Oracle in the Crypt

When I was a child, I loved reading  about Greek mythology, and have always had a special liking for the Oracle of Delphi.  The mystery surrounding this priestess of Apollo - well, it intrigues me.... as her boss' purview included music, poetry, prophecy, and healing.... all powerful stuff!

In poking around the web for something inspirational that I could relate to a Halloween journal page involving this oracle, I came across this image of The Oracle from the movie "Percy Jackson and the Sea of Monsters" - something I've not seen, nor will I likely ever see given the poor reviews!  Nonetheless, I found this image (and accompanying You Tube on this animated puppet) fascinating.

I also lucked out by snagging a Tim Holtz  skull die,  and found some awesome inspiration from  both Anna-Karin and Jan Hobbins using this die.  Since I was working in my journal, and did not want a lot of dimension (having already done that for my Tim tag), I decided to go with Jan's technique.

I started out in my larger Dylusions journal by putting a strip of washi tape down the binding between the two pages to protect the rest of the journal from whatever wet media might be applied to these two pages.  Then I gessoed the two pages with a baby wipe, to get a lot of texture.  

Once dry, I added a smidgeon of Distress Micro Glaze, which acts like a resist.  I wanted to preserve some white to serve as a reflection for a hanging lantern I had in mind. 

Then I smooshed the pages around in some Hickory Smoke, Ground Expresso and Black Soot Distress Paint on my craft sheet, having learned my lesson that Distress Stains and Sprays don't really play too well with gesso, at least if you plan on having the color stick around!  I dried, and repeated several times, to get the depth I was looking for.  I prepared two pages, but ending up using only one - but I love the effect on both....

Below you can see the resist from the Micro Glaze..... this is what you see in the upper right corner of the page on the left, above, which is the page I ended up using.

Then I started on my skull..... Jan used foil tape on cardstock as her base, so that is what I did....

and then distressed with the Tonic retractable scratch tool (as Jan did), coated with Wilted Violet Distress paint, wiped off, and repeated with Ground Expresso Distress paint, wiping off just before totally dry.  The beauty of Jan's technique with the foil tape is the shiny surface - it lets you wipe off paint once it is almost dry.....leaving all that yummy distress in the crevasses of the die and scratches from the tool, while still leaving a thin layer of paint on the surface.

Nice and rotten looking, no?  Love all the grunge!!

Now to fill those eye sockets and other cavities with something dark and sinister..... I started by distressing a piece of plain white card with the same colors of distress paints used for the background pages (but no gesso this time).  Then I traced the skull die in pencil, including the sockets, onto the  cardstock and and then cut out the background for my skull.

 I traced the eye sockets and other cavities to provide a guide when applying a thick layer of Glossy Accents...

followed by Black Soot Distress Glitter (as we already know, I dump....)

 And here is the result.  This will provide a perfect cavity into which to put my flame "eyes"!

Now to the hanging lantern....similar to this little baby from last December (before I knew I should make separate posts for each project, lol!

On my Halloween page, I decided to use the other lantern of the hanging lantern die.  I again used foil tape on card and after cutting it, I ran the die cut through an embossing folder.

Then I painted it with Black Soot Distress paint and wiped off most of the paint for a tarnished look. For the background, I  took a piece of old mop up card in pinks and purples. and generously sponged parts of it with Mustard Seed Distress Ink to give it a glow; then I positioned my die cut looking for the best "glow" before cutting the background out to fit inside the die.

I auditioned it .... and it passed! I  pulled up the inner two struts slightly to give a bit of dimension.

I then made the candle to go inside; this little candle die cut is part of two candles in the hanging lantern die. The flame is painted with several warm colors of Viva Decor's Maya Gold paints (which have just a bit of sparkle to them).  I added a smudge of a blue Maya Gold at the base