Tell All Tuesday ~ Featured Artist: Lee Kreklewetz

Hi guys it's TAT time yay =D I just love how every week I can share with you the work of someone from anywhere in the world ~ people that we will probably never meet personally or even have come across otherwise. In a facebook post today I shared how my videos have now been watched in 190 countries, and how shocked I was at that - not many that commented seemed at all surprised by it but it just BLOWS my mind: this is why I love the internet! <3. And today's TAT proves it yet again, as we are traveling to Canada to meet Lee, enjoy =)

Tell us a little bit about yourself & what kind of artist you are.

Hi my name is Lee Kreklewetz, I live in Edmonton, Alberta Canada. I am 59 years old, and retired after working 35 years for a power company. I am enjoying retirement life; it’s like that old saying "how did I ever have time to work". I have always been an artist in my mind, always a crafter, always a doodler. I did not pick up a drawing pencil until about 6 years ago, just before I started my blog. My blog was supposed to be just for family and friends to connect with me, but it morphed into more. I started creating art, and loving it. All those old feelings returned; how much I loved paper and pencil, and paint, and creating. I love to draw nature, birds and women - my women don’t look like any women you would know, but I do love creating them. All my work is colourful, I love color and you will see that in my art. I guess you could call my style folk art or though really I would prefer no label, it’s just my art. 

What is the biggest challenge you personally face as an artist and how do you overcome it?
The biggest challenge for me as an artist, is first to call myself an artist. I always think of my art as elementary not sophisticated. I have not had any formal training, only a few courses at the university. I feel intimidated by everyone's beautiful art out there. I am kind of all over the place with my art: collage, painting, drawing, doodles. I use paint, markers, watercolour, crayons. To overcome my fear of putting my art out there and calling myself an artist I do things like enter a swap or do an online interview like this. Do you know how long I have been thinking of doing this, finally I decided to bite the bullet and just do it…so if I can you can too. 

What do you love most / least enjoyable about your art? 
I love everything about art, but I must tell you I am a supply junkie. I love paper, pastels, neo-colours, acrylic inks. So I love to use many art supplies when creating. When first beginning a new project, I usually never start with an idea; I will put down some paint and collage papers on canvas and see where that leads me, and just play. Sometimes its total crap, and other times it’s something new and exciting to me. 

What messages do you try to portray in your work and do you feel you achieve it?
When people see my art, I want them to be visually stimulated by the colour and feel my joy when creating art. I want the viewer to know that creating art is not about being perfect, or knowing how to mix colours to get that perfect piece of art. It’s about you creating what you love and creating it your own way, because my colours are not perfect. I don’t always colour in the lines, I don’t believe that is what art is all about.

Tell us where can we find out more about you & your art? 
In case you want to check out my blog Defining Me.....I post just about everyday always with some art.

http://leekre.blogspot.ca/ 

Thank you so much for sharing Lee, you're work to me looks so...I want to say 'carefree' but don't want it to sound as if I think there's no effort involved in your work, I mean it in a joyful, expressive kind of way. What I most love in your interview is the ...'because my colours are not perfect. I don’t always colour in the lines, I don’t believe that is what art is all about' part, hear hear I say! =D

Do you

?

Email me or click the link to find all the details here =)

Much love

Jennibellie

A Bunch of Backgrounds

Hey guys, so for a long time now I’ve been asked if I’ll do a video on backgrounds…so I've done one! 

Nowadays I tend to create one journal page start to finish – whether it takes me 5 minutes or a week, I will just enjoy adding whatever I like to that one page and watching how it develops, as you may have seen in my regular art journal page processes, like this one for example:

So I thought I would take up the challenge to show a few techniques for cleaner looking backgrounds like these below

& include lots of information on how I develop a page too:

Hope you enjoy, click here for the blogpost I mentioned in the video regarding acrylic inks =)

...and in case you're wondering, the snowman got it today :( 

I only made him yesterday as a friend for Sweepiebum but overnight nearly all the snow has gone, incredible when you consider how deep the snow was (just look how far Sweepie's legs are sunken) aww well I'll buy him a new toy when I'm next in town instead lol

Thanks for visiting, much love Jennibellie xoxo

Old Paint -2- Shimmer Paint

A Quick Tutorial:

Hands up how many of us have old acrylic paints that don't even have an inch of paint left in them??

