'Any Old Iron' ~ Artist trading Post Exchange New Challenge

Hi everybody! Today, I'm excited to share my first design team project, for the Artist Trading Post Exchange challenge. Ruth is hosting the challenge for this fortnight and she is asking us to create a piece of work inspired by this fabulous photograph of a rusted door, she took whilst on holiday. If you would like to join in, hop over to the ATP blog by following this link and you'll find the challenge guidelines as well as plenty of fabulous inspiration from the rest of the design team. There's a £10 voucher for the Artist Trading Post for one lucky winner ! You can create anything you wish, but it must contain some stamping, and no digi images please.
 I love the wonderful colours and textures Ruth has captured in the picture, and decided to use them as my inspiration for this mixed media canvas.

I started off by adhering some torn book pages to the surface of my canvas, using  Matte Multi Medium. Once this was dry, I applied  Embossing Paste through a Tim Holtz Lattice Work Layering Stencil  and a stencil from my stash. Once this was dry, I set about creating the rusty texture using Golden Glass Bead Gel. Ruth has a great post on the ATP Exchange blog about this wonderful medium.  I applied the gel with a palette knife and also sprinkled a few seed beads into the gel while it was still wet. This added some variation to the texture.

 This is a fabulous medium to use and I got a little carried away, applying it to a bit more of the canvas than perhaps I should have. I had meant to leave some smooth areas. Once these layers were dry, I started to add colour. I used Luminarte Silks. These are wonderful metallic sheen, acrylic glazes and come in a variety of gorgeous colours. They are a dream to use !

The colours I've used here, are from the the Autumn Splendour and the Fruit Punch sets. As they are essentially glazes, the colours layer over each other beautifully. After having such a lot of fun painting with the Luminarte Silks, it was time to apply some detail. I stamped three butterflies onto a piece of lightweight paper using black Archival Ink. I heat embossed the images with clear embossing powder and painted each one with with Luminarte Silks.

I then cut them out and adhered them to the canvas with Matte Multi Medium.

This close up shows why I wish I'd left some smooth spaces, I think my butterflies have a little more texture than perhaps they should. As you can see I am embracing imperfection! To finish off the canvas, I added some touches of gold foil to the stenciling, a dictionary definition stamping in the background and a Remnant Rub On word across the middle.

I just about manged to capture some of the glint of the foiling in this photo. So there you have it ! my first ATP Exchange post. If you'd like to try any of the products I've used to create this canvas, just click on any of the links and you'll be transported to the Artist trading Post shop. I look forward to seeing your 'Any Old Iron' projects x