Website Updated

Excited to have my website brought up to date. Lots of new photos of artwork! New canvas paintings and ten new alcohol inks. 

Here is one of my brighter alcohol inks below:

Be sure and take a look at my website:  www.lbwilliamsart.com

Journaling Workshop - Entry 3

The workshop was such a fun day with exciting interactions,

 both among artists with each other and with their art supplies! 

Here are some more photos showing the artists at work:

Below are more sample pages done by students

attending the workshop. These works in progress

are great examples of creativity at work.

Above is a colorful page created with acrylic paint and
heavy brush strokes.

When watercolor is added to bubble wrap and then printed,
it adds a very interesting background texture.
The addition of pretty postage stamps and painted
boarders creates more interest.

The page above is a great example of two different
transfer techniques - Photo transfer & Tape transfer.
It is dramatic left black and white, but would also
accept colors quite nicely.

A light watercolor wash was put down as an inviting
background and then layer with both collage,
transfer techniques and text.

More from Visual Journaling Workshop

Below are some more photos from my last workshop on Visual Journaling. Each of the artists who attended did a great job on their individual journals and I want to continue to showcase a few of their pages today and in my upcoming blog entries.

These two pages show how watercolor can be used to create
a dynamic background for additional layering techniques.

The left page features a Tape Transfer on a graphite background.
The right page features paint and collage techniques.

This page shows how a watercolor background
can tie in related collage images and how a play
on words can add humor!

After creating graphic swirls as a resist under a painted
background, feathers were used to print a dramatic
design that captures interest and movement.

Below are photos of some of the artists in action!

Happy Journaling!

Visual Journaling Workshop

On Saturday I taught a workshop on Visual Journaling to members of the Cabarrus Art Guild and their friends. I can't tell you when I have had so much fun teaching a workshop! The group was fantastic! Everyone was enthusiastic, energetic, creative, and ready to experiment.  Here is a photo of the class.

Below are a few action shots from the class:

They created some beautiful journal pages and successfully applied some of the new techniques that they learned. Here are a few examples below:

I will be posting more photos throughout the week. So be sure and check back to see more of the work created at the workshop. Happy Journaling!!

Visual Journal - Fun with metallic paint

Here's some examples of how metallic paint can be used in visual journals. Metallic paint covers completely and adds drama to any image. In the examples below I altered the paper with watercolor & acrylic paint and them went out in nature to draw plants from direct observation. Back in the studio I added gold metallic paint to make the plants stand out from the background. Later I used the collage technique to add in a boarder of metallic patterned paper.

Close-up View

In the example below I used a light wash of blue watercolor for the background and drew the plant from direct observation with a black technical pen. Back in the studio I added silver metallic paint with a paint pen. I also added some quotes using the same pen. It is always interesting to incorporate text with artwork.

Visual Journal - Fun with photos & text

In the following journal entry I altered the pages with watercolor and then went to a friend's garden and drew day lilies. I also took a number of photos when I was there. When I got home I painted the flowers with gesso and collaged in (using an acid-free stick glue) the photos taken during my visit. I later added some press on letters to create some more interest.

Visual Journal - Fun with design

Visual Journals are great for going beyond the simple sketch. I only had a few minutes to do a quick pen and ink sketch of a building that caught my interest when we were traveling in the Czech Republic. The page looked so empty when I got home that I went back and added color and an interesting black and white design to finish out the page. I had so much fun with the design that I carried it over onto the facing page to unify the image.  When I was finished, it looked as if I had planned it out from the very beginning, when in reality it had just evolved!

Here I used playing cards for inspiration. I altered the pages with watercolor first and then I glued on the playing cards. I used pen and ink to repeat some of the symbols and designs that were on the cards to make a uniformed page.

You can have lots of fun using very simple designs or try your hand at more detailed work. Start small and build up - you might be surprised where you end up!

Visual Journal - Fun with flowers

Visual Journals are a great way to loosen up and enhance your creativity. I start by altering the white pages of my sketchbook in some way. In the following examples I used watercolor and colored pages from a magazine as part of the background. I then found some beautiful flowers and did contour line drawings of them with a black drawing pen directly on top of my altered background. Take a look!

 I used an acrylic paint mixture for the background in the two below. I drew the flowers with a contour line and later filled the flowers in with white gesso.

Visual Journals allow for experimentation in an uninhibited way that it is both energizing and exciting.