Turn Your Artwork Into Jewelry!
Sometimes you look at your illustrations and think what else can I do with them, you can photocopy them and mount on chipboard or turn into ATC's (Artist Trading Cards), have them printed onto greeting cards, postcards or turn into prints. But why not try something different, what about making jewelry with your illustrations, simply photocopy your artwork to fit the size of the piece you are working on, trim and insert into open cab pieces, jewelry casings, watch casings, into bottle caps, jewelry frames, or transfer to fabric and stitch onto the images, so many possibilities.

Here is a piece of jewelry I made using one of my illustrations:
Lacy's Halloween Party
This is a preview of my new illustration's I created for product licensing!

This piece is called: Lacy's Halloween Party!

Lacy is a young wizard who lives the town of Agatha Mews just 40 miles south of Boston and loves to sprinkle magic everywhere she goes......

This original piece was made on Strathmore Bristol Board, Oil Pencils, Markers and Acrylics!

I then photocopied it and turned it into a necklace called:

Enchanted Soiree!
Using my illustration, rhinestones, vintage pearls, metal roses, aurora beads, clasps, and glass covering!
Hope this inspired you to turn your illustrations into some jewelry or accessories.
Magic and Joy,
Lisa

Re-discovering My Childhood Through My Work!

I've always loved to draw ever since I was little. I would love to draw mermaids, unicorns and rainbows, always collecting greeting cards, stationary and stickers, using them as my inspiration, my fave sticker to collect was the Lisa Frank Sticker Line, I loved the name and the stickers themselves.
Collecting stickers, roller skating, leg warmers, hair clips, pom poms, Hello Kitty, Rainbow Brite, Strawberry Shortcake, Poochie, Smurfs, Rose Petal Place, Jem, plastic charms, unicorns, rainbows, Return to Oz, Record Players, Holly Hobby Ovens, Fraggle Rock, Beneton, The Outsiders, Growing Pains and Silver City Pink Lipstick all played a part in my childhood years and still do today.

My mom would take me to Toys in the Attic in Montclair to pick a toy or to my favorite stationary store in Upper Montclair for a journal or drawing papers. Then we would stop off at either Swenson's Ice Cream or Grunnings on the Hill. I'd come home and start drawing and writing, or work on my sticker albums, perhaps make some clothes for my dolls, set up my doll scene or watch tv, I was always occupied, and no one had a computer, we had Atari and TV, that's about it, so much of my childhood was spent learning crafts and using my hands.
Once I reached high school I saw art in a new way, learning to develop it into more of a fine art route through watercolor, oil painting and sculpting. I would paint landscape scenes, figural forms and serious fantasy. It wasn't until college that I started experimenting with collage and layering techniques, eventually falling back in love with pottery and sculpture.

After college I started loving the look of collage, mixed media forms and primitive techniques. Up until around 2006, I was more of a grungy girl, loved working in muted and dark, vintage colors, then I leaped into happier moods with bolds and rainbow color blends which can be seen in mixed form in my book: Altered Art Circus! After the books release I started tweaking my color palettes and have now gone back to that tutti frutti age where unicorns soared, Betti Boop became a mermaid, and where the sweetness I loved is called Kawaii, a time when dolls were dolls, all with adding a modern whim to it. Lately I have been mixing my images by copying in them and adding them to scrapbook paper backgrounds with a canvas or wood base. Adding layers of additional coloring, paint, glitter, etc. These illustrations are made with Strathmore watercolor paper, and my coffee/tea process, which can be found in my book: Altered Art Circus. I then heat the paper with a heat tool, then the painting begins.These illustrations are done on bristol board with prismacolor pencils and markers!
This multi image piece was made ATC sized and illustrated into watercolor paper using pencil and watercolors!

I will blog again about how to use your illustrations and incorporate them into your mixed media works such as atc's, mixed media painting, etc.
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!