Queen of the Night!

Hello and welcome to Magpieheaven! Today I would like to share a project that I have over on Unruly Paper Arts' as inspiration for the Readers' Art Quest, The Dark of Night. Please do pop over to Unruly Paper Arts here. We'd love you to join in with this month's challenge: there are some truly beautiful inspirational creations from the columnists.

This project was quite  a challenge for me. I began with a drawing of a profile I had been experimenting with for Mary Jane Chadbourne's Anthology of an Art Doll class. I used Inktense pencils as water-colours and some metallic dimensional paint to create a queenly face. It's years since I spent so long painting faces and I've been really loving this opportunity to let my imagination go and create characters!

My queen fitted onto an MDF butterfly, which I painted with Fresco paints by PaperArtsy in Space Cadet, Inky Pool and London Night. For a little more dimension, I added some die-cut card with stencilled Lin Brown leaves in Grunge Paste. The addition of Treasure Gold helped to accent these 'tiles' - a tip I learned earlier this summer from one of Lin's own workshops. A paper-cut of butterfly wings from Retro Cafe Art Gallery accented by gold dimensional paint and I was ready to add the final embellishments on my Queen of the Night and to cover the back with some beautiful fashion plate paper from The House of Zandra.

And what is the identity of my Queen of the Night? Is she the character from Mozart's opera, The Magic Flute? Is she a goddess from Mesopotamia or an elegant and fashionable lady who sports the latest fashions by day and presides over her elegant and fashionable salon by night. gathering artists, poets, musicians and thinkers together for sparkling conversations? I'll leave that up to you to decide.
   Thank you for stopping by Magpieheaven today. it's always a pleasure and a privilege to have your company. Please do remember to have a go at our Readers' Art Quest over at Unruly Paper Arts, as you could win yourself a mystery goodies bag including items from our sponsor this month The Eyelet Outlet!