What I am really loving is that a couple of my friends daughters have joined the class. How awesome it is to have young girls involved and enjoying art. I know I am not alone, I have met many women who can say the same; but I wasn't really encouraged in art at school. It is such a central part of who I am, but how many of us have told us we are 'no good at art', purely because we can't draw photo images etc? It is such crap. Anyway, I think it is great to be able to encourage our daughters. And I am so excited that my daughter has decided to join our group. She has told me she wants to be an artist 'Just like you, Mummy.' When I told her that she already is an artist (this girl is a prolific creator, give her a pen and paper and watch her go), the look she gave me was pure melt-your-heart stuff. Well, she IS. Sure, there are techniques to learn, colour combinations to understand, and rules to be ignored whenever we feel led. But she IS an artist. She has already come up with her design for our next class and bugs, er, reminds me every day that 'we need to do more on our cards, Mummy!'. Such a helpful lass ;) But then, isn't it cool to see a kid with a passion for something? Some of you may know that we are homeschoolers. It has been in planning for sometime, but implemented only this year (looooong story). The kids are always asking for 'grades', which I am kind of against. How discouraging can that be? But when we talk about art, they asked if you can fail Art. I told them that the only way they can fail Art is if they don't produce something that they haven't taken care and thought about. Other than that, the only 'F' in Art is for 'Fabulous', Sweetie....
Hmmm. Waffling again.
Somehow I got into my head Egyptian Canopic jars; you know, that are used to store organs for the afterlife? That's kind of Anatomy, right? Then I saw a Babushka on Pinterest that showed a nude, then a skeleton, then the organs. It was cool, but also a bit gross. And I don't like to out and out plagiarise unless it is for practise (and for ones own use and enjoyment), which is totally cool. So I mixed the two together. Canopic Babushkas. Why not?!
If find myself apologising for the poor quality photos, yes, AGAIN. I was literally still drying these on the way out the door; we had been away for a few days and got back late; and the camera battery was going flat. I had to take them all in minutes flat..... :(
The Babushkas are joined with a brad ad the bottom and fan out.
I tried to do my version of what I thought an Egyptian Babushka might look like!
In the middle is her 'skeleton', followed by an Anne Frank quote about the soul. Because Babushkas are sure to have a soul, right? I also thought it was something to reflect on the whole idea of canopic jars and what we take with us when we die - the soul is immortal.
To make the background I started with a large sheet of thick card (not quite large enough - I was 3 short!). I have this lovely little stencil; which originally reminded me of bunting (<3) but also looked a bit like pyramids. How convenient! I scraped some sand mortar through it, then gave it a few layers of tinted and glittered flow medium. Loved it! So tactile!
Not much else to say about the rest of the process. I had to hand draw and paint or ink them all, then gave them a layer of clear embossing powder which was to protect the paper; make it a bit thicker, and also to help bring out the bright colours. Sadly, these are the best photos I got before I had to swap them all! I hope they give you some idea. I was really please with the end result (above). Whimsical and fun!
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