An Easter Queen of Hearts by Aurora Davison

Meet Arora Davison

Hi all; firstly it's a privilege to be here among such talented people. I sent in my proposal as a 'what the hell', so when I was accepted I ran around screaming which I'm sure was quite a comical sight!

I am a divorced mother of two, a girl and boy - my son has autism which has not only been a challenge but a learning process of what I am capable of, we have faced quite a bit of adversity and he's only mildly affected.
I moved earlier this year to Bathurst to a new calmer life with my love and my son who now attends school within an Autism Support Unit. My daughter would not leave the city and lives with my ex-husband. It broke my heart but she is now able to do so much she couldn't before as our life was all about her brother's needs. I wonder sometimes who suffers the most, the one afflicted or the sibling whose needs are just as great but swept under the carpet of another's diagnosed need...
My partner also has two kids and his boy has autism too. We just bought a house with mountain views and huge potential - we are still unpacking. Our only companion so far, Shadow a rather psychotic rescue tabby is 'adapting' to her new home. Later will come a Husky, fish, and a python. This place is almost as I always imagined a home I would one day live in.

I am new to art, my world was not so long ago sewing machines and fabric. My ex-husband and I had a thriving business which in part destroyed us. He still has it, I left burnt out from the long hours spent making endless shop and class samples. I taught pretty much all the classes and most seminars, and wrote 30 instructional magazine articles while running the shop. I haven't sewn in 4 years and although I keep a basic machine on hand I have no plans to sew again.
I originally started or wanted to learn to draw to make art quilts and met Jane Davenport at a show, and it took a couple more years to haul up my courage away from my fears to tentatively start draw/art journal/painting about 1 year ago - I lost a lot of self confidence in my marriage.

I create mostly at my desk which I will expand as we fix up the place. Under negotiations is the spare room downstairs and the huge shed in the backyard.......I am practising my "but babe" in varying tones of pleading, lol. The shed will be perfect once cleaned out for a combined gaming (he plays war games) and teaching studio. 
I generally even if I take some art supplies with me don't create when I'm away, there is always other things to do.

Watercolours are my favourite - tube, pan or pencil. Being rather OCD the medium takes some of my control issues away. I am exploring other mediums as I can afford them but always fall back to water based. I will add here that despite needing more room for my expanding stash of art supplies, it is far less then I once needed for sewing, and more portable!

I love fantasy, myths and whimsical art, and find elf ears sprout on my girls lately of their own accord. Anything inspires me from other's art, a lyric, a quote, a piece of music, or a quick escape to the local forest or river's edge. I'm a nature baby and there is where I find peace.
I have other projects swimming around my skull and in many ways that forces me to create also.

I create when I can usually when alone, not everyday as I'll confess it still does not come naturally. When blocked I look at what I've done already and know I can do it again ... at least with paper I can just paint over it if I stuff it up!

Anyway that is me. Blessings to you all for an awesome 2015!!! xx

An Easter Queen

When I first got the email saying I had been selected as part of the very talented Crafty Crusaders Guest team, I was ecstatic! Then when I saw the calibre of the artists I seriously wondered if Crafty Crusaders had meant to send that email to someone else… So since receiving my goodies to play with, the Mepxy markers (I’ve never used alcohol markers before!), my creative neurons have been in serious overdrive, learning how to use them and creating something special and with easter just around the corner I went down that rabbit hole and out came a whimsical easter Queen of Hearts.

  Ingredients for this mad party!:
The Mepxy marker colours I used are:
W31 - Bridal Skin, W11 - Nude, W37 - Chocolate, R02 - Light Peach, W04 - Peach Skin (all from the Skin Tone Set) and L95 - Pale Olive, R59 - Cardinal, 00 - Colorless.
Whatever colours you choose, the 00 Colorless is the most important for this project.

I also used a smudgeproof fine black pen to draw the design onto Canson 300gsm Mixed Media/Acrylic paper. Tracing paper. Clear glaze medium and a coral pink ink for the background. Hair dryer or heat gun to quicken the drying time.

  Lets get started... 

Resize and trace off the design with a pencil onto tracing paper, and transfer by rubbing the back of the traced design onto Canson 300gsm Mixed Media/Acrylic paper.  The original image is at the end.

   

 Trace over the burnished pencil lines with a smudgeproof, waterproof fine black pen. Allow to fully dry. Drip, splatter, spray the ink (avoiding the Queen as much as possible), add water to dilute the stain further. You can always add more colour later. Allow to dry. Cover the entire paper with one coat of Clear Glaze Medium. Allow to dry. The purpose of the glaze is the give the paper a slick but somewhat patchy surface which results in a childlike painted effect. Use the selected marker colour and while still wet (do small areas at a time) smudge in a circular motion with the 00 Colorless marker. This marker has a special fluid which disperses the marker ink. The more you smudge the lighter the colour becomes but be careful not to apply so much pressure that the paper is damaged.

  Tip: dip the Colorless marker ‘into’ colour from another marker for a diluted less intensive effect.
   Tip: colour in just part of the area and use the Colorless marker to extend the colour albeit diluted.

Wipe the accumulated colour of the marker on a scrap piece of paper to clean between colour changes to avoid tranferrence.  W31 - used for the skin of the queen

   

Colour blended with the 00 Colorless Marker with light and dark areas forming the highlights and shadows. Make the under eye and line of nose as white as possible. Further darken with W11 for the shadows around the nose and decolletage

.  

 R59 - lips and diluted for the cheeks. Notice the cheek with the heart is lighter; the other one was done first and only the residual colour on the Colorless marker was used to do the heart cheek. 

Yes, R59 is that dark!

   

 W37 - mark in the swirls of the hair and blend the rest with the Colorless marker.

  Redarken the edges if necessary. Again this colour is intensive, so you don’t need much.

   

 Do the back bunny ear in full strength W37, but use the dip method for the rest of him: dip the Colorless marker ‘into’ colour from another marker and dab onto the paper for a diluted less intensive effect. Colour in the back of the robe around the shoulders and inner sleeve.

   

 R00 - for the body of the robe, cape and inner bunny ear. R02 - to darken the cape. L95 - for the shawl and sleeve ends. Use the 00 Colorless to blend and move the colour around.

Remember to ‘clean’ this marker as you change colours!

Both floating hearts were only partially coloured in and then blended with the Colorless marker.  Diluted R59 was used to add warmth to her hair.

   

 A few more black dots, and ink splotches and drips were added as the background was not dark enough and the quote seemed the perfect last bit.

“When I was your age, I always did it for half an hour a day. Why, sometimes I’ve believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”

Lewis Carroll - Alice in wonderland.

Thanks for coming by today.

Aurora 

 

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