Mixed Media Portrait Collage (text background)

I decided to try a portrait collage using text as the main background.  Here is the finished painting. I took a few in process photos and will try to explain the steps.

First I chose a photo from a magazine that I used for the head. I added body and legs with map and patterned paper.  The background was various types of paper glued down. I added a layer of gesso to the background but wiped some off so some of the paper showed through.

Here is step two.  I added some paint to the background in a few colors. stamped a heart and painted flesh color on the body.  I used a brayer to apply the background paint so it was more translucent.

Lastly I painted facial features and a few other details like a theater mask and a stage.

Adding the text was the last and fun step I chose several quotes from the internet based on my subject (going to the theater).  I wrote them in black pen first in block style script.  Next I used a white Signo pen to fill in the letters so it would stand out against the painted background.

Back From Artfest!! Misty Mawn

These are three collages I  worked on in class. I need to finish the face here.

 Day one on Thursday My class was with Misty Mawn. She is a fantastic collage artist. We learned how to do backgrounds and some subject techniques. Misty demonstrated all these collages.

we used stablio marker to add design

 Misty put together collage piece and painted on a portrait overtop the image. Face Before,

This was a silhouette image collage.

These two pieces were done by other students in the class.

Assembling a vase of flowers.

Starting the Girl with a pearl earring collage.

She does a great job with faces. I wish I took the portrait class.

This "halo" was done with a stencil doily.

Here the collage face is painted with different colors.

Mile High Mixed Media Group

   Saturday I got together with our monthly art group to try some complicated papers that Anne Bagby is known for.

These are stamps we made with a peel and stick flooring square and foam shapes stuck on. We applied paint with our brayer to these stamps on the black and white paper.

Collage on Foamcore

Here are some close ups of the long panel.

We had another Art night Last Friday and we worked on an unusually long collage on foamcore. First we trimmed it to the length and shaped the top. After laying out our images we glued them down and painted around them. We added another color and some other papers and text. Then I blended the colors together with Carand'ache crayons and wrote some description about the theme which was Travel. Lastly we hot glued a ribbon and did some splattering. Click to see the detail.

More Artwork from my Workshop

I finished this in Ohio on my workshop with Zana. We took 4 pieces of illustration board and used spray watercolor with templates for the texture. Then we collaged and stamped and put them together. I would like to try this with my class using watercolor paper and botanical leaf prints. I will perfect this over the summer. I liked adding extra pieces like a photo covered puzzle piece, torn and painted paper and some metallic touches.

Narrative Collage

This is a style of collage to tell some kind of story with text and pictures. I chose my son's upcoming marriage and used different things to describe their relationship and interests.
I started with layers of text below the actual collage and then painted the background. Painted papers were used as collage as well as images. Finally charcoal was used to outline the main images and text.