The Stars Wish Upon Me

Working on my newest mixed media collage; The Stars Wish Upon Me; I thought about the importance of wishful thinking. 

I started first physically with this piece; 

My first initial inspiration was to search for clippings that held texture. The first image were the red lines in the background; I picked up scraps from previous projects. I thought that I wanted to create a new image completely out of cut out scraps that I had in a pile by my bed. (I'm a messy possibly lazy artist and you can find me working on my bed or near my bed lol) 

The reason I worked with texture is because I knew I was going to edit in photoshop and focusing on texture creates new and interesting lines when I edit. 

other scraps I found were clippings of trees, bees and birds. BTW NATURE IS PERFECT FOR TEXTURE FINDINGS. 

I like to work intuitively when I make collage; I allow myself to simply pick what invokes a "yes" within me even if it does not make sense yet. Even if it does not work out in the end; simply creating is a great use of my energy. 

The stars came next; I wanted to cut out the pointed ends from my vintage magazines. This lead me to an image of a hawk; and a sweet girl looking at a bride. 

STARS ARE MAGIC; we wish upon them all the time. Wishing to be more successful, prettier, or happier. But I like to believe that the moon and the stars wish for me; that I too am significant in this celestial space. Instead of wishing for something external of me; the sky wishes that I continue to be. 

I try to practice gratitude and appreciation whenever I can; even make it a point. Because honestly, how amazing is it to be able to live in this world. Even with all the pain; There is beauty in everything. 

BACK TO ART; the kissing of the stars on the left felt fitting because who doesn't want to??  lol I then started to rip some pattern stickers into small pieces to create a mosaic of falling sky. 

Also, I don't scan in my work on photoshop, I like to take a picture of my physical collage and then upload that picture onto the program. This is because, I personally don't like the way my printer scans in images; they always seem dark and not clear enough for my liking. 

Now in photoshop; I started by replacing/ copying parts of the collage to make the image have a more consistent layout. That means I covered the images on the bottom right such as the bees and the butterfly. I also covered the kissing face on the left to create a better composition. Because HONESTLY; I have a habit of overdoing collage and adding too many images. 

Once I fixed the composition, I began to mess with colors and even inverted them which created this vibrant blue and yellow. I made sure to add contrast in order for the people to stand out in the mosaic of stickers. 

Now for the last part, the text. I began to search up images (stock & free of course) of different letters. I know I wanted to continue to have texture so I first started with ballon letters & foam letters. But then, i stumbled upon beaded letters and had that (yes!) feeling so I started to work that into the collage. 

somehow; it all came together. 

(Peep the man hanging from the stars) 

How wonderful would it be to catch one? 

Im happy with how it came together and I love combining both physical and digital because digital really works as proofreading. lol 

I now have this piece available as a print and a sticker here on my website!! 

I hope this post was insightful in a way or two, I wanted to be open about my process and how it manifests in the end. Please let me know what else you would like to know! Should I go even more in depth?