Life Book 2015 – Week Eight | Visionary Art by Carmen Alicia

The lesson for this week was Treasure Seeking with Mati Rose McDonough And a Bonus Lesson from Tam! . This is the first time I use gold leaf and I was very inspired. Instead of watercolor paper I used a 6×6 wide edge canvas.

She painted the background using different media and drew a boat to represent the journey we are all going through and applied the gold leaf.

My mind did not want to make a boat. I made a small flower-pot with pink orchids using acrylic paints and more gold leaf to the center. I fuzzy cut the leaves from a collection of hand-made Indian papers.

Here is a close up of the bird – I used Tim Holtz Caged Bird die and paper I created using a Gelli plate.

Then I added some butterflies cut out of handmade Indian paper using an older Butterfly and Dragonfly Spellbinders die.

BONUS LESSON

Tamara Laporte gave us a bonus lesson from Life Book 2014 called Tree of Life. According to Tam: ““The Tree of Life” alludes to the interconnection of all life on our planet, and is symbolic of the theme“Celebration of our Connections in Life”.

In Tam’s project, the girl on the swing represents herself surrounded by the “Tree of Life” The branches are embracing her and the swings represents the freedom she embodies with her own expression of life. This project was on watercolor paper.

Unfortunately, I do not picture myself in this picture because I don’t like swings. Whenever I get on a swing I get sick to my stomach. Never the less, I created the girl, which was based on Tam’s project, with a few changes. You can see by the expression on her face that she doesn’t like it at all. I dressed her in western wear. On the dress I used a colorful fabric Washi tape which fit the Western theme just right.

I also used a Unity Stamps that says “Everywhere she looked there was another reason to say thank you.” On the trunk there is a heart representing love and because it is a make believe magical place I added glitter all over the trunk and around her body.

On the back of this watercolor paper I created an alternate “Tree of Life” with a girl on a hammock. I feel this one really represents me sitting under the tree life.

I used a lot of different media on this one and made it truly my own. I felt that the trees represented my parents who gave me my life and so lovingly cared for me. I stamped “Life Is Good” on the right tree trunk and “Believe – and inspire” under the hammock and a trio of butterflies from Unity Stamps as well.