*Jennibellie's hand shoots into the air quicker than in a Hogwarts class that contains Hermonie* 

and I've no idea why I keep them rather than just using them up, they are usually colours I have duplicates of anyway...but as I did keep em let's do something with them =)

I recommend using the cheap acrylic's as pictured for this, as they come in their own bottles they are easy to mix, or you can use acrylic that comes in tubes and just find an extra container

1st:

Extend the amount of your under an inch of acrylic by adding a fluid medium, here I'm using a Liquidtex one found in the acrylic mediums section. This not only helps old gloopey acrylic become useable again but gives it fluidity for the shimmer to mix evenly. I added may be 4x the amount of fluid medium to the amount of paint.

2nd: 

Next alter your colour if you wish, I realised I'd kept the colours of the acrylic paint as I brought them (even if I wasn't much fussed with the colour - again for no apparent reason lol) so here's your opportunity to customise your colour, use something with high pigment like acrylic ink. I want to keep this white so I add nothing at this point.

3rd:

Shimmer time! First I added some of this Acrylic Pearl Medium because it gives extra shimmer without any colour. Now I'm not expecting everyone to have this, so in it's place you could just add some white or cream colour mica powder if you too wanted *extra* shimmerettery, without the additional colour. I also add to this paint some light baby blue mica powder to give it that gorgeous shot-through-with-blue hint that you get in a lot of white/baby pink nail polishes =)

FYI ever since I showed this little black spoon in my DIY Art Glass tutorial I've been asked where I got it ~ the truth is I've no idea, sorry folks! It came with a set of mica powders as far as I can remember, but it definitely isn't something that I've seen available individually *sad face*

4th: 

Shake it baby! When thoroughly mixed test out your paint on a scrap piece of paper until you are happy with your colour, consistency and shimmerettery standards. Enjoy producing some absolutely fabulously arty paper to play with in the future at this point too ;)

5th:

Get some scrap papers and claim your fabulous new paint with a homemade label ~ and don't forget to paint the top of your bottle so you can see at a glance what gorgeous new colours you have to choose from.

There you have it: upcycled old yucky paint into homemade shimmer paints

easy peasy lemon squeezey, enjoy =D

Tell All Tuesday ~ Featured Artist: Stephanie Hannahs

Hello everyone, hope everyone is having an awesome tuesday, whether you're snowed in like me (check my facebook page to see pics of my garden here) or sunning it up in another part of the world. We've a multi-talented artist featured today, which of course all we are, hugely talented beyond belief (to even manage to fit art into our days sometimes lol ;) ) take it away Stephie =)

Tell us a little bit about yourself & what kind of artist you are 

Hi, I'm Stephie and I live in Central Wisconsin on a hobby farm with my husband, Bill. I am a mixed media artist and I work mainly in acrylic paint. I enjoy doing a lot of creative activities like gardening, baking from scratch, journal making, carving stamps, making hats, dolls and small embroidery works.

What is the biggest challenge you personally face as an artist and how do you overcome it?

The biggest challenge I face as an artist is to remember to create art that I enjoy and having faith that others will find me and enjoy my art too. It's tempting to create art that is popular but that's never been my style. In high school I used to make these weird necklaces like a doll head, arm or leg on a satin cord or a bent up fork or a spoon or a small transformer car. They weren't just weird random things but accessible things, everyday things that I took and juxtaposed them with the idea of fashion. And of course the other kids would stare, make fun of me or say rude things. I had something they didn't -- I had my own style and these were my statement pieces. I loved having small wearable works of art that couldn't be bought at the mall even if my outfit was. I thought it was great fun; it made me happy and I still enjoy having a unique necklace to wear. I know that creating art for me today is completely the same. My approach to art is a bit like a discovery. I often times don't have a plan when I start out I let the supplies talk to me and take me where they want to go. I strive to expand my skills by improving my techniques and applying them to my art so I can make pieces that I would love to own and use. A lot of the time I will keep one piece out of a series that I make so I can wear it, such as my book necklace, I kept the first book of the series. These days wearing an unusual necklace is often times a conversation starter that leads to me handing out a business card, making a sale or having a piece of art commissioned. 

What is the best thing that art has brought into your life?

The best thing art has brought to my life is the reassurance that my creativity is always with me. I spent many years taking college courses and put art off to the way back burner. I was getting a bit depressed not being able to create in my spare time. I spent all my time devoted to school and taking care of house & home. I realized that during the last couple of semesters I'd try and speed read through a lesson then I'd go carve a stamp or do some embroidery. It was just last year (2012) that we decided that I'd be happier making art so I made a switch. Wow, my ability to get back into it has been astounding to me. It's very rewarding to be able to work with tubes of paint, paper, beads, glues and fabrics again. I'm making things I only dreamed of during my days at school taking notes, doing papers and lugging around books. I guess in some ways art has brought life back into my life. It brings me great joy, solace and contemplation to see an idea turn into a fully realized piece. Then to be able to share this with others on line, at craft shows and at local galleries is really cool. I think this year has given me more confidence in creating and because of that I'm improving. Even my husband said he's noticed I'm becoming more skilled.

