Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Indulge

Last night I wanted to do something in my art journal to celebrate and mourn the last day of my job, but just couldn't get my head in the right place. As I poked around online, looking for inspiration, I found some lovely artwork someone had done for the 52 Pages group on Wild Precious Studio. The prompt was "Indulge." What can I say? The word spoke to me.

I'm a cake freak with a wheat allergy, so cake definitely represents an indulgence for me. It's delicious, wonderful, heavenly... and inevitably followed by exhaustion and foggy headedness cuz it makes me not breathe worth a hoot. Sigh. Still, there are times it's totally worth it.

The page is super simple. Remember that whole can't-get-started thing? I laid down some color with Inktense blocks, then drew the cake and covered it in gesso. I was so spacey that I forgot that gesso is normally a first layer under paint. Um, paint... Yeah... Forgot to paint the cake. I did remember that cake needs shadows. Those were added with watercolor. I outlined the plate, tiers, and candle in Pitt marker and Gelly Rolls.


Considering how spacey and uninspired I was, I'm pretty happy with it. I realized this morning how very un-art-journal-y it looks - no layers, no spray, no stenciling... Guess I was focused on cake and not indulging in art supplies. LOL!

On the back, I stamped the word 'Indulge' and then stared at the page for a long time. What is there to say about cake that cake itself doesn't already say? Eventually, I decided to list other things that might be considered indulgences. Again, tired won, and the page is not terribly complicated. I managed to write the words in a few different ways, but none of them are what you call fancy.


So there you have it. Proof that art can come from a muddled, tired, brain in mourning. Or maybe shock.