Art Every Day Month Begins

November is a month of projects. Some of us are busily creating things for holiday gifts, or to keep up with the seasonal rush of small businesses. Some of us are writing novels as part of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month). I thought about that, but it seemed like too large a mountain.

Instead, I decided to try  the Art Every Day Month Challenge  being run by Leah over at Creative Every Day.  The rules of the challenge leave the choice of what you do pretty wide open. I've decided to put some limits on myself, and do a collage for each day of the month. I'm hoping to get over my reluctance to cover up layers. I tend to get a little too attached to early parts of a project, sort of like a writer becoming attached to a sentence, and trying to force the story to work around it!

This is today's creation. First, I wrote all over the page about what was on my mind, then with pastels, I drew a variety of symbols. Then, some paint, followed by some strips of paper that I had painted, and a couple of magazine pictures. Since this is just an exercise for myself, I felt it was OK to use the magazine bits. Of course if this were going out of my house, I wouldn't use copyrighted material. Then, I added more paint, cut out words, more pictures, more pastel, more paint (with stamps). I finished as I began, with writing. Whew! That was a lot of layers.

 

 

I'm pretty happy with the results, but it was almost a disaster. I started making this in an old sketchbook that I hadn't ever used very much. Apparently, I had only used that paper for dry mediums in the past, because the paper started to disintegrate when I added the paint! Once I realized this I stopped and let the paper dry. I got a book of watercolor paper, and sewed the first paper to the watercolor paper before continuing. Project rescued, and the horizontal stitching lines add a nice touch.

 

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Over the last month, I have been taking an on-line class in Photoshop 10 through the local community college. The class has been quite time consuming, but I really enjoyed it. This is a Photoshop collage that I made early in the class. I have since learned how to fit things together more smoothly. In this image is a passage and statue on the Chatham University campus, and some trim from one of their buildings. Also, a pillow from the oldest one's apartment, fireworks from the Fourth of July, and both my girls. And the Neighborhood Lion, can't forget him!

 



This first series of classes focused on the basic mechanics of using Photoshop. I've had one version or another of the program for several years, and only learned how to use a few of the tools, so this was useful for me. I'm much less intimidated by the program now. It doesn't feel quite so much like a foreign language. Has software ever given you that feeling?

Since Weasley crossed the bridge, I've had a hard time getting back into blogging. So in addition to AED, I'm going to try BlogHer's NaBloPoMo (National Blog Post  Month), and attempt to post every day in November. Have you heard the saying that it takes 30 days to form a new habit? November has 30 days, so I guess we'll see if it works. Is anyone else working on one of these November projects? If you are, I'm rooting for you. Stay focused, and have fun!