Let’s meet and have artsy fun together!! :-) – Call of the Wild Soul – Art Retreat with Tam and Erin

Imagine a space where you can be yourself, connect with like-minded women, bask in the beauty and energy of a mystical place and make glorious art for 3 days ... ... wouldn't that just be wonderful?! :) I know right? Awesomesauce and awesomeballs all mixed into one experience! And guess whatsies? YOU CAN HAVE THIS EXPERIENCE! With me, good old Tam and the beautiful Erin Faith Allen too! :) We are going to be teaching art classes in Glastonbury on a wonderful 3 day retreat, and we hope you will come and play with us! :) For more information and to register now click here: www.callofthewildsoul.com/glastonbury-england/ The Details Rainbows, unicorns and awesome little sparkly things will all be part of it! ;) Where will we be gathering? Glastonbury (UK) ... also known as the Isle of Avalon ... also known as the Heart Chakra of our planet. The energy of Glastonbury is pure alchemy. You arrive, you become enveloped in pure soul magic, you leave a new person with new layers of yourself revealed. That's what this retreat is all about: marinating in hardcore earth magic, and unleashing new facets of you in land which has been a place of pilgrimage for thousands of years. Glastonbury is layered with myths and legends: Glastonbury Tor, Wearyall Hill, the Abbey, the healing waters of the Chalice Well, the Holy Grail and King Arthur, Saint / Archangel Michael, Joseph of Arimathea, Jesus Christ, Mary Magdalene and other saints and luminaries. Wouldn't you just love to crack open your art supplies here, and see what pours out? Join Tamara Laporte and Erin Faith Allen for this epic three days of exploring feminine mythologies within while anchoring into the power of one of the most potent energy vortexes on our beautiful planet. You don't want to miss this! Over three days you will spend one and a half days with each of the two teachers. Your days will be split between time in workshop space, and time exploring the mythical and lore-soaked landscape with your tribe of wild women. Class & Teacher Info As women we often sacrifice ourselves to people and the world around us, at times forgetting ourselves and appreciating who we are. We gloss over what we've contributed to this world, how important we are and what a difference we've made. Really, we are all super heroes in disguise. It's time to take off our costumes and let our super powers be seen. During our time together, we will look at and reconnect with our positive qualities (our super powers). Through dialogue with other women (while exploring the lands of Glastonbury), we will uncover and look at what we've done in life that was life enriching for ourselves or others. We will honour our super powers by incorporating them into our art works represented by using words, colours, shapes and form. Technique-wise we will create a 'paint over collage' piece which is a beautiful method that lends itself well to getting in deeper touch with self. The technique allows for symbolism, spiritual connection and transformation as well as learning more about mixed media layering, collage composition and basic portrait drawing and shading. Tamara (also known as Willowing or Tam) is a mixed media artist, illustrator and art teacher who loves making a mess and has an unhealthy obsession with brayering paint. Her work can be described as "mixed media folk art". It ranges from whimsical children's illustrations to a more stylised fantasy art. Love, mystery, innocence, hope, spirituality, kindness and self-connection inspires her. Her paintings contain healing themes, uplifting messages and inspirational poetry. She believes that the act of creating art can be a catalyst for healing and personal growth. Her classes contain self development as well as learning art techniques. Deeply passionate about helping people get in touch with their creative fire, she would love to help YOU get in touch with the artist in you! www.willowing.org Thousands of years ago, Woman was equal. She was respected and seen in all her strengths as mother, daughter, sister, leader, priestess, goddess, grandmother. She was wild, full, empowered, wise, and free. Then the patriarchy came, and life for women began a long descent into darkness and inequality. Things are beginning to look up ... the Big Wild She is rising again. Through a mixed media collage self-portrait we will unleash our Big Wild She. Through intention and artmaking ritual we will access our layers of forgotten power and vow to intimately know and nurture these vital aspects of our womanhood. We will spend our morning exploring a mythical and ancient site in Glastonbury, and return to the studio to create a mixed media collage self-portrait that reflects our experience in the landscape and the new revelations of the Big Wild She that we, as 21st century women, still are. Erin: An artist and empath, Erin experiences the world on a supernatural level. She makes art to understand herself and the planet she lives on. Feeling the strong and undeniable presence of universal woman-ness, she actively conjures feminine story through words and pictures. Her work conveys the delicate dance between light and shadow, and she believes we must know our depths to know our heights: we must howl in wild stark exposure at the moon in order to know true bliss in the glow of sun. Erin's art has been featured in numerous publications, and hangs on walls around the world. www.erinfaithallen.com Retreat Information The Daisy Centre: The retreat will be hosted at the Daisy Centre in the heart of the village, with a mix of time in the onsite workshops, and out within the environs of Glastonbury. www.daisycentres.com Schedule: Our time together will begin at 5pm on Thursday, July 4th and close at 5pm on Sunday, July 7th. Once you have made payment you will be sent a link to download a PDF with greater detail and information. In the meantime, if you have any questions, or any issues making payment please email Erin at callofthewildsoul {at} gmail {dot} com. For more information and to register now click here: www.callofthewildsoul.com/glastonbury-england   I SO totally hope I'll get to hang out with YOU there! :))))))) Lots of love, big hugs, Tam x

