Faux Embossed Mixed Media Canvas

You might this that embossing and easy wall art don't belong in the same sentence, but this project is about to prove you wrong. Create a Faux Embossed Mixed Media Canvas using a vintage glue technique. Give your design as a gift or hang it in your home.

Materials:

Aleene’s Original Tacky Glue
Aleene’s Decoupage – matte
Paint brush
Stretched art canvas
Book pages (romance novels work well)
Acrylic paint – black, plus colors of your choice to suit your design
Pattern of your choice
Scotch tape
Toothpick
Handpainted or fancy printed tissue papers

Instructions:

Cut or tear book pages into approximate 2″ x 3″ strips.
Brush Aleene’s Decoupage onto canvas, working small section at a time.
Brush back of torn page with Decoupage, lay onto canvas and brush over top with Decoupage. Repeat to cover entire frame (front and sides). Note: you can keep all your pages going in same direction or overlap askew. Let dry completely.
Draw your pattern onto canvas.
Apply tape to Tacky glue bottle to create small tape nozzle.
Keeping tip of nozzle able 1/4″ above canvas, draw a thin line of glue over pattern lines. If your lines flow together where you don’t want, let glue set up for a few minutes to slightly thicken and use the blunt end of a toothpick to pick up some of the glue to help to clean up any areas of unwanted glue. Let dry until completely clear.
Before you start painting the background, check to see if there are any words that you want to show through on the canvas. If you don’t see any words that you want to peek through the painted areas, you can always decoupage them onto the background before painting.
Paint entire canvas black (leaving desired words exposed). Let dry.
Brush over the design areas of the canvas with desired colors to suit your pattern. On this canvas, Heidi used a layered dry brush technique to keep adding and adding layers of colors. Let dry.|
Tear pieces of tissue paper into strips. Glue along outside edges with Decoupage leaving some pieces hanging over and extending beyond the canvas.
If desired, glue embellishments in place to accent pattern design.