What motivates you to work? I’ve come to know that I need deadlines; left to myself I can fritter away a day along with the best of the procrastinators even though I have the best intentions in the world. Look at this week. I usually start on my sermon note piece by Monday afternoon but what with this bad cold, a new baby, and all sorts of other challenges I didn’t really start until Wednesday. I listened to the sermon on CD and took lots of notes, made some lists, and drew a page full of compositions but I didn’t start with the art until Friday. Let me tell you… my Saturday deadline was looming over my head because these pieces take lots of time! I had no wiggle room.
Then I couldn’t find the right shade of blue paper, so I got out my acrylic and inks and stained a bunch of rice paper. When I tested my pen and my stamp pad ink I found that the ink bled on the paper. Now in near panic mode I emailed my calligrapher friend Alesia who knows all about ink and paper, asking how one seals soft papers.
You see, when paper is hand made, like the rice paper I used, it may not have been sized to prevent ink from seeping into the fibers like blotter paper. This was the case with my paper. An online source gave a recipe for cooking gelatin, alum, and water which is boiled and painted onto the paper to seal the surface. I did that. I then made the artwork and then I
followed Alesia’s suggestion to paint the paper with 1:1 acrylic matte medium and water. It worked. No bleeding ink.
I’ve put in quite a few really pleasant hours today doing the rubber stamping and stenciling on this piece. It’s my favorite part of this work… it’s a quiet time, and meditative, prayer-like, and I find myself memorizing the lines, asking myself and God all sorts of questions. I get into a rhythm, listen to a bit of music, time flies, and it almost seems like the world pauses to stretch my time to fit the amount of work I have to do. Now it’s finished and I am thinking about the next composition and the next deadline.
Then I couldn’t find the right shade of blue paper, so I got out my acrylic and inks and stained a bunch of rice paper. When I tested my pen and my stamp pad ink I found that the ink bled on the paper. Now in near panic mode I emailed my calligrapher friend Alesia who knows all about ink and paper, asking how one seals soft papers.
You see, when paper is hand made, like the rice paper I used, it may not have been sized to prevent ink from seeping into the fibers like blotter paper. This was the case with my paper. An online source gave a recipe for cooking gelatin, alum, and water which is boiled and painted onto the paper to seal the surface. I did that. I then made the artwork and then I
followed Alesia’s suggestion to paint the paper with 1:1 acrylic matte medium and water. It worked. No bleeding ink.I’ve put in quite a few really pleasant hours today doing the rubber stamping and stenciling on this piece. It’s my favorite part of this work… it’s a quiet time, and meditative, prayer-like, and I find myself memorizing the lines, asking myself and God all sorts of questions. I get into a rhythm, listen to a bit of music, time flies, and it almost seems like the world pauses to stretch my time to fit the amount of work I have to do. Now it’s finished and I am thinking about the next composition and the next deadline.
Congratulations, Jo, on your new baby and your inspiring blog. I really like your collages and musings on the creative process.
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