♥♥

Blog hop love - Jane Davenport Signature Stencil Series :)

Hello friends! Wow, lately it's blog hop central over here! I love getting involved in testing out new products, giving out shout outs to awesome artists and shops and share with you how I create my art! :) (If you're a supplier of art supplies and ever want me to demo them for you or be part of a blog hop, do email me! (willowing AT gmail.com).

So without further ado! I was invited to be part of a blog hop to show off the fabulous new stencils produced by www.artistcellar.com. These specific stencils are the 'Artistcellar Signature Series" designed by Jane Davenport! Jane is a good friend of mine, a fabulous artist and also teaches on Life Book this year! Her lessons are SO super popular. :) Her lesson went up only 2 weeks ago. :) (Just a reminder that you can still sign up to Life Book - there is enough time to catch up!) 

Anyhoo, I personally love her art too and was delighted to hear that she had some stencils out. You get 4 of them in a pack and they feature faces and facial features in her style that you can use and play with in your art journal (or in a painting). The cool thing is that even though the designs are clearly and recognisably Jane's, when I started working over the stencils, I found the faces came out 'me' looking. :) So you can still make the faces really your own and not be too worried that the face is 'too someone else's style' if you know what I mean!? :) I did a little video of the process below.

BTW!

Artistcellar are giving a way 1 set of the stencils to one of you!

If you want a chance to win, leave a comment below telling me why you'd love to own a set of Jane stencils! 

(Give away will close on 14th March 2013 - Winner announced on 15th March 2013)

Here are the other artists taking part in the blog hop, do check out what they've done with the stencils! It's fun to see how everyone else is using them! :) 

Sunday 3/3 - Artistcellar (www.artistcellar.com/wp)
Monday 3/4 - Teesha Moore (www.teeshascircus.blogspot.com)
Tuesday 3/5 - Jeanette House (http://www.jeanettehouse.co.uk/blog/)
Wednesday 3/6 - Dawn Sokol (http://www.dblogala.com/)
Thursday 3/7 - Tamara Laporte (www.willowing.org/blog)
Friday 3/8 - Effy Wild (http://effywild.com)
Saturday 3/9 - Kass Hall (http://www.kasshall.com/)
Sunday 3/10 - Mindy Lacefield (http://www.timssally.com/)
Monday 3/11 - Jane Davenport (http://www.janedavenport.com/

And if you have the stencils and you're doing some art with them do leave a link to your blog post in the comments too! I've love to see how you use the stencils! :-)

Essence of Angel - Free Art Tutorial

Essence of Angel "Dance When You're Broken Open"
(Rumi) (Original SOLD) (Prints for Sale Here)  

