Expandit texture in a Wintery landscape by Rebecca Yoxall

Hey lovely people!

Hope you're feeling fine on this last October Friday.

I've been mucking around with a great product called 'Expandit' and have put together a bit of an Autumnal/wintery landscape showing how the Expandit can be used as 3 dimensional element to any of your arty endeavours. Expandit is a paste that bubbles to form a foamy sponge when heat is applied. Have a look and let us know what you think :-)

For the first stage I used Purple, Burnt Sienna and Turquoise Brusho on good quality watercolour paper. Wetting the paper with water then painting smooth washes of Brusho colours in streaks creates a beautiful backdrop.

I tend to sprinkle and amount of Brusho powder onto a palette and add water gradually with a pipette to achieve an inky consistency then apply to the paper with a soft bristle brush. It may be helpful to use a different brush for each colour.

I gave the wash a little time to dry but whilst there was still a slight dampness to the paper I sprinkled some of the burnt sienna in the bottom corners. You can see from the image below that the right hand corner was much wetter and the Brusho crystals have spread further. Either is fine as I then squirted water from a spray bottle to liven up the left Brusho particles.

Using a bamboo dip pen I scratched twigs/stems/seed heads through the sprinkled Brusho

and built it up so that there appears to be a tangle of wintery stems.

To allow a bit of lightness and tonal contrast I sprayed again with a bleach solution. As you can see from the below image I clearly label any bleach materials and use with extreme caution.

Once completely dry I could get to work with the amazing Expandit product. I used a plastic palette knife to apply a liberal amount in a stylised stem shape (cow parsley/hogweed)

The thicker you apply the Expandit the more it will bubble and the more raised up the texture will be. I applied heat with a hot hairdryer, but a heat gun is probably best. (you can also iron on the reverse)

It's quite mesmerising to watch it expanding and growing.

The Expandit can be left in it's original colour or tinted with Brusho and or Brusho acrylic mist spray. I used the Turquoise Shimmer mist spray to further enhance the wintery theme. Then using a white gesso (or white acrylic) I painted extra details for the white leaves and bigger seed heads.

Often the shape of your brush stamped down onto the paper will give a perfectly good leaf shape. And that's it! My Autumn/Winter hedgerow using Brusho and Expandit.

I hope you are enjoying the Colourcraft blog. Please leave us a little comment to tell us what you think.

Bec

:-)