My Bathing Beauties Chunky Book arrived this week--all ready in their suits for summer fun! I am not sure who did the cover art. It was hosted by Donna Cartagena, so I am guessing this is her page. Last year I hosted an artist trading card swap with the theme "At the Seaside", and Gillian Allen was kind enough to post the pictures of the cards on her Art-e-Zine website (where you can find oodles of gorgeous art and loads of inspiration!
Here is my page. I don't know where I got my image of the ladies in bathing suits, but I had been wanting to use it for something, and this was the perfect project. The background is from a vintage reproduction postcard of Nice. I also had some scrapbooking paper that reminded me of wet sand. This was a fun book to work on.
I hope that the other artists won't mind if I share a few of the pages here. All the art is really great--as always! This page is by Dana Gibbons. You may not be able to tell, but there is a piece of raffia (is that what the stuff is called?), with a little seashell attached to it. Yet another row of bathing girls! The background has an ad for clothspins!
Tina Shoaga created this page. I have several of Tina's ATCs and I think her art is great! I love the colors in the background on this one. I wonder if she bought paper like that or used watercolors to create washes--anyway, it is a nice contrast to the bathing suits! The woman in blue even has a set of pink beads on. Not the most practical suit for swimming, but she certainly looked fashionable!
Another Bathing Queen. This page is by Evaly Jerome. She attached ribbons and tiny seashell buttons to the bottom of her pages. I like all the starfish touches she added--down to the starfish earrings. All the pages in these books also have art on the verso side. This is mainly where the artist has their name and email address, but it is also decorated in some way. So really you get double the art.
Okay, one more and then I better stop. If I can find some time, I should put more of the art in an album. This page is by Rita Bellanca, another artist I have traded with before. And she does wonderful work! I love the blue on this page. It might be rubber stamp inks, I'm not sure. There is also some gold in there as well. I have seen other artists use the inks to create reall cool washes, which I have never been able to do myself! I hope you enjoyed a little sampling of pages!