Media Journal: "Fear" (mixed media on gessoed paper)

This piece is my October entry to Dina Wakley's awesome #showusyourmedia challenge done with #rangerink, and this month we have to cover "Fear". I've put it on Instagram as we have to, but I wanted to be able to show the whole process here. To me, it is a man living in darkness looking out of a window at a world being masked by the encroaching darkness spilling from Fear which floats overhead. The colours and beauty of the world are being destroyed by Fear.

What does fear mean to me? I'm very open about my past bouts of clinical depression - I've had two in my lifetime. One hit during my Ph.D and I spent 1 month on Valium hoping it would pass, and then 18 months on Prozac when it didn't pass. I've since been in remission but I have had a few small relapses - the most recent one being around Christmas of 2016, but thankfully it only lasted a week or so and was caused by a pain drug I was trialing. Depression robs of you of so many things and for me, it robbed me of the ability to relax as I was paralysed with fear 24/7 - not the slight nervousness or worrying about finances that most people (irritatingly) call "anxiety" - I mean full blown unrelenting 24/7 clinical anxiety where your heart is racing all the day long and your adrenaline is at maximal levels and your body is ready to fight-or-flight...except you're just trying to sleep or watch TV. It's hell. It really is. NEVER dismiss someone who talks about depression or anxiety - not until you experience them can you really know what it feels like. I felt during both bouts that I'd become a shadow and that all the colour had been robbed from my life and the world. That was the basis of this work. Fear hangs over the man in the picture's world and spills out darkness. The world inside of his window is already just shadow and the world outside of his window is slowly being destroyed too. He has copper to his left, which is associated with beauty and creativity - things fear rapidly destroys.

If any of my readers think that they or someone they know is suffering with clinical anxiety or clinical depression, speak to a medical professional - don't leave it to chance. If you're unsure, you can self-test online for free, and if you live in the UK you can get free online cognitive behavioural therapy - I used that very website over 10 years ago and believe me - it works. You are not alone - but never try to ignore it. Depression is a fatal illness if not treated - you would not ignore cancer, don't ignore depression.

WHAT I USED:
Ranger Dina Wakley Media Journal [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
(I used a "watercolour paper" page)

Daler and Rowney Simply White Acrylic Gesso [BUY NOW: UK]
(this is not available in the USA so I recommend this instead)

Old credit card for applying gesso

Ranger Dina Wakley Media Acrylic Paints in:
   Lemon [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   Lime [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   Tangerine [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   Sky [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   Night [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Ranger Dina Wakley Media 1" Flat Brush
(this is from the 4-pack of short-handled brushes [BUY NOW: USA, UK])

Dictionary definition of "Fear" 
(mine is from a 1951 Oxford English Dictionary from a second hand book shop)

Paper scraps - mine are from:
   Idea-ology Tim Holtz Correspondance 12" paper stash [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   Idea-ology Tim Holtz Tissue Wrap Melange [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Copper foil tape [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Ranger Dylusions ink sprays in:
   Black Marble [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   After Midnight [BUY NOW: USA, UK]
   London Blue [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Ranger Tim Holtz Distress Matte Collage Medium [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Foam brush for applying Collage Medium

Pipette for dispensing ink

Winsor and Newton ProMarker in:
   030 Black [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Idea-ology Big Chat stickers [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Idea-ology Small Talk stickers [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

Ranger Dylusions White Linen acrylic paint pen
(this is from the 2-pack of paint pens [BUY NOW: USA, UK])

Ranger Dina Wakley Media Scribble Sticks [BUY NOW: USA, UK]

WHAT I DID:
STEP 1: I used an old credit card to apply gesso to the page in the journal and left it to dry for a few hours - this is a great way to get a really thin, even coat that is just enough to paint on.

STEP 2: I wanted the idea of colour being masked by shadow but still very much being there, just hidden, as that's what fear really does to you - it makes you forget the colour of yourself and the world, but the colour is still there. I selected Night (of course) as the shadow, and I wanted Lime, Lemon, Tangerine and Sky as my colours of the world.

STEP 3: I also wanted some collage elements and in my scraps bag, I had some strips of tissue wrap torn from the edges of a recent project and an off-cut of paper from a paper stash that had some orange on it and would match the theme. I cut a dictionary definition of "Fear" too, and I arranged the elements on the page to work out how they should go. I wanted to have the paint under them so that they were a window the viewer is looking out of, seeing fear out there, spreading shadow over the world.

STEP 4: I added paint to the page and made some bold strokes, leaving some paint thick and textural.

STEP 5: I applied Collage Medium to the elements and added them directly into the wet paint - I did not worry about ensuring every edge was stuck down. I added a few little bits of Collage Medium over the paper so that it would act as a resist in later steps, but only in a few spots.

STEP 6: Whilst it dried, I was working on another project and went to look for something I needed and I found a role of adhesive copper tape that I'd forgotten and I decided to use some, so I applied it here to add to that abstract "window" concept. The outermost layer of the rape roll had oxidised a bit which made it even better. Once I'd put it on, I added Black ProMarker down one edge and blurred it with my finger whilst wet, so that the copper hardly showed on the one side - it just needed muting a tad!

STEP 7: With the paint almost dry, I used a pipette to apply 1mL London Blue, 0.5mL After Midnight and 0.5mL Black Marble along the top of the page and in a few other places, in separate spots - the ratios were important as I wanted the lighter blue to mix into the darker colours but still be visible. I held the page vertical and let it fall, catching the ink on a paper towel at the bottom of the page.

STEP 8: One spot of the ink looked like a head, so I used Night paint and some rough brushwork (the brush was wet) to apply some shadow and to turn that head into a person in darkness looking out of the abstract window and seeing fear.

STEP 9: With the Night Scribble Stick slightly damp, I 'edged' the whole page with it. I then used Night and Black very wet to border the dictionary cut-out and to add some spatters.

STEP 10: Using the stickers and a white paint pen, I added a phrase at the bottom of the page: "Fear is when no beauty shines and darkness robs the world of life and colour". DONE!

Journalling tag: faux verdigris/malachite technique

I've done another variation on the splattered plaster technique of Wendy Vecchi's that I've been playing with lately - this time I wanted to achieve a kind of verdigris effect. Verdigris appears on old copper that has been exposed to the elements, and it is usually basic cupric carbonate or tribasic cupric chloride, depending how close to the sea you are, and these give slightly different tones to the blue-green or teal patina. The former is PG39 Copper Carbonate Hydroxide, and the latter is somewhat similar to the mineral Atacamite, which is sometimes used as a pigment. Whilst I don't know the pigment compositions of the products I used to achieve this effect, I'm pretty sure the natural verdigris pigments had any involvement! Since I left the tag I made to dry overnight, I've realised it maybe looks a little more like Malachite, which is also PG39 but in native form, does often have veins of calcite (white) and pyrite or native copper (both gold) inside of it - and that effect is really clear on this project.

The original plaster technique works because the Archival Inks dissolve into the iso-propyl alcohol and the Distress Spray Stain is both water-based and contains an insoluble pigment. When this is mixed with the dye solution in alcohol, the wet pigment sinks and forms clot-like blobs. When you press the tag into it, all of the alcohol soaks into it, along with the water-based matrix of the Spray, leaving the white pigment stuck to the tag last, on top of the dye. I had a brainwave when I was walking home from work that maybe this would work if I used other water-based pigment suspensions - so I thought about India ink. The problem with this, however, is that India ink has a slightly different make-up than Distress Spray Stain. To explain - the latter is a white pigment suspended in a clear resin-containing matrix. Coloured India ink is a shellac-based matrix containing pigment particles and is thus very similar, but in many cases, the matrix contains a dye to give a more even tone when applied to the page and that gave me quite a different - but BETTER result that I expected! 

It's a multistage process with long drying times, so keep that in mind if you want to try this out. I think I need to work on this a bit more to get it more realistic but hey, it's a start! You will probably want to read my original take on Wendy's method first so that you know all the steps involved, as I'm going to abbreviate things a little bit for this iteration of it.

WHAT I USED:

Ranger Dylusions Journalling Tags (Size 10) - these are 10.5 cm by 21.6 cm - or 4 1/8" by 8 1/2" and are the same kind of surface as the Dylusions Journals. [BUY NOW]

Ranger Archival Inks in:
   Chrome Yellow [BUY NOW]
   Sunflower (Wendy Vecchi's line, BUY NOW)
   Bright Tangelo [BUY NOW]
   Monarch Orange [BUY NOW]
(it can be more economical to buy the Archival Mini Ink Pads that come in sets of 4 colours - to get all of the above, you need to buy Set 1 (Vermillion, Monarch Orange, Library Green, Cobalt), Set 3 (Bright Tangelo, Chrome Yellow, Vivid Chartreuse, Manganese Blue) and Wendy Vecchi's Set 1 (Carnation Red, Sunflower, Paradise Teal, Potting Soil). You can buy Sets 1 and 3 together very economically.

Ranger Distress Spray Stain (Tim Holtz's line) in:
   Picket Fence [BUY NOW]
   Tarnished Brass [BUY NOW]

Dr Ph. Martins Bombay India Inks in:
   Grass Green [BUY NOW]
   Aqua [BUY NOW]

Tsukineko StāzOn Re-inker in:
   Copper [BUY NOW]
(this is the little bottle of StāzOn ink that you get when you buy a new inkpad)

Rubbing alcohol - I used 90% iso-propyl alcohol - I think this slower-drying combination is better for techniques like this - you can read more about the different options here.

Palette Knife - I like one with a large blade area.

Ranger Mini Ink Blending Tool - only one foam pad is needed for this project and you can wash it and re-use it. [BUY NOW]

Ranger Non-Stick Craft Sheet or a piece of acetate (e.g. overhead transparency) that you can work on - but the Ranger sheet IS better really. [BUY NOW]

WHAT I DID:
SAFETY: I recommend you work in a well-ventilated area as this project involves rubbing alcohol and the solvent-based StāzOn ink does give some folk a headache!

STEP 1: A word of warning - during these first few steps, you do have to work pretty fast, so that you don't lose too much to the air. The reason I picked these four orange and yellow Archival Inks was to build up a copper-y, warm undertone for the tag - you can't actually see them very much in the finished tag, but where they do poke through, it's warmer than the standard cream tag. I discovered a little tip here - wipe your craft-sheet over with a few drops of rubbing alcohol just before you smoosh the ink pads onto it and they'll release more ink with less effort. Cool huh? So, as usual, I besquished my Archival Inks onto the craft sheet - I used roughly equal parts of Chrome Yellow, Wendy Vecchi's BEAUTIFUL Sunflower, Monarch Orange and Bright Tangelo. I added a about 1mL of rubbing alcohol to teach of them, whilst keeping the four colours separate. I lifted them off of the sheet by stirring each puddle a little using my trusty palette knife, then slightly intermingled them, just before I proceeded to the next step.

STEP 2: I then proceeded as per usual and sprayed Distress Spray Stain in Picket Fence over the pools of Archival Ink and alcohol. I gave 2 squirts which is less than I usual go for, because I didn't want a white-dominant or pastel tag. I then added just a couple of drops of Dr Ph. Martins Bombay India ink - specifically 4 drops of Aqua and 3 drops of Grass Green. At first, this sinks to the bottom of the white/yellow puddles so you need to smash it around with the palette knife to spread the colours around - you can see below how mine looked at this stage. The white areas do feel sticky and a little stiff, that's quite normal, so don't worry!

STEP 3: I then did a face-plant of the tag into the puddles of inks and stains and moved it around a little bit. It gets quite soggy with alcohol, so you need to be careful not to tear it or wrinkle it. After mopping up all of the wet stuff, I added some more rubbing alcohol to the craft sheet and used my palette knife to lift any dried pigments and used the tag to mop those up too - if you have patchy, gap-y results, just put some more of the Archival inks down with rubbing alcohol, add the spray stain and India ink, exactly like in Step 2, and just build up a few more layers - I actually did about 3 layers but the 3rd layer was just Archival and spray stain, no India Ink.

STEP 4: At this stage I was like "wow I'm done - I made a verdigris tag" and I knew it needed a little touching up but I left it to dry for a few hours. The two-tones of green gave it a lot of depth and 'trapped' layers of white pigment under the India ink give the effect of wrinkles or veins which is pretty cool - you can see that in some of these close-ups.

STEP 5: Once the tag was completely dry, I went back and had another look and decided it needed something to make it more copper-y. I had a look through my stash and found my Distress Spray Stain in Tarnished Brass, and I didn't think that had the warmth of copper really, so I also grabbed my StāzOn re-inker. Without remembering to shake the re-inker first, I put out a drop onto my craft sheet and got a puddle of red-brown liquid. I then remembered, shook it and put out some more, which was copper-y as it should be. I used my Ranger Mini Ink Blending Tool to pick up first the red-brown matrix and secondly the copper ink. I edged the tag with the effectively diluted ink, which added a bit of nice sparkle, so I also buffed a little over the white areas too.

STEP 6. I decided it was time to add some more layers, but with a slightly different technique. I smooshed some Bright Tangelo and Monarch Orange inks onto my craft sheet, added rubbing alcohol followed by a few drops of StāzOn re-inker and a few squirts of Distress Spray Stain in Tarnished Brass. I then planted the tag into it.

STEP 7. Finished! Here are some close-ups of the copper veins and details of the tag. This would be a great background for a card-front, maybe with a copper panel held on with rivets or eyelets or copper-coloured brads? Could be really useful in an industrial card or even just as an alternative to any other patterned paper or background. Hope you give this a try and that you enjoy it as much as me!