Have you ever found anything that originally daunted you as an artist that you can now overcame easily?

There's always a moment when I see something that interests me, like a necklace, and I wonder if I can replicate it. Years ago before phone cameras and the internet I'd just have to live without it. Now I snap a picture or research it on line. Technology has made a big difference for me. Also, I make a lot of my own patterns for the things I sew or create because either I can't find a pattern or I don't want to bother buying one. If I have a pattern I usually end up changing it somehow to make it more my style. A lot of times my projects don't turn out, like wonky dolls, but you'll never see those! My dog gets those. Ha-ha... he likes them! If there's a big gap in the time I put out one work to the next it's probably because I'm working it out. It can be a bit wasteful drawing and redrawing a pattern but I kind of enjoy figuring things out and learning as I go. Ideally I'd like to create something start to finish with no interruptions. 

Tell us where can we find out more about you & your art?

♥ Face Book Page ♥ ♥ Zazzle ♥ ♥ Society6 ♥ ♥ Blog ♥ ♥ Pinterest ♥ ♥ Portfolio ♥ ♥ Fabric ♥ 

Thank you Stephie, I loved the part in your interview about the things you'd create at school, it kinda reminds me of my time at school ~ and it's so funny how all the kitsch stuff you wore then is now HUGE news! You'd have made a fortune selling them to classmates if you were at school now lol and I love that you make things yourself through testing too, if you ever do a batch of wonky dollies send one Sweepie's way, that's his sort of crafting ;)

Email me or click the link to find all the details here =)

Much love

Jennibellie

I'm So Happy!!!

You know those moments in your life when you just stop and out of nowhere realise just how happy you are? I'm not talking about a happy hour, or day, I mean those moments when you realise your life is *just* right? Well I'm in one right now. Yeah there's things to be improved ~ but that's life, there will always be something...but then I think it'd be damn boring if we didn't still have things to do, have goals that are still waiting to be achieved or unseen places left to visit. 

Even when (in fact especially when) the going gets tough I'm always grateful for what goodness I have in my life...but I've only ever had a couple of those times when I've felt 'aaaaaaaaaahhhhh I could not be much more content than I am right now'; which is what I am feeling right now. I guess this is the reason why my new video is the way it is, here are some silly dance moves for your viewing pleas~uuuuure!

Have a happy weekend

xo Jennibellie xo

Tell All Tuesday ~ Featured Artist: Jenny Grant

Hello guys, happy mid january =) hope 2013 is rockin' so far for you...I'm getting there, slowly but surely finding my groove again, but I'm also allowing my creative self to breathe for a little bit. I think she needs some space, so I'm just doing small bits and pieces daily (like in my doodle post) to keep my creative diet healthy, but not to the overloaded to the point where I'm sick of it & just want to binge on the bad things instead ya'know?? 

What would the artistic chocolate/cake-binge equivalent be?? hmmmm?? One to ponder on...anyhow focus Jennibellie! get on track, this is a TAT post! And a great one it is too, tons of wisdom in this one, so I'll now hand over the reins to the very astute Jenny Grant:

Tell us a little bit about yourself & what kind of artist you are. 

I am Swedish living in New Zealand. I am married to a kiwi and we have 3 wonderful kids, 8, 6 and 1,5 years old. I am a Mixed Media Artist and I create my art based on an intuitive process. The imagery in my paintings emerge during the process of painting. When I find my flow my intuition guides me through the process. It might sound like a cliché but it is magical and it fills me with energy! I work with mixed media - acrylic paint, different mediums, watercolour, ink, colour pencils, fabrics, paper, photos... anything that comes my way. My work is very rich with many layers that add depth and texture to my art. My work has been exhibited and is for sale both in Sweden and in New Zealand as well as on-line. I believe that many of us have lost the connection with our spiritual self. Many of us search for answers. We want to expand and explore love, creativity and our spirituality. But we fail. We seem to go in circles and not find the answers. I do believe that we should stop searching and start listening. Listen to our inner voice, our inner guide. If we do, we will achieve more, and peace will develop within ourselves. Painting is a great way to practice listening to our inner voice. 

