COLLABORATIVE WORK WITH JOANNA GRANT

A while back, Joanna Grant of Joanna Banana Design Originals, got the wonderful idea to do something with those half-finished pieces of art hanging around her studio  The idea was to mail her half-finished pieces to her artsy friends (first obtaining their permission) and invite them to finish the pieces and then mail them back to her.  In exchange, she also invited them to mail a half-finished piece of their art for her to finish and mail back.

Doesn't this sound interesting?  Are you excited yet?  I bet that you have some half-finished pieces of art that you wished someone would finish for you too. Think of the surprise and excitement when you open that package and find your original art work completed in a way that you never would have imagined.  This was great fun and I would do it again in a heartbeat and encourage you to contact some of your artsy friends and start swapping art work.

First up:  The beautiful half-finished art work that Joanna sent to me.  

Joanna relayed that she started with a substrate of salvaged matte board and then covered it in recycled wallpaper for the background.  In case you are not familiar with Joanna's work, I would call her the "recycle queen" because she uses a lot of recycled materials and at times she even recycles her own art work.  Next, she added a laser print copy of the vintage girl, added several layers of paint and swirly die cut pieces made from her Silhouette machine….added a few pieces of book text and the leaf.  That's as far as she got before she mailed it to me to finish.

Next up, the finished piece:

I have to admit that putting that first pen stroke to someone else's art work was at first a little intimidating but once I "got on a roll" it quickly went away.

To finish the piece I basically used acrylic paint pens to add dots and circles to lighten or deepen colors.  I eliminated the "Princess Leia" buns with paint and the addition of a flower and butterfly.  Lastly, I added the "dream" sign.  A little color added here and there and drum roll, please….finished!

The half-finished piece that I sent to Joanna.

This is my half-finished piece that I sent to Joanna.  It consists of a gelli print background glued to a matte board substrate.  Various pieces of gelli prints and hand painted papers were added along with the two faces and hand cut from magazines.  Pretty simple, huh?

Now, get ready…this is what she sent back:  

PRETTY AMAZING!  RIGHT?  I am blown away by this piece and keep looking at it, studying to learn how she made it.  I know that Joanna makes a lot of painted embellishments herself and stockpiles them for future projects.  Embellishments like the painted circles and flowers.  (This is something that I think I will implement into my art process.)  You can't see from the picture but she added glittery tape, rhinestones, foil and 3-D flowers.  She even finished the back of the piece which looks like a collage of colored tissue paper and paints?  Joanna's work is always superbly done and finished to perfection so I guess that the finished back shouldn't surprise me.  lol!  UPDATE:  Joanna now has a description of her process on her blog.  Hop on over and take a look!!

Thanks, Joanna for a fun project.  I loooove it!!!!

Interested in seeing more of Joanna's lovely work?
Visit her blog: http://joannabananadesignoriginals.blogspot.com

Until next time!

Hugs,
Ginny