Gelli Art Plates and CS Stencil Shapes

I'm still having fun with my gel printing plate from Gelli Arts, and this time I made a slew of manila tags with some fun, bright acrylic paint colors from Kay's stash.

The steps to create these tags are surprisingly easy and will transfer well to your pages, cards, and art journal projects.


Here's the drill:

1. Add blobs of acrylic paint to the geli plate and blend with a brayer. Don't be like me. Don't use way too much paint. Look at that mess. Ugggh.

2. Press and burnish tags onto the plate to transfer the paint. Use the brayer to blend as needed, and keep going until the paint is gone. Clean your plate and brayer. (And wipe off the drippy paint mess, too, Tricia.) Sit back and watch the paint dry. Switch the laundry loads.

3. Trace large, simple shapes onto the back of your favorite tags and cut with a scissors. You can also run the tag through a die cutting machine to create shapes. Here, I've used the Altered Panel Custom Shapes stencil to add a butterfly and a house shape to this tag.

4. To create a contrasting base for the shapes, paint tags in a solid coordinating color with simple brushstrokes. Allow the paint to dry and match a shape with each tag. You can also create some more neutral geli prints for the tag base.

5. Adhere the shape and draw around the outside edge with a fine-tipped marker. Draw around the image a second time. Crossing over the original line will add to the desired look. Caffeine helps. Finish the tag with a stamped sentiment and top with ribbon.

There is so much more that could be done with additional stamped images and embellishments, but I was quite happy with the simple look and chose to stop there.

Sentiment from the Fire & Ice Greeting UM.

Sentiment from the Tribal Art Nouveau UM.

Sentiment from the Tribal Borders & Backgrounds UM.

So . . . I thought I had this post all wrapped up. But I had more tags, and after sleeping on it, I decided to make this:

I followed the same technique as described earlier, but with Graffiti Black Smooth paper as the base, a white pen for outlining, and the Hopes stencil for the shapes.

Did this look difficult? It's not. See for yourself!

Happy Painting . . .
Tricia