Hello my creative comrades! I had a total art block for a while and was uhming and ah-ing over what to do. So one morning I was looking through my own flickr account and came across some of my 'paint over collage' paintings and felt inspired to do another painting like it! And I'm so happy that I did because this painting might well be one of my favourite ones of mine ever! I documented the process so you can try it too.
If you want more in depth guidance on how to create art like this; I run a mini workshop called: "Collage, Paint and Soul" which you can sign up to here (clicky clicky) if you want! :) 

But for now here are the progress shots with instructions of how I made 'Essence of Angel'. :) Hope you enjoy and if you create something in response, do link to your blog post in the comments, I'd love to see your work! :)

Step 1. Create a pleasing to you collage. I used a variety of scrapbooking papers/ book pages and magazine papers. Choose a face from a magazine over which you will paint another face later. 

Step 2. Use clear/ transparent gesso and go over your collage. Let dry. Once it's dry, paint over the face and add extra things like hair or crowns or whatever else to make the face your own.

Step 3. Continue building up the layers. Add colour with watersoluble paints/ crayons/ pencils to the background. I also brayered over the background and continued to build layers.

Step 4. Continue building up your layers and add interesting elements to the body element (or other depending on your design). I added a bird, a big hand, a house/ castle and some butterfly wings at the bottom of her body.

Step 5. Once you are happy with the entire piece, add quotes or lyrics that you love to the background. I used Rumi quotes. I also added little doodles like hearts, stars, moons, suns etc. :)

And here is the final painting (again, ha):

Hope you enjoyed seeing the progress shots and remember that if you want to get more in depth guidance on this technique, sign up to my mini course (super affordable) here:

1 Space on Collage, Paint & Soul

(self study group)

£14.99 GBP

Dear Elliot

Dear Elliot,
You probably thought to yourself that you were not going to get a birthday letter, seeing that you are the second child and much of what we did for and with your brother passed you by in the chaos of a 2-child household.

There a pros and cons to being the second child dear Elbie, yes, your life is documented less, you didn't get a grand birthday party for your first year, but we as parents are also a lot more chilled about child-rearing which means you get a lot more freedom to explore and be who you need to be. Relaxed parents, means relaxed and happy baby. :)

And no matter how much less time I have to video your every move, the love I feel for you is the same as I feel for your brother. The love Elliot, it's so big, it's like 3 galaxies x a million rainbows with fairy dust, magic rainbows, baby bunnies, chocolate fountains spewing glitter and daisy petals. Something like that, but than bigger. The love for you and your brother: it can't be contained.

So, let me tell you about you beautiful boy. You are kind of a miracle, I don't say that as most parents do. I mean to say that conceiving you naturally (as we did) was highly unlikely! Your brother came to us through IVF and when we were planning on getting him a sibling, we went to the IVF clinic discussing another embryo transfer and you were apparently already making a little house inside my uterus! The chances of that were so small dear Ellie, so imagine that: you are truly a miracle! :)

Your first year, well now; you. are. a. riot. Not sure why, but for some reason you have wanted to do everything fast, soon, sooner, early on. At the tender age of 3 months old, you were fed up of 'just lying about' and started -with great frustration- to try and roll over. By 4 months you had the rolling over thing down pat. But merely 'rolling over' was boring, so crawling came soon after by 5/6 months you were crawling and at 7 months you were pulling yourself up already. By 9 months you walked. What's going on with you that you are in such a hurry? ;) You even started growing teeth early (well, earlier than your brother, that is)! Your first tooth arrived around 7 months! Oh also: your first actual smile - I swear - lit up the room at like 3/4 weeks old! They all say that those smiles are not 'real' but I'm sure they were social.

You have the most gorgeous smile and twinkle in your eye, you are headstrong, you know what you want and you want it NOW or better yet: yesterday!

