Avant Garde Shoe Art at The Art Republic

It has been busy weeks for me... My shoes prototypes are finally out and I was busy reviewing them and to make some adjustment before my grand finals for The Art of Shoes Design Competition which is happening on 8th January 2014... My designs can be found here and is open for public voting till 6th January 2014...

Finally after weeks, to commemorate the competition I'm currently in, my new project with The Art Republic is this shoe art using Graphic 45 Couture paper collection... Absolutely love this collection... Inspired by Alexander McQueen, I came up with this detachable concept where the album, toe-box and a mini-top hat can be removed as individual pieces... The top-hat itself can be worn as a fashion accessory... Reveal underneather the toe-box shows a glass slipper within... When put together, it is a grand master-piece of shoe art ready to be displayed... Besides, there'd be 4 ATCs which can be traded during class...

The Grand Ensemble...

Remove the toe-box to reveal the glass slipper...

The stand comes as a separate entity to hold the album...

4 ATCs that can be traded in class or in any interest groups...

Pinwheel Altered Pencil Holder Children Workshop at The Art Republic

My very first children workshop with The Art Republic is up. Join me to have this fun session in basic art alteration and create a pinwheel that works like a windmill.

A Thank You Card...

I hardly make cards as it's not something I can add a lot of dimensions to it... When Graphic 45 announced making a Thank You card for the November challenge, I was thinking... Hmm~ Perhaps I should give a try...

It took me a long time that I decided to do a pop-up card without having a clue how to do it... It was seriously a last minute work, I only conduct an internet research on the various pop-up mechanisms the day before the challenge due date... Then I only get started doing it using the Secret Garden collection in the late afternoon and get only partially completed 1n the next morning... I submitted the pop-up interior of the card for the challenge just in time... Phew!!!

Sometimes when you want to do something you've in mind, you kinda visual what you really want and start looking around that can give you the mojo to do it... Especially for pop-up card, it's really all about the mechanism... How you want your object to pop, how it flips etc.. And despite the tight deadline in entering the challenge, I wanted it more complicated to the extend I've kinda overdone it... In the end, I really have to stop researching and stick to one that's do-able within a day... So in the end, this is what I've come out with... The final complete look...

The Front...

Done quite alot of fussy cutting on a card I should say...

This is where the "Thank You" pop-up when open... More fussy cuts here...

The back... It's actually taken from the mirror... The letterings are actually
mirror images which can only be viewed on the mirrow...

Kaiser Craft Tea Break Happy Days Workshop at The Art Republic

My next upcoming class at The Art Republic is these shabby Kaiser Craft Tea Break multi-year perpetual calendar and altered dress form. Inspired from an old-fashion retro rotary telephone which I got to use it when I was young kid.

You will get to learn how to create this calendar and altered a papier mâché dress form to complement this calendar. Learn how to apply and mix colours via mix-media and basic paper decoupage using paper tissue. There'll be lots of intricate artwork and detailing embellishing with fluttering buttferlies, flowers, trinkets, motivational quotes and fussy cut-outs.

Build this well, and you can be sure that this calendar will last you for a very long time.

My Inspirations...

After conducting a few classes at The Art Republic, quite a number of students have asked me where do I get my inspirations from or what inspires me...Hmm... This can be quite a profound question and really depends on what is within your surrounding...

Inspirations can come from anywhere and everywhere, it's just that whether you want to take a moment to get inspired... It can be from a place, an object, a theory, people whom you love or even a total stranger... Everyone gets inspired differently so it can be quite hard to explain where my inspirations really come from... Sometimes it's all about the mojo moment... To get that dose of mojo juice to feed my inspirations, I'd watch a lot of tutorials on YouTube or even visit scrapper's blogs to know what they are creating... Sometimes I'd think how they do that!? It's amazing!!! Well sometimes it's really about the mojo... But be warned, once you get that juice going on in you and get so inspired by it, you'd run to your scrap corner and try to do something, it's always the case when the moment you look at your scraps, you just lost it... The magic spell is gone!!! No worries, I do get that at times...

I'm still exploring, as always... Inspirations come and go, if you lost it today it's ok... It'll either come back to you one day or you get inspired in a different way... Sometimes, it's good to think a little more flexible and differently... The more you try thinking differently, the more mojos you'll get... So when you reached this stage, don't stop and keep the momentum going... The more you do it this way, you'll get to realize your inspirations will start coming in from different aspects... It's about practice and give your thinking a little thought...