I CAN Slay the Jabberwocky!

I love the final battle in the Tim Burton Alice in Wonderland movie, where Alice is dodging the Jabberwocky and trying to gather her courage to slay this hideous monster. This does not follow the books, but I still love her six impossible things! I used the Jabberwocky and the champion Alice stamps. I LOVE these images and it is rare to find them in Alice stamp collections, but  Red Eowyn has them!

I created an art journal page using water soluble crayons, collaged text, Sharpies and matte multi-medium. I had planned a lovely yellow spread (for our best butter challenge) with stenciled background textures, but things when in a completely different direction when I began to work; The only bit of yellow is her hair! Sorry about that! I began by tearing up old book pages into little scraps and built the rocky crags by gluing them down with a layer of matte medium both underneath and on top. Then I sketched in the massive chessboard. The color is all added by scribbling it on with water soluble crayons and then, instead of painting with water, you paint with matte medium (see this post for a better example of this technique). This melts the color and lets you move it around but also seals the color so it won't be disturbed by subsequent layers of color.  I added the shading to the rocks, the trees and the sky in the same way.

You can see how Alice's armor glitters with clear Gelly Roll Stardust pen. This is where I ran into trouble when I tried to add all the text and details. I couldn't get anything to write on the matte medium coated surface except Sharpies, and they did not want to write for long. I kept having to scribble on a piece of plain paper to get it going again. So I have my bold printed Sharpie text instead of the fanciful doodles I had planned, and on the trees and rocks as well. You can see the difficulty when started with the small text around Alice and the Jabberwocky; I had to switch to the larger Sharpie to get the ink to stick for the list of impossible things.

The text around the characters is bits from the Jabberwocky poem as the Mad Hatter said it in the movie:

The Jabberwock with eyes of flame.The jaws that bite.The claws that catch.

Beware of the Jabberwock, my son,and the Frumious Bandersnatch. 

He took his Vorpal Sword in hand.The Vorpal blade went snicker-snackHe left it dead, and with its head,He went galumping back."

And the six impossible things that Alice says in the movie:

"Six impossible things. Count them, Alice.There's a potion that can make you shrink.And a cake that can make you grow.Animals can talk.Cats can disappear.There is a place called Wonderland.I can slay the Jabberwocky."

I hope you  enjoy this art journal page although it turned out completely different from my vision, and go visit the Altered Alice to see the Best Butter challenge winner and honorable mentions! Please leave a comment before you go, I love hearing from you.