"Leonardo's Queen of Hearts" (12 tags of 2013 - february)

Well, we all know whose Queen of Hearts "La Gioconda" - the Mona Lisa - was... I thought, I'd take a slightly different approach on the February tag of the 12 tags of 2013 over at Tim Holtz's awesome blog.

The Mona Lisa stamp is one of my favourites among the beautiful Tim Holtz stamps (and was on my very first stamp sheet I bought!!!). I followed Tim's instructions as closely as I could, but I had to improvise a little on the pendant that shows some words Leonardo could have written, if he had been the one to do a tag like this...

I made the pendant using one of the idea-ology "Fragments" and embossed the edge with silver embossing enamel. I also stamped some scratches onto the surface of the pendant, to give it a worn and old look.



The Letters for "XOXO" and "14" are cut from black card using the Sizzix Alphabetical and Tipeset dies.

The background was stamped with architectural and art images from the "Classics #7" plate and Mona Lisa's crown comes from the "Shabby French" stamp plate. I used the Bingo Embossing folder, as I do not own the kraft core seasonal impressions...

Doing a painting like "La Gioconda" changed art history a lot - artists discovered nature and man in the midst of it as something very beautiful and important - this meant the end to medieval times! "Bingo" is maybe a little too modern, but if Leonardo had known the game and the meaning of this word, he maybe would have shouted "Bingo!", when he finished his painting of Mona Lisa... ;)

I had a lot of fun playing with the Distress inks, "bathing" the die cut tag in them, spritzing and colouring and I really love the intense feel the red creates! The combination of the various textures is awesome (it always is when it comes to Tim's tags, isn't it?)

I hope you liked what you saw!
Thanks for your visit!

Hugs,
die amelie xx