The Sketchbook Project 2012

I have FINALLY started working on my entry for The Sketchbook Project 2012.  I better hurry it up, it's due by Jan 31st!  You can learn more about the project here:  http://www.arthousecoop.com/
(Note that there are three options, I'm currently participating in "2012."  The limited edition will be something I'll tackle in the near future.)

I selected the theme "Heroes and Villians" and I'm really excited about where it's taking me.  I'll be exploring the hidden sideshow freaks (both good and bad) within me.  I've done my homework for the past several months but have been fearful of touching the actual sketchbook.  Well I got over that this weekend, thanks to some wonderful encouragement on the blissfully_art_journaling yahoo e-group, and I'm playing catch up.  I've already created the cover, the inside cover, and started on background pages.  I fearlessly took out the staples so I could play with the pages.  I plan to assemble as a spiral bound notebook when it's all done.  I may have some room to add additional pages (I have to keep it within 1 inch thickness-so far I'm no where near that).  We'll see how much time I have though...gotta get these pages done first.

  This is the cover of the sketchbook.

This is the inside front cover.  The inside back cover will be an elephants rear.  The End.  Get it? I just think its funny and makes me smile.  It also dawned on me as I was painting this that my mom really liked elephants.  She had a huge collection of them on this big set of shelves in our living room.  I recently got a house warming present that was an elephant.  And I just saw "Water for Elephants."  There are lots of elephants in my life these days.  Need to ponder what that might mean.

This is a sample background.  Spent hours on these pages and I'm really liking how they turned out.  Each one is a different color and pattern/texture.  All aged looking brights such as red, purple, turquoise, lime green, orange, yellow.  I used Liquitex Ink in raw umber to get the stains and darken the pages.  The Ink makes for a nice tea stain with a lot of water or much darker stains straight out of the bottle.  Once the pages dried, I went back over them with watered down color again, just to make sure the color stayed true/popped.  This really helped with the turquoise, lime green, and yellow pages.

I will be adding elements that I'm hand painting, collaging, etc.  to each page.  Will share my progress in future posts.