Art Class with Dina Wakley
This past weekend I had the privilege of taking an art class at my near by scrapbook store in Lake Worth, Florida called Everything Scrapbook and Stamps. This was not an ordinary art class, this was a mixed media art class taught by the wonderful Dina Wakley. This class was titled "Creature Feature" because we were incorporating animals into our work. I attended this class with about 15-20 other talented women from the surrounding neighborhood. I had an absolute fantastic time at this class. Not only did I learn new techniques by Dina herself demoing them, but it also allowed us to instantly try them for ourselves. Dina has a great sense of humor and throughout the class she would tell funny stories of her family or interesting tales of how she learned from experimenting. The facility was offering three different classes over the course of the weekend. I was fortunate enough to as least attend one.
The class allowed us the use of all of Dina Wakley's paint and medium line available by Ranger. That was the amazing part. Her entire line of colors were at our disposal and all her mediums to play with. We even got to play with Neocolor water soluble crayons and Stabilo "All" Pencils for our pages. I have played in the past with both of these mediums, but never in the use and style has Dina showed us. So I was appreciative of learning new ways to use art supplies I already am familiar with. The Dina Wakley line also includes beautiful stencils, masks and stamps which were all there including all her new releases due to release at the end of the month. You can see it used on the tag on the page on the left, its called Birds in Flight. It comes with like 4-5 different flying birds. I definitely pre-ordered all the stencils and one of her new stamp sets. I was able to play with her Gel Medium for most of my work as well and did purchase a pot of that has well. It really works different compared to others and applies tissue paper an book paper very flat without any wrinkles. That was a huge plus for me.
She was gracious enough to sign my "Courage" cover that I had purchased months and months. I loved her message, "art forever, housework never". But, I also purchased her Scribble Birds Stamp set from the store that day and asked for another autograph on my stamp set. I couldn't help myself, I left so inspired and have been practicing everything I have learned. Working with heavy body acrylic paints is rather new for me. I usually would work with my fluid ones to cover my surface, but in the world of mixed media, this is not desirable. In mixed media you want the ability to add layers of dimension to your work, you want elements that peek through and others that do not. Mixed media entails working with different forms of media or art supplies to experiment and see how they perform wet or dry or together. Its a world I have found to simply play around and have fun. There are no rules and no expectations. Your work becomes pure serendipity.
I will definitely want to take classes again with her in the future. She is actually coming to Florida again with Dyan Reaveley, another artist from Ranger and the creator of the Dylusions line. Overall, an amazing experience that I will remember forever. Can't wait to continue playing in my art journal.
Evi
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