We are going industrial at AVJ

P I have loved putting together my February CG sample for Tracy's 'Industrial' challenge at AVJ. In thinking about the terminology and meaning of industry we think of factories with rising chimney stacks exuding steam and smoke, metals, mechanical and automated machines, blast furnaces, manufacturing industries, car plants and so on. But I also like decayed metals, particularly rusty ones so I turned to Tim's faux, riveted metal effect, his remnant rub background and idea-ology combined with DecoArt media acrylic paints and mediums to produce this Curio Box.

Easter is approaching and I had bought a papier-machie egg from Hobbycraft last week and decided to use it. Having found an old Ipod box in my drawer of alterable items everything started to come together in my head but the egg was going to be difficult to stick it in the box so I cut it in half using a craft hacksaw.

The egg was first covered in foil tape to give it a good covering of silver and then I cut and marked pieces of Tim's foil sheets and covered over to give it a stronger layer. Next I used media acrylic paints coating thickly, semi drying between each layer and wiping back. I used black. prussian blue, burnt umber with burnt sienna mix, and quinacridone gold. But I didn't get the effects I wanted as when I rubbed the paint away between each layer I had a stark contrast between the silver and the coloured paints.

 
So next I added some alcohol inks but it looked too false. Nothing to do but change it completely then..... I added some random and thin amounts of sand paste and dried then some mid grey and paynes grey paints. I blended some black round the edges, dried it and then added a paynes grey wash before quinacridone gold again. Ok it's not like Tim's 'Heart and Soul' heart which is where the inspiration came from but I quite like how it has turned out.

 

So onto the box. I gave it a coat of black gesso inside and out then did Andy's mega crackle technique on the outside with the decoart weathered wood and crackle paint so I painted the inside of the box with white gesso to lighten the whole thing. The mega crackle worked brilliantly with the large black cracks.
 When it was dry I gave it a coat of matte varnish and then a watery wash of prussian blue and quinacridone gold before adding some remnant rubs.

For the background behind the egg I revisited Tim's January tag of 2014 but changed it a little and used distress sprays and remnant rubs.

The butterfly is one of Tim's duo set,  I feel a tutorial coming on so keep a watch out on the Destination Inspiration posts next month but you can see it is well rusted and has that industrial feel to it.

The word curio is made up of Tim's alphabet blocks with the letter shapes given  a very light dry brushed layer of gesso and then a wash of quinacridone gold acrylic paint. I dabbed vintage photo distress paint over the arrow and when dry brushed a little treasure copper on it.

Finally I had almost everything made to put it together. As always my eclectic mind gathered more bits along the way and I added some natural materials, moss and husk hair to provide more interest. You can also see I found a rusty spring and finished off a little bottle that had been part painted. You can also just make out a tiny star in the moss which was punched from Tim's punch using left over card I had altered to look like rusty metal and glued it to a memo pin.

I love the butterfly adhered to the crown of the egg ......

.... and the blocks glued to the top of the box.

Here you can see how the egg and butterfly protrude from the front of the box - had to pack it out with chipboard first otherwise they would have disappeared inside.

I think the mix of industrial and natural materials have worked really well together and have put me in the mood for Spring.

Now it's finished I am very happy with the outcome and this has become one of those rare pieces that I would like to display in my house and I know I will use it for my sideboard Easter

I hope you can find some time to pop over to the AVJ challenge blog to take a look at all the other inspirational pieces mage by the very talented Creative Guides and if you take a shot at entering you could be in with a chance of winning a £20 shop voucher from Country View Crafts or being one of our Pinworthy Mentions.

I am adding my industrial butterfly on the egg to the Frilly and Funkie challenge 'enjoy your embossing'. 

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful weekend.

hugs Brenda xxx

Create your own visual style... let it be unique for yourself and yet identifiable for others.

Orson Welles