When my mother passed away, I took back some of the artwork that I had done for her over the years.
When I was heavy into ATCs around 2009 – 2010, she liked what I was doing with scratchboard.
Scratchbord (a brand of scratchboArd) is India Ink over a white clay surface. You scratch away ink to leave white lines. I discovered Pitt Artist pens, which happen to be filled with India Ink. You could scratch away detail, color with the Pitts and then scratch more detail into the colored areas.
I had a special matboard created for some of these ATCs, and put several together for as a birthday for Mom.
Sorry for the poor photo, but I had trouble getting the shot behind the glass.
Doodlewash prompt: Snow – since all of these ATCs feature snow, I’m using them for the prompt even though I didn’t do them specifically for today.
Love these.
Many thanks, Donald!
Sandra these are beautiful….and the fact that they were in your mother’s home makes them all the more meaningful! What a lovely collection of snowy scenes! And the ones in color are amazing….more like woodcuts. I’ve done a couple of scratchboard scenes…but never knew you could add color! LOVE!!!
Thank you, Judy! It’s the India Ink. It’s thick enough that you can scratch through it and cut cleanly without it chipping or breaking off.
Wow! Those are incredibly beautiful! I can’t believe they are done with scratchboard. I remember buying some pre-printed ones for my son when he was little, but haven’t tried it myself since I was a kid.
Well, there is scratchboard and there is scratchboard, lol. The good ones are done with a high quality clay underneath and india ink to scratch through. The Pitt Artist pens I used are fabulous, but I destroyed them quickly with this process, which is one of the reasons I stopped. It was getting too expensive to keep buying new pens.
So beautiful!!! Thank you for sharing
Thank you, Antonella!
Sandra, these are just gorgeous. I’ve always thought of scratchboard as a kids’ art surface, something I played with when I was in school and an easy technique I taught to many other students over the years. You, however, take this humble art form to a whole new direction and the result is impressive. Your skill at composition and texture shine in these paintings. They are a pleasure to view. Thank you for sharing.
May I offer my condolences on the loss of your mother. I hope your memories of her carry you forward with joy.
Many thanks, Sharon! Scratchboard was the medium many artists used as a practice run for woodcuts back in the day. If you get a good one, usually mounted on board, it is much different than working on the one’s made for kids. Good clay and india ink – both expensive so you don’t see too many people using it any more. I used both good and bad ones for my ATCs. Adding the extra india ink from the Pitt pens made it easier to work with the bad ones.