Multimedia workshop with Benjamin - DAY4

The topic for day 4 was stencils. And let me start out by presenting the winner (at least in my opinion) - Agnieszka. Her finished work was so dainty - and look how beautiful when framed. Well done Agnieska !!!

We were introduced to several ways to do stenciling. The first - geometric stencils. Benjamin did a demo where he started out working on a cheap canvas board. He covered the front (that is the canvas side) with masking tape. He uses the blue type which is for painters. As you can see at the top - he has drawn his design on to the tape and then he has cut out a geometric pattern.

Benjamin decided on yellow and red with orange as the colour between. On a palette he first mixed his red paint - adding a good amount of acrylic gloss and a small amount of retarder (a retarder is a substance used to slow the drying time). With a sponge roller he put the colour on a little more than a third of the pattern.(Not exactly a third - because it needs to extend in to the next colour).  

He then did the same with the yellow - starting from the opposite side. Finally he added orange in to the middle layer so thata it blended both with the yellow and the red.

Then this was left to dry. When dry - the blue masking tape was peeled off revealing the painted pattern.

On the web site: pinterest there are many example of art made with masking tape. Just take a look: PINTEREST

The second method for stenciling was to look through old magazines to find an interesting photo or picture. Benjamin had found a little superman figure in a magazine. He tore at the page and reinforced the back of the figure with blue masking tape. He the proceeded to cut out the little superman figure - very precisely. He then had a cutout figure to use in some other project and a superman stencil. He took the stencil page and attatched it to the background with masking tape (the same backgrounds that were made in the DAY 3 workshop). Final step was to use acrylic spray paint.

Below is the result after removing the stencil.

The final method that was discussed today was using a freehand drawing. Benjamin discussed several ways to design the subject. Here is the stencil he made showing a glass of water. ALl the colour is because he has used the stencil many times. To produce this he made a drawing with to two nuances - black for shade and white for light. He then cut out the dark bits - because those would be filled with colour.

And the result

So now it was up to the group to try. Once lesson quickly learnt - its never as easy as it looks when the teacher is doing it. First out a freehand drawing of a bottle made in to a stencil (this is the stencil after use)

And the result when put on to paper

Here is an ancient egyption that has beeen cut out of a magazine (and then glued on to the paper on the right)

And another masterpiece by Agnieska on last weeks backgrounds

These have been produced on last weeks backgrounds using a stencil made from a freehand drawing.

And finally Agnieskas work

and here is the stencil she made using palette paper

The group has now learned a lot of techniques to make backgrounds and to compose artwork - so now its up to the participants to use their creativity to put it all together.