Florence Turnour's Blog

My Tree Overfloweth - Florence Turnour 2020 This project started with a palette of collage paper.  I chose a palette of colors, then I painted thin lightly waxed Sandwich Paper (deli paper) using these colors, using a gel plate and some of the stencils I designed. I created a large tree stencil, painted a black rectangle on watercolor paper, and sponged the tree onto the background. Then I started designing animals. I drew the animals in pencil, and used the photocopier to resize them until they fit nicely on the tree. I cut the drawings out, and traced the shapes onto my collage paper. For the small details like eyes and ears, I assembled the shapes before cutting them out. Here they are. I worked on this one type of animal at a time over months, between working on other things, and not having time to do any artwork. I posted the individual animals on Instagram as I went. I made a few animals that didn't go on the final tree. These rhinoceroses were too busy, and ended up in a s

 I think this is my favorite of this series of landscapes, which I made at the end of 2019. Most of my projects begin with a palette.  I like the iPhone app iPalette, that lets you choose colors out of a photograph. This one started with a photograph I took at the Sherman Library and Gardens in Corona del Mar. I used a gel plate to (somewhat) quickly create a set of papers with about 3 or four sheets of each colors. This paper is Southworth 32 lb cotton resume paper, which I got at an office supply store. I decided to texture this paper using texture plates made from found objects.  I applied the textures to the colored paper, using the same set of colors, to make a too large collection of collage papers. I used these for a set of landscapes.  I figured out that even though the colors of the buildings contrast with the hills, the size of the buildings and trees were too close to the size of the texture marks on the hills. I tried to correct this in the last two of this sequence, one a

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School started today, so I got behind in Creative Jumpstart while I prepped. Today I really enjoyed Nathalie Kalbach 's demonstration and snuck a little time on it. I love the result. Such a great idea, collaging a drawing. I love the line I get from the cut edge. Thanks, Nathalie! Thanks for looking!

In Rachel Greig 's Creative Jumpstart lesson, she talked about using gesso as a kind of resist. I tried painting gesso through a stencil onto paper, and then using India inks over the top. Here's the result. Neat effect. Thanks for the inspiration, Rachel!

Here is my project from  Creative Jumpstart , Day 9, inspired by Gwen Lafleur . This one is collaged gelli prints. Thanks for looking!

Here is my project from Creative Jumpstart , Day 9, inspired by Diana Trout . I ordered the watercolor ground that she used, so I had to wait to give it a try. There was some bright pink gelli printing on the page before I put the watercolor ground, which you can see through on the painting. Fun project. Thanks Diane! I love that I now have a way to put watercolor into my junque journal, which has many pages full of leftover acrylic prints. Thanks for looking!

Day 10 of Creative Jumpstart was a lesson on Gelli printing by Annie O'Brien Gonzales . I'm a big fan of her work, and I have her book, so I had a flip though for additional inspiration before I got going.  I used a new stencil I just designed and my Gelli plate to make this. Some of it is collaged from Gelli prints on deli paper. I just bought some Posca paint pens (I blame Andrew Borloz), and used the yellow to draw on the flower. I was tempted to keep drawing all over it, but I thought the better of it. Thanks for looking!

Inspired by Andrea Gomoll 's presentation in Creative Jumpstart , I got out the watercolors and painted wet on wet backgrounds. I'll need to watch a few more times before I get what she does, but her textured and sparkly backgrounds got me to at least spatter my little paintings. These are ATC's to trade with kids in my son's middle school art club. Thanks for looking!