What is the biggest challenge you personally face as an artist and how do you overcome it? 

One of my biggest challenges is to get time to paint. I have 3 young children. I usually work late at night when they are asleep. I also get 1-2 hours work when the little one has his morning nap. He is a good sleeper… so far :-) I place my unfinished work around the house so that I can look at it when doing house work. The paintings speak to me at different stages and I get inspiration of how to continue. I note down my inspiration when it comes and place yellow stickers on the paintings to remember what to do next. When I get time in my studio I can jump straight into the painting process. 

The biggest challenge artistically is to keep my intuition lead the process. When I analyse the painting too much the flow is lost. I need to be brave enough to trust the process, just let go and do it. The challenge is to not be afraid to mess up or to lose something that I like. Not to steer the painting process with thoughts around what looks good or what will sell BUT to keep the intuition steering the process. I have many paintings going in different stages at the same time. I switch between them when I get stuck. I also work in art journals. In my art journal I can be even more brave and just let go instead of analysing the results. When I let my intuition lead I feel very strongly when the painting is finished. I get filled with energy and peace at the same time. Very powerful! 

What is your greatest personal achievement either in your art, or because of it? 

Through my art I practice to be brave and trust my intuition. When I do I get filled with energy and peace. The same feeling I get when I take other decisions based on my intuition. As children we all have access to our inner voice but through life we stop listening. Why is that? I think that one of the most important gifts we can give our children is to encourage them to continue to listen to and act on their intuition. To find a way to encourage our kids to be true to themselves and have a direct link to their intuition is a challenge. I think there are a couple of fundamental things that we can teach our children to help them to listen to their intuition. One is to love themselves for what they are and not for what they do. A second thing is to not be afraid. Many people today are driven by fear and I think that is very dangerous. The third thing is to have fun, to not take life too seriously. I learn things through the symbolism that appear in my art throughout the process. I put messages on the backs of most of my paintings with some words of wisdom that I learnt while painting them. You can see examples of this on my blog. In my latest Solo Exhibition "The Voice Within" I exhibited a series of paintings painted during 2012 that taught me many lessons, you can see more in the exhibition link below.

What is your heart's greatest desire for your life as an artist? 

I would love my art to hang in people’s homes and in public places around the world and bring joy and wisdom. I would love to continue to put up regular exhibitions where the message is as important as the paintings. I would also love to be able to help individual people, both children and adults, to be less afraid, to be braver and to listen more to their intuition. I think that is a small but very important step towards a more human and sustainable world. 

Tell us where can we find out more about you & your art.

My art is displayed in several places both in Sweden and in New Zealand (for more details see my web site). 

My blog and photos of my art is found on my web site: www.flowbyjenny.com. Exhibition Link

I post all news on my Facebook page: www.facebook.com/jennygrantart

Thank you so much for your wonderful interview Jenny, you share sooooo many insights 

and I *love* the idea of putting your unfinished artwork up, so your subconscious can evolve it for you while you get on with other things. I kinda of do this with my art journals - keeping them out and open until I'm ready to work on them again, but as I can't be in my studio all the time (...and when I am I'm working on them anyway) it's kind of limited, but I think many of us will nick that fabulous idea now you've put it out there ;)

Want to be a featured TAT artist? 

Email me or click the link to find all the details here =)

Blog Jewels

Blog I love you, you know I do, you are the thing that I have created online that I'm most proud of. 

You've challenged me, often. You've made me face down my fears. 

You're filled with my love and I'm proud of you.

You deserve some fresh jewels. 

I know other blog owners treat their blogs to fancy new banner & button jewels more often than I do, but I'm poorer in this field and you know that. Still I give you what I can, enjoy your fresh new video tutorials page =)

DIY Art Glass Tutorial

So you guys know I'm really into making my own supplies, I feel it can only ever add something entirely unique to a project if you use handmade embellishments & supplies - like you have put your stamp on it from the get go, from the very inside out. 

So I've a new homemade supply tutorial for you: art glass!!

I love it not only because of the way it looks (blings up any project in seconds!) but also because it's so versatile in how you make it ~ I show you many 'ingredients' for my concoction in the tutorial, but as long as you're crafty you can find a way to transform something you already have on hand into faux art glass.

Here are some projects that I've already shared on this blog that have been made with art glass:

 

Here's the tutorial, I hope you enjoy it & have fun making your own:

Much love Jennibellie xoxo

Tell All Tuesday ~ Featured Artist: Sarah Spindell

Hello all, I'm hoping everyone is getting more into the swing of the new year now? Slowly (very slowly it feels like) but it's still surely, I'm pulling myself back into the routine, rather than feeling like it's pulling (/dragging-kicking-and-screaming) me lol so I'm glad TAT's back and I can get back into my own creative groove too. First up is Sarah so sit back and relax to enjoy her artful share =)

Tell us a little bit about yourself & what kind of artist you are. 

I am 22 years old, a full time college student and I work part time as well. I love watercolors, acrylics and I'm starting to alter books and get into a little more scrapbooking and mini albums. I love finding ways to make things that I can't afford (like using cardboard instead of chipboard and making my own embellishments and embossing powders). I'm the type of artist that opens my Art Journal and throws something at the page and I go from there. 

What is the biggest challenge you personally face as an artist and how do you overcome it? 

I find that my biggest challenge is letting go of the control with my art. I have a hard time accepting imperfections in my own art work and I am quick to judge it, gesso over it and start again because I'm too hard on myself. I overcome it by telling those little voices in my head that are saying "You're not good enough. This piece is awful. What are you thinking?" and I tell them to hush up! 

What is your greatest personal achievement either in your art, or because of it? 

When I was taking Drawing 1 at my community college, our teacher made us enter one of our pieces into a judged contest in the Fall and the pieces that were chosen were hung in the gallery at the school where hundreds of people would come to see it. I didn't know that it was a judged competition until the end of the Spring semester! Haha. But to have been in a gallery made me so proud of myself. 

What is your heart’s greatest desire for your life as an artist? 

My great desire is to one day own an Art Retreat for free. It's a really long stretch to do things for free. But I believe that one day I could possibly do it. I want a place where women can come together in one place and create art and feel free from their stresses and just let go for a few days. 

Tell us where can we find out more about you & your art? 

Well. I started a blog over the summer at http://thinkcreatesarah.blogspot.com/ 

I have a YouTube account as well that I try and update when I can (excuse the Sign Language videos. I am a student! Haha!) between sleep, work and school! I should have some new videos up soon. You can find it here: http://www.youtube.com/user/thinkcreatesarah 

Thank you Sarah for our first TAT of 2013, that was a really fun interview ~ the art retreat is such a lovely vision and let me just say.....me first, me first, shotgun, shotgun lol I would definitely be up for "roadtesting" that vision when you need a guinea pig ;) lol I also want to say thanks to all those who have emailed me over the hols to take part in TAT, I'll be getting back to you all hopefully (fingers crossed as I type! ~ which is not easy btw lol) over the next week =D

Want to be a featured TAT artist? Email me or click the link to find all the details here =)

Doodle Daze

Doodle days...or more like daze at the moment. I've not really managed to get back properly into the swing of them yet since the hols.

All I've really managed to do in terms of creativity is these couple of doodles, so pretty much nada :( Regardless of how rubbish they are though it does help make me feel that at least I've done something, and I am still working on something for you guys in the form of the glitzy supply making tutorial that I mentioned recently ~ it's just that everything's happening rather slowly lol

Today I saw The Hobbit, which gave me a square bum due to it's length but I enjoyed it immensely ~ not least for the fact that it seemed Richard Armitage (the Dwarf Prince) was on screen more than Martin Freeman (the actual Hobbit). FINE BY ME! If you don't know who he is Google him, he is my type personified & he had action scenes galore in this, with slow-mo hero-stylee walkin' shots out of a blaze of burning trees, with sword in hand and fire in eyes...as if I needed to be any more in love with him lol

Hope you're managing to get a better grip on 2013 than I have so far =) happy weekend, Jennibellie xx

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!! Let's Make it AWESOME

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!! 

it's 2013! ~ Blimey, that looks strange to the eye =) 

I'm so glad it's here ~ even though I'm not one for new years resolutions, nor do I really see the date as having any impact on an actual day itself, but I'm still glad because I had an awesome 2012...and I can't wait for an even better 2013. So I just uploaded a video to welcome this fab new year, with a journal exercise:

 

It's quick & easy, and is just to get a happy mindset for starting our new year. I hope you enjoy...

(If you don't already recognise them & want to know what papers I'm using for this exercise, it is recycled paint pages from this video below:)

PS I know I said in the last TAT post that I would have the artist interviews back up on the 1st (sorry if you stopped by expecting to see one yesterday) I just thought 'it's still the holiday mode really', so decided to start them back up this coming Tuesday instead, so don't forget to drop by then =) 

See you soon, Jennibellie xxx