100 Day Project

Welcome to Day 1 of my 100 Day Project!  I was inspired to start this by a post on my friend Linda's Facebook page about a gallery exhibit in Marquette MI.  Nine artists worked every day for 100 days on a project and then displayed the results.  It was impressive and started me thinking.... wondering if I could do something similar .... and then really asking the question "What would I work on?".

The guidelines are simple:  Select a simple idea that allows for exploration, keeps you excited or curious and fits into your life.

The project I have selected is:  Collage with paper, paint, fibers, glitter and more.  (Of course I included GLITTER!!!)

I plan to experiment with color and texture and start by making a 4" x 5" card each day.

Soooooo...... today is the first day.  Day One.  I woke up several times last night excited to begin.  And then I got into my studio and felt overwhelmed.  Sort of funny - it is just playing with paper and paint..... I had already cut some wonderful mixed media paper into the right size so there they were....these little white pieces of paper STARING at me.  Harrumph.

Of course they needed COLOR!  So I squished out some paint and used a brayer to paint four cards and some scraps.  And some deli paper to be torn and collaged.  And used a little bottle to stamp some circles.  And a little stick to make some tiny dots.  OK.  Feeling much better now.

It was really fun to use the deli paper to soak up the extra paint and now I have great thin paper to collage.  So I picked one of the cards and then glued on deli paper scraps to add to the design.

One of the DVDs that I watched recently about collage and creating backgrounds talked about the importance of using paints and adhesives with "tooth" in order to be able to write on the background that you create.  So I am using a new product (for me) - Pam Carriker's Mixed Media adhesive.  And it worked great.  Way expensive but I got a bunch on sale.  Also important regarding "tooth" is the type of paint that you use.  Today I used cheap acrylic paint and that has binders in it that make it perfect to write on.

So I wrote on it:  RELAX.   Seemed like a good word for DAY ONE of my new project.  I can't wait to see what this leads to.....           barbara