ARC November

Welcome to the November meeting of Arc.

This month I started reading The coloured pencil painting bible, by Alyona Nickelsen...and reading is the right word, boy there is so much text in there. Not a whole lot of pictures, at least not in the first half. For anyone wanting a quick solution to an arty problem... this is not the book for you. This book requires dedicated reading to make full use of it. I do intend to work my way through it and do some drawing along the way, but there is no way i could complete that for this month. The text is a bit heavy going, though I know it is all useful stuff.

So I grabbed a book that has been on the shelf for a while, I think i picked it up at a charity shop..

The boy in the dress by David Walliams

I had imagined this book to be very funny, full of witty banter, I guess because the characters that The author plays on tv. However it was a bit of a disappointing read, not a dreadful book by any means, but.. just not.. gripping.. you know?

Having said that, this is clearly a kids book. I would say aimed at no older than about 10yrs. It is about a boy who, as the title suggests, wears a dress. The book deals with family splits, the distance between child and parent, feeling 'different' wanting to be an individual but not wanting others to laugh... and most importantly it deals with friendships, and how no matter what you do, your real friends will always be there for you.

When I say it deals with these issues, it doesn't, not in any great details, but it does touch on them. I think for the intended age range there are enough good moral points and guidelines for how people really should be more accepting of each others differences.

I have no problem in keeping and reading kids books, but this one is neither a great read or a classic, so now that it has been read I shall take it back to the charity shop.


I started my page  with spray inks, followed by white acrylic applied with a textured brayer.

Incidentaly if anyone knows where I can get a Fiskars brayer called 'Streamers' preferably really cheap, then please let me know. it is now discontinued. I have the handles I just need the roller. 

I then added some white gesso to the edges, putting it on roughly to create ridges.

love the texture, I had to tone it down a bit as it started to look like snow, and I didn't want that. 

I then rubbed Treasure gold onto the outer ridges..

once the treasure gold is dry it can be polished..

next I stamped a little row of houses, and coloured those with Fresco paint. 

I also stamped hahahaha all over the background, highlighting some of the letters with gold paint. 

Finally I wanted to add the boy in a dress, but this is as far as I got, I am not happy with it and need to do it again. I will get that done and edit this post to add the final photo in. 

if you are playing along with ARC then link up here..