Exquisite & Delicate - The Journals of Derika Volpi

This coming Saturday, 17 September, I am very excited to be hosting a visual journaling workshop at the Play Café which will be taught by my wonderful friend and artist, Derika Volpi.  She holds a BA (Fine Arts) degree in Information Design, and is passionate about hand lettering, typography, layout, sketching and photography.  Have a look at her instagram profile (@derikavol) and you'll see what I mean!

Derika's visual journals as well as her photography highlights all the wonderful detail that most of us tend to overlook when we see beautiful big landscapes or when we travel to new and unknown places. We are so often overwhelmed and taken by everything that is "bigger and better" that we lose so much of the exceptionally beautiful detail that surrounds us.  This is a theme that keeps emerging in much of her work.

She prefers to work in small and portable formats mostly. As a busy home-schooling mother of 2, many of her journal pages are done in her tiny A6 Moleskine Diary - which is a practice that she has inspired me to follow too.  She believes in a minimalist approach to art materials.  Derika's pages are often a combination of 3 elements only - collage, sketches and hand lettering.




She adores paper and prefers to use old labels, postage stamps, pages from old journals, vintage book papers, even the patterned insides of used envelopes as well as tiny seeds and leaves discovered during nature trips - which she loves taking with her family.

During the workshop, she will be guiding us through the creation of tiny journals made with recycled papers, and also introduce us to her unique style elements as we create our own visual journal pages.

Message me if you'd like to attend - and I'll forward you the details.

Here's a sneek peak into some of her wonderful journals:

Sunset Colours and a High Five

This weekend, I had a very quick, very enjoyable play with colour to prepare this week's diary/journal, based on this week's challenge from
The Documented Life Project, which was to use at least 5 layers - and do a "high five"!
Earlier today I passed by one of my favourite clothing stores and the colours in the window made me stop, stare and memorise the combination - orange, candy pink, aubergine and grey.
While I was playing on the page, we had a heavy rain shower, followed by a perfect rainbow and then a glorious sunset.
The sky turned into luminous hues of lilac, pink, orange and gold as the setting sun peeked out just below the rainclouds.
So I just had to play with these colours!  

First layer - stencilling with pink, green and black blow pens.
 Then I started playing around with these wonderfully textured paper squares on the paper.

Second layer - Relief printing with embossed paper
 & distress ink

Layers 3 & 4 - Collage with various textured paper squares - and then - finger painting with pink and lilac acrylic paint

The remaining paint was scraped onto the left hand diary page with an old credit card

Almost done - my worktable says it all!

Add some orange spray ink, 3 numbers, pencil for contrast,
some blue gel pen lines and we're done!

Whimsical Art for a 7 year old Ballerina

A while back I had to complete a very fun little project.  
I was requested to do 3 whimsical paintings for my niece who got a room makeover around her 7th birthday.  
Her room's new theme was to be French Vintage/Ballet in Lilac and Antique White with bits of ballet pink thrown in.  
She is seriously into horses right now, recently became proud mama of a baby Basset Hound and her favourite wild animal is a giraffe.  
I had to incorporate whimsical faces as well. 
Phew...it was quite a tall order to bring all the elements together, but here they are. 
And most importantly - she was over the moon - which is the best reaction any godmother could've hoped for!

Close to my Heart

Taking pictures of the progress of a journal spread or painting really filters out the emotional attachment that I seem to develop while working on something.  

 I tend to work very light. 

Because I'm a watercolourist at heart, you see.  

My darks can, most of the time, be made even darker.  

The camera lens gives me an objective eye to track my progress and the depth of contrast. 

Thank you digital technology! 

And thank you Jane Davenport and Rachelle Panagarry for your inpsiration.

And here is the final spread. 

Supply list: Acrylic and watercolour paint, brayer, acrylic texture paste, spraypaint, handmade stencils, stamps, coloured pencils, collage on watercolour and mulberry paper.

Windows open.

And windows closed.

Experimenting away..

Just a quick check-in to say that I'm still here experimenting - mostly at night. You will find me in my little studio somewhere between 10pm and 2am amongst puddles of gel medium, blobs of paint, snippets of paper and stacks of journals while listening to audiobooks about travel. I am taking art-infused nocturnal journeys. And to me they are truly epic!

Right now the soundtrack to my nightly antics is Travels with Charley by John Steinbeck. I've been unable to travel on my own as much as I used to since the birth of my sweet little girl. And that is ok for now - for this is a very brief season in my life. She is growing up so fast.

You might wonder where I am going with all this? Truth is, for the first time in my life I don't have any idea what all these trail-and-error artsperiments may lead to. I am living on very little sleep but oh I am having tons of fun and I am learning and absorbing so much in the process.

Here are some of the results..

Wanderings Under the Sea

Still immersed under the surface and filling my little handmade journal entitled "Cirque de Sirene" with merfolk and their companions. All thanks to Teesha Moore's and Jane Davenport's incredible guidance with Mermaid Circus. It is still a work in progress with more illustrations, collage, lettering and writing that need to be added, but here's a sneak peek....

The cover..

..and inside...

Just had to include a miscievous merman ...did you know that mermen actually chase tubes for fun? That is where surfing originated from! But nobody would've believed it if the first human who saw it and then tried it, said that he'd seen mermen do it now, would they? Just a thought...