Wednesday, 7 May 2014

Dreaming with the Dragons - Gold and the letter Q

Hello and Welcome to Magpieheaven. I know we Dragons always say this, but I can't believe it's time for the Dragons Dream TIO again! And it's my turn to choose the recipe too, which I'm really excited about! I do hope you will be able to pop over to the Dragons Dream and see what my 'teamies' have created and that you will feel able to join in too. Remember all you need on your tag is to include the letter 'Q' some gorgeous gold of some kind and at least one stamped image. I chose a jumbo tag - I need some more of these now - and I came up with this Renaissance themed fantasy. I expect you've guessed that my 'Q' stands for Quill and that my focal stamped image appears to be on a unravelling scroll!
I wanted to have lots of fun with texture on this one and try to create something sumptuous, so here are some steps along the way.
I painted my jumbo tag with Honeydew, a Fresco Opaque.
After spreading a thin layer of Grunge Paste over my tag, I pressed down some gauze from my stash into it.
When this was nice and dry, I went over it with some Brown Shed Fresco, which is a translucent.

 This is when I really got too involved to take any more photos! I stenciled through a Prima flourish stencil with Wendy Vecchi gold embossing paste and I applied lots of Frantage and Gold UTEE! I made the quill from a Lynne Perrella stamp of a nib, which I tipped in gold UTEE  and the feather is book text, gessoed, spattered with gold UTEE and sculpted onto wire. The hand gripping it is a PaperArtsy mini.
Here you can see the stenciling and a rose created from two different PaperArtsy flower dies. I stamped the Lynne Perrella lady on to card painted first with Stone Fresco, heat set her, and painted the detail with washes of Fresco. There is a bit of a shine on the photo, as I applied a couple of coats of clear UTEE to the image. The little resin bird has been painted and then Treasure Gold in Rose Quartz was applied. I also used Rose Quartz on the under-side of the rose petals.
For my letter, I used the 'triple embossing' technique. I applied Versamark to the tag and then layers of UTEE and Copper Frantage. I heated from under the tag with my heat tool, after each layer was applied until there was a moulten puddle! Then I covered my 'Q' with Archival Ink and pressed it into the melted UTEE. On the top left are some bronzed fragments, which I pressed into Claudine Helmuth's Multi-Medium. My tag reminds me of the Wedding Chests given to newly weds as gifts in Renaissance Italy as they began their new life together. Some of the beautiful paintings in the National Gallery are actually panels from these richly decorated chests, which often showed mythological or allegorical scenes featuring Venus and Cupid - of course! Perhaps my lady, seated at her arched window has sent out this little golden bird with a message of love and loyalty to her fiance? Have a lovely, creative Wednesday and don't forget to try and join in with the Dragons Dream TIO this fortnight.

16 comments:

  1. Gorgoeus tag Hun I love all the texture and the flowers. Elizabeth xxx

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  2. As always, there is so much to look at on your tag - I love this one, rich colours and textures and images! Great theme, well done.

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  3. Another brilliant piece of inspiration! Just love the richness of this glorious tag! Hugs, Chrisx

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  4. WOW...Fabulous work Julie Ann, Love the texture & amazing colours...the image is perfect...Beautiful flowers too..Love it all... Hugs May x x

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  5. Wow, Julie Ann, this is sensational - like some extraordinary piece of medieval art (obviously commissioned by the Church - with all that gold, nobody else could afford it!). Stunning gauzy texture... must give that a go, thanks for the inspiration. Glorious tag, and what a great recipe for the Dragons.
    Alison xx

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  6. You always seem to manage to transport me in time when I come on your blog and this just screams out medieval times. The layers and texture you have going on look like leather in areas. Stunning.
    Julie x

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  7. Wow Julie ann this tag is stunning!! such gorgeous rich colours! and the image is perfect. I love your quill..excellent xxx

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  8. How cool is this ?! Such an amazing creation, love every detail.

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  9. Amazing details on both your Tag and post, your love of words and vivid imagination really shines through here :-) x

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  10. Wow this tag is gorgeous, I love all your texture and layers, fab colours too. I love xx

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  11. Stunning tag, love all the texture.

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  12. Julie Ann - your tag is stunning! I loooove the gold embossing- so rich! As always -your art is just beautiful!! I might try and do a tag too! xo

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  13. Wow love the effects you've created on the background of your tag, just love it, reminds me of medieval and the image fits in perfectly - fabulous xxx

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  14. This is a stunning art tag Julie Ann, I love that quill pen! xxx

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  15. This is amazing, that quill pen is wonderful!

    Lucy x

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  16. Wow wow wow, pretty pretty please with cherries on top, can you do a tutorial of your wonderful utee techniques, this is absolutely gorgeous and has such rich details. I love using heat embossing and would love to learn more. I have my idea for Q and gold, nothing like this, yours has so much detail and gold lustre with so much detail and another beautiful story :-) Kezzy xxxxx

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