Take a leaf out of my book...

Hello all!  Thanks for stopping by today.  You won't be here for long as it's just a sneak peek (seems a long time since we had one of those at Words and Pictures).  I'm over at A Vintage Journey today sharing my take on the contents of this month's travel bag at Destination Inspiration.

It's an altered notebook, my first creation back in my (somewhat chaotic) craft room, and I rather like it, though I do say so myself!  I hope you'll be able to hop over and take a look.  And in the meantime, I need to do some more unpacking, sorting and then repacking for a week of work and play away from home.  No rest for the wicked, they say...

A room without books is like a body without a soul.
Marcus Tullius Cicero

Abstract Crackle - or is it?

Hello everyone!  It's my turn to host the challenge over at A Vintage Journey, and for this month I've chosen one of my favourite things - crackle - and since I've had a pretty crazy year, I've called it Cracking Up!

Do check out the fabulous crackled creations made by my amazing team-mates, and come and join us on the journey for a chance to win the prize from this month's brilliant sponsor, Tando Creative.

I've got a piece of abstract art for you, full of crackled texture.  At least, I thought it was completely abstract as I was making it, and as it leaned against the wall of my craft room for several months.  It was only as I was photographing it that I realised there is actually a shadowy figure of a woman emerging from the book page fragments, paint and crackle.

Can you see her?  The face at the top, looking down and to the left, lowered in something between melancholy and meditation... and perhaps a blue hooded robe.  Having found her, I've fallen in love with her gentle grief and calm serenity.

I've no process photos, I'm afraid.  I was carried away in the making of this and, besides, I wasn't really sure that I would ever be posting it here at Words and Pictures.
















But when I remembered this challenge was coming up, I thought I would bite the bullet and take some photos to share it with you.















So I do have lots of close-ups so that you can see it really is strongly based on crackle...















... not only crackle, but also some of my favourite paint colours in a heavy-body version.
















There are scraps of book text throughout too...















... adding even more dimensional texture.















I love it when the light catches on some of the crackle glaze, and it shimmers into life.













I'm really happy with the sense of movement in some of the paint marks too.














I wish I could say I planned it, but the woman's face is completely accidental, formed of some crackle and a book page fragment.  Maybe my subconscious knew what it was doing...















I considered adding extra definition when I discovered her, but it was some months later, and I felt she was better left slightly shadowy and subliminal.
















Once again, there are no words (except in those book page fragments).  I hope this canvas speaks for itself.
















Altogether, it's a step in a new direction which feels very much a good place to keep stepping.















Now that I'm back home with access to my craft room again, I think there might be some more canvases coming to life.














And the next time, I might actually go in pursuit of creating the figure within the shapes, colours and textures.

I hope you're inspired to play with some crackle and join us on A Vintage Journey this month - don't forget to check out the other Creative Guides' projects.  Your crackle can be stamped, stencilled, painted, or you can use a crackle medium of some sort.  There are plenty of ways for you to be Cracking Up!  I hope we'll see you there soon.







I felt the most intense pleasure in piercing the stone in order to make an abstract form and space; quite a different sensation from that of doing it for the purpose of realism.
Barbara Hepworth