How-To: "Resist" Technique

I'm sure you appreciate the irony of teaching a "resist" technique by making a Valentine's Day card.  Now, let's get to it!  

By "resist," I'm talking about covering up a portion of your surface so that what you do over the top of it is "resisted" -- in other words, will be left blank.  Here, the white heart.

I'm starting with 140 lb. weight watercolor paper postcards.  (You can start with anything you like using.  Cardboard.  Newspaper.  Cardstock.  Anything you like using that you know will hold the the paint/ink that you'll be using on top.)  

For the resist material, we're using good old painters tape.  The kind of masking tape that covers, but that pulls up easily and without ripping what's below.

Rip yourself off a strip.

 Then begin covering the paper with it, in the shape that you want to remain clear of the paint/ink we'll be using on top.  Here, I'm building a heart.  (For Valentine's Day.  Get it?)  

And because I'm anti-perfection, I do not care that all my edges are rough.  Because the fun of art to me is seeing how things turn out, instead of trying to wrestle things into submission.  (Which I do enough of in my daily life.  Just ask my husband.)

Next, dip a brush into water and coat the watercolor paper.  (Because I like the runny, fluid way that the watercolor paint will work in this method.  But you could also use acrylic paints.  Or use the watercolor more drily, without getting the paper wet first.  Or, forego paints altogether and use rubber stamps and inks to stamp all over the card.  You get the picture:  there are many, many possibilities.)  

Next, I'm taking a brushful of crimson red.

And I paint it all across the card, over the resist tape.

 I decide to add some purple swirls to the mix.

And then, let it dry all the way.  Which doesn't take that long, really.

And THEN . . . the big reveal!  Pull off the painter's tape and see what it looks like beneath.

I love the way the paint has run into and underneath the seams where the pieces of tape overlapped.  And some folks would be very pleased to leave the project as is, here.

But I'm a dodader-upper.  I like to add more layers and images.  So I get out some stamps and inks.

And go to town.  Until this is my rosy, swirly piece.

And then, because I like words and pictures together (just like in this blog!), I use a waterproof pen to add words and more swirls of dots.  

Of course, there are many, many, many ways we could collage this into even more intricacy.  Nothing has even been glued to this piece yet!  (That is a first for me.) However, because this is a lesson about resistance . . . we will end here.  THANKS FOR PLAYING WITH US!!!

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