Collage and Waxing

I finally finished another of the mixed-media projects from Katie Kendrick's workshop Layered Impression, which I really hated to see end. I learned about collaged faces. I thought I was finished with this one, except for the words, but yesterday morning I started tweaking things and wound up revamping much of the background, and I like it much better now.

It's funny how I pick out things and place them intuitively on the page trying not to think too much about the outcome, and then when I call the page done I can see a lot of repeated symbolism that relates to me in a personal way. For instance, I tend to use tulips a lot since my dad died seven years ago. They were one of his favorite flowers, thus in my journals they have come to represent him. It's not intentional. They just seem to appear. It's the same with teardrops. They started appearing about the same time.

Lately, eggs have started appearing in some of the pages, I think they represent the children we never had. The tear, on this page, is for the ones we never had and for the one we got so close to adopting before the mother changed her mind. It was a long time ago, it wasn't meant to be, and we have had a blessed life. Despite all the blessings and chaos going on in the background, there is still a kind of sadness in our hearts that will probably never go away. So this page turned out to have deep meaning for me, even though I wasn't aware of it while working on it.

The little penguin is a quirky doodle drawing that I did a few years back in watercolor. One of Katie's classes was in putting a wax topcoat on pages, book covers, etc. Since I didn't have a project from Katie's class finished to practice on, I used this one and, also, one that I have shared before from the 21 Secrets workshops with Connie Hozvicka.

This is my first attempt at waxing. The wax kept having dull spots and shiny spots (still does). I thought I was doing something wrong. It finally dawned on me that I hadn't prepped the paper with gesso before working on it, and the paper was absorbing the wax. The back is also waxy. Lesson learned! lol

Yep, I can relate to the little penguin that I pulled out of a bunch of random marks and squiggles. I am an only child, and I have often felt like he looks. :)

This is my second attempt at waxing. The paper had been prepped with gesso, plus several layers of collage, paint, and medium. Unfortunately, there were a couple of dips in the page, which allowed the wax to be thicker in a couple of places. I attempted to fix it after it dried, then decided to leave well enough alone. Waxing takes practice! I still love the page and can totally relate to it. :)

That's it for now!  Back with more as I finish them! Hope something on here brought a smile to your face! Happy creating, and don't be afraid to try! :)