Hi everyone! It’s Bonnie here today with the Week 10 Prompt for The Art Journal Adventure. I was lucky enough to be gifted this week with some fabulous ephemera from a dear friend and one of the old photos in the collection sparked this week’s theme which is Travel. I imagined this wonderful woman in the photo as someone who did the unexpected and travelled the world by herself in a time when perhaps that was not as common as it is today.

I have a great deal of designer paper, in spite of having donated a huge box recently, so I have been incorporating it piece by piece into my mixed media projects rather than just collecting and petting it 🙂 This page started with a vintage style paper with a world map printed on it. I cut the page to 7.5 x 10 inches and began to play.

I wanted to knock back the design and begin making it more my own so I started by dry brushing gesso in places. In other places, I smeared the gesso onto the background with my finger and used the end of a small brush to scribble words that suited my theme: things like adventure, go, roam, and travel. I wasn’t looking for legibility, just texture and marks. I knew most would be covered eventually.

Once the gesso was dry, I added more visual texture and pushed the map into the background with stamping using Coffee Archival Ink, Carabelle Studio Quadrillages, and Joggles Circles Background Noise Rubber Stamps.I didn’t use blocks, just inked and rolled the patterns on.

Next, I grabbed one of the new Itty Bitty ATC Stencils, Mod Squad, to add some subtle stencilling. I scribbled Peeled Paint and Vintage Photo Distress Crayons on my craft sheet, spritzed with a little water, and used a mini ink blending tool to apply the colours through the stencil. The Vintage Photo showed up better than the Peeled Paint but I like that tone on tone effect and how it changes the background quietly.

I auditioned several pieces of ephemera as well as some new printed elements which fit the theme until I was pleased with the basic composition. Then I set about aging the newer pieces with Coffee Ink and distressed edges. The post card is actually a stamp applied to beige designer paper. I just love that photo!

Things were adhered with Scor Tape or Aleene’s Super Thick Tacky Glue and then some Idea-ology Remnant Rubs were added. I love little details and tiny pops of black!

The sentiment was printed onto white card stock, cut into segments, and the edges inked with Coffee Archival Ink. Black matting was added to each fragment before they were popped up on foam squares. The word “travel” was also a Remnant Rub which I wanted to adhere to some book paper. I imagined this woman reading quietly on long train rides by herself. I applied gesso over the scrap of book text, let it dry, and then transferred the rub-on to the gessoed paper.

At this point, I took my page to my sewing machine and added some messy brown stitching in a few places. Three die cut black arrows were added to create a loose circle shape and add movement. She is travelling around the world, after all.

A scrap of burlap was tucked behind the word Travel and some lace lightly grunged up with Coffee Archival Ink was added in three spots. A few very old buttons from my grandmother’s button box were also adhered on both sides of the page. A doodled black border was added to the edges to tie things together.

And that’s it! Travel page finished. I love the story this page tells right down to those three men in the upper right corner who I imagine are relatives who tried to talk her out of going because it just wasn’t done! LOL  I can’t wait to see in the AJA Facebook group where this Travel prompt takes you in your Art Journal Adventure! It’s a wide open theme which can be interpreted in so many fabulous ways. Have fun 🙂