Field Guide to Nature-Inspired Art

Field Guide to Nature-Inspired Art : Techniques and 12 Projects for Mixed Media

A perfect book for aspiring mixed media artists who want to build technical skills alongside the careful art of observing and celebrating the natural world.

One of the biggest challenges for any maker is learning how to effectively translate a location orexperience into a finished piece. Teacher and award-winning mixed media artist Tara Axford is here to help you do just that—think through the process of using “pocket finds” and observations from your life to create unique compositions that capture a place’s essence.

The book includes:

• A framework for creative observation: extracting color from place; simplifying natural forms into a personal visual vocabulary; creating moodboards; and using photography to notice, collect, and record
• Techniques for creating mixed-media surfaces and compositions, including gel plate printing, hand-carved rubber stamps, watercolor, collage, and expressive mark-making with ink
• 12 hands-on projects that put these skills to work: composing with pocket finds, loosening up with drawing and color, translating nature through hand-carved stamps, and creating mixed-media collage in unexpected forms, from stitched postcards and sculptural paper vessels to a hand-bound artist book

With this book by their side, readers will build their technical skills while learning to represent the familiar with fresh eyes.

 

Size: 8.5in x 11.0in  |  Pages: 160  |  150+ color images