Blooms and Roofs: A Color Study

I've been experimenting in my sketchbook lately exploring color and pattern, working up the nerve to do some serious fabric design on my newly purchased canvas cloth.  I started with some loose sketching of flowers layered on top of each other on one page and then a repetitive pattern of house doodles on the opposite page.  I really wanted to play more with using bright colors against soft hues.  I watered down some simple craft paint and started to play.  Here are a few peeks of what I created in the end.

Dont they remind you of crisp autumn leaves against a sunset sky?  As I was painting the houses, I started to imagine a story about little costumed ghosts and princesses going trick or treating door to door.  Do they inspire you to try a bit of fall inspired art making of your own?  If you'd like to try working with this color palette, I made it super simple for you.  I isolated the colors that I created with and made a digital palette just for you!

As soon as I completed my pages, I left the room and my 3 year old son snuck in and picked up his own creative inspiration on the next page.  I was able to catch him on tape and interview him a bit on his process.  If you have a child, a childlike heart, or maybe need a bit more childishness in your creative world, I highly recommend that you spend the next 2 minutes letting him inspire you.

XO, HARMONY

Inside My Art Journal: Exploring My Yellow Self

 I am taking a fabric surface design ecourse right now and have been giving a lot of thought to patterns and colors that I want to experiment with in a textile.  It's really hard sometimes to sketch out ideas and it feel totally original to me. There are so many iconic background creators out there right now, sometimes I feel at a loss for what is truly me and what is inspired by the images that I have seen.  I believe that it is truly ok for an artist to use other people's work as inspiration.  In fact it's how a lot of really famous artists got their ideas, by working alongside and being influenced by there artisan counterparts of their day.  But sometimes when I use a technique frequently used by another much more famous artist, I feel inauthentic, and in-authenticity is a total killer of creative energy.  So today's journal pages truly reflect me wrestling with myself to find a unique creative voice that is totally me.  I also really wanted to experiment with pattern making on yellow backgrounds ever since I saw these! Yes, you can get inspiration from anywhere, even socks.  The trick is how to take that inspiration and help it grow something new and unique that could only come from you. 

So here are my 2 pages for today.  I also used a lot of the artsy tape that I made with you yesterday.  Can you spot all the different ones?  If you'd like to create your own tape for a project, check out my DIY here.  Thanks for stopping by today.  I'd love to hear what you are journaling about (on paper or on your blog) today.

XO, HARMONY