.

Mixed Media Clay Painting: LuLu's Carnival!
I've always loved illustration and experimenting with different art supplies to create an illustration, in my children's book:"Star and the Milky Way Cafe" I choose to use prismacolor pencils and markers, since it was for children, I wanted children to relate to it, as if they were coloring the images in.

As I started switching back and forth from illustration, writing, publishing and collage, I found myself combining a variety of materials to finish pieces, finding I had a love affair with Altered Art and Mixed Media Illustration, yet I found myself doing other things, creating artful projects, with less attention to what I started out to do: Illustration.

I've been experimenting with various clay recipes that I have been making from a variety of materials, until I finally found one that can work as a bisque paper clay, mixed with paints, air drying and watered down to form a paste which can be adhered to canvas, 3-D sculpted and turned into what I call Clay Paint!This is the first 10 stages in my new mixed media clay painting called: LuLu's CarnivalIn these first 2 photo's you can see the beginning stages of the piece, where I layered old book print onto canvas with my fave Modge Podge, then drew a Charlotte/Carnival Doll image onto it with a Crayola Pencil ( I am a Crayola Supply Addict, love their products and use in many of my works, including items in my new book: Altered Art Circus). Filling in the background and image with acrylic paints, mixed with Claudine's Paints (Ranger Ink). Then certain parts are layered with my clay paint mixture and a charlotte doll head from my doll parts line.Here in this 3rd picture is an upclose detail of LuLu's Clay skirt.Now I draw in the extra illustrative details of LuLu's Face which you can see here in the 4th photo!In this 5th photo I have outlined LuLu with a deep pink glitter gel pen and began painting in the face and and her clay dress.In these 3 photo's above show the different painting details! Here is the fully painted LuLu, but she is missing a Carnival hat, balloon and carnival tent curtains, which I have drawn in and painted in which you can see in these next 2 photos!There are a few more details which have to be added to this painting in order to bring it really to life such as more gel pen outlining, dimension to the background through extra textures, I love Crayola Texture Paint, its great priced and can last a while. When mixed with paints or other mediums, you can get interesting results. I will also be adding petal porcelain to coat my piece, again this is another fave medium of mine, followed by glitter and beeswax, which I melt in my beloved Melting Pot (Suze Weinberg-Ranger), followed by a crayon and beeswax mix. These photos of the finished piece will be up tommorrow. I have a full journal of these images in them which I will get photographed as well.

Learn Mixed Media Clay Painting in my workshop of the same name where you leave with a medium to large sized canvas art piece and a new way of painting!
Here is an image of my hand molded/ hand made doll heads. I molded one for this piece for LuLu's hair barrett.