Hi everyone! It’s Bonnie here with Week 4’s Art Journal Adventure prompt and page. The theme for this week’s prompt is to feature Doors somewhere/somehow on your page. Not only do I love real doors and their architectural value and beauty but I also like what doors symbolize whether it’s mystery, new beginnings and adventures or home. I decided to do a close up version of a wooden door with someone looking through the keyhole and have been looking for an opportunity to use my new Carabelle Studio Starry Eye stamp…Love it!

I have a plethora of patterned paper so instead of creating wood grain paper from scratch for my background, I cut my 7 x 10 inch rectangle from a 12 x 12 sheet with a greenish gray hue. I wanted wooden boards for the door but before I scored two vertical lines, I gave the page a coat of matte medium and let that dry thoroughly. The matte medium allowed me to line the scored board lines with Walnut Brown Pitt Big Brush pen and gave me some open time to soften and spread it to either side of the scored lines to age them. I repeated that a few times until I was happy with the distressing and the depth of colour then added some to the outside edges of the page. White, Cotton Candy, and Chocolate Gelatos were used to intensify and alter the original paper to make it my own 🙂 They were scribbled on in spots and then spread with both a dry and a wet finger as needed.

To create the keyhole plate, two rectangles of black (8.5 x 4 and 7 x 3.5 inches) were cut and detailed corners cut out using a circle template. The keyhole in the center of the smaller layer was created with a traced circle and ruler lines and then cut out. To create texture and a faux metal effect, the top layer was embossed with TH Alterations Diamond Plate embossing folder.

I used fingers to apply 4 colours of metallic wax to the entire top layer of the door plate and also to the edges of both layers. Metallic acrylic paint or Gelatos would also work but I used what I had. I love how it alters the black card stock and how the metallics really emphasize the raised diamond plate pattern. Foam tape was attached to the back of the upper layer and four screw head brads were poked through but the two layers were kept separate for now.

On a scrap of white card stock large enough to cover the keyhole opening, the Carabelle Studios Starry Eye image was stamped with Jet Black Archival ink. The background was coloured with a fleshtone alcohol ink marker and then part of a nose and mouth were drawn so they would show through the keyhole. I took a little artistic license moving them over slightly so they were visible.

Out came my handy dandy coloured pencils which I used to colour her up. She was then adhered behind the opening and the top layer and bottom layer of the door plate were joined with the foam adhesive.

The door plate was adhered to the altered wood grain paper using more foam tape.

I found this awesome quote about doors which I spelled out with a mix of Idea-ology Alpha Tiles and some small wooden letters and adhered beside the door using Aleene’s Super Thick Tacky Glue.

To finish the page off, two keys die cut from gold metallic and text printed papers were offset and glued to the top left corner after the wood grain paper was adhered to the black card stock base. The key served a couple of purposes for me: it brought some of the metallic from the door plate to the background, balanced the composition, and repeated the whole key, keyhole, opening doors theme I had going on.

As far as your Door prompt, it is wide open (pun intended) in terms of where you want to take it. I can’t wait to see where you go with this one. We have such a talented, creative bunch playing along with us on the Art Journal Adventure Facebook Group. If you haven’t already found us, all you need to do is follow the Facebook link in the sidebar. We would love to have you join this incredibly supportive, friendly, and inspiring group of Adventurers!