Awesomely, your first word with any kind of meaning was 'heeya' from 'Old MacDonald'. Your brother's first word was 'heeya' too and it's now making me think that we either sing that song too often, or you both will pursue a career in farming. You are now able to say the full phrase from the song like so "heeya, heeya hoooo". When you say 'hoooo' you purse your lips into a perfect little 'o' pulling the funniest face. You've also starting 'baby talking'. You'll point at something and then say something to the effect of: 'daddaaa wadindoooow?' With proper intonation and everything. You are so ready to talk and you think you're already actually talking, it's just not our language quite yet. It's magical though, the sounds you make. Like bells.

Dude, I love you so much, but you have got to sort out your sleep behaviour. I thought your brother was an atrocious sleeper in his early days, but you, you are a disaster. You've had nights where you slowly drove me to the edge of insanity by waking up between 12-15 times. Seriously; not funny. You've reduced it down to about 5 to 7 times at the moment which is a great improvement but still considered a legitimate form of torture so please: stop. I don't want to go down the super-nanny road.

The weird thing, my little love, is that, though your sleeping behaviour drives me utterly bonkers, when you've woken up again for the umpteenth time and you latch onto the breast once more and my lips touch your soft little hairs and I look at the blissful little look on your face I am irrevocably sold on you. It's impossible not to love you, no matter how often you wake up.

You have a slightly unhealthy attachment to my electric toothbrush. When it's bath time and we both go into the bath room, you'll see it standing there. You start pointing at it and baby-telling me that you want it and then (baladaaabuddhaa blad da da?), when I give it to you, your little fist grips it like it's the holy grail. You then sit in the bath with it for the entirety of the session (still with iron fist around the toothbrush) and then, when it's time for bed and I take it off you: all crazy hell breaks loose. You are both devastated and inconsolable at having to give up the toothbrush. I've been meaning to talk to you about the perils of life and the terrible things that can befall all of us human beings, but parting with a toothbrush wasn't one of them my sweetheart. ;)

Elliot, you are perceptive beyond your age, have a great sense of humour, a strong will and a beautiful energy about you. You have a big love for your big brother, you call him 'daa-daa' :-) and you too love being with and dancing with your daddy too! I am devoted to you little man, I'm so honoured to be your mama. You make our little family complete.

Art Doodle Love - So Awesome!

Hello groovy art gang! :) 

The awesome Dawn Devries Sokol has a new book out called 'Art Doodle Love'. It's a wonderful book which is created to inspire and encourage you to create! It's filled with colourful pages and inspiring prompts. You can make art and doodle on all the pages. I'm completely in love with the book and Gracie (my fabulous assistant) saw it too and has already ordered two, one for herself and the other for her 11 year old daughter.

It's a really great book for delving deeper into yourself and connect with yourself through the prompts and the art making. I highly recommend this book! :) Watch me play in it, I am drawing bunnies lately: 

Want to see what other fabulous artists are doing with the book, take a look at this blog-hop list:    Feb. 2: Pam Carriker, http://www.pamcarriker.com/blog/
Feb. 3: Samantha Kira Harding, http://www.journalgirl.com
Feb. 4: Aimee Dolich, http://artsyville.blogspot.com
Feb. 5: Jane Davenport, http://www.janedavenport.com
Feb. 6: Carla Sonheim, www.carlasonheim.wordpress.com
Feb. 7: Tracie Lyn Huskamp, http://www.thereddoor-studio.blogspot.com
Feb. 8: Tammy Garcia, http://www.daisyyellowart.com
Feb. 9: Carissa Paige, http://www.carissapaige.blogspot.com
Feb. 10: Mindy Lacefield, http://www.timssally.com
Feb. 11: Dina Wakley, http://dinastamps.typepad.com/
Feb. 12: Tamara LaPorte, http://www.willowing.org/blog/
Feb. 13: Jill K. Berry, http://jillberrydesign.com/blog/  
  PS. Dawn will also be teaching on Life Book this year! Did you know you can still join? It's not too late! Come join us and learn from an amazing group of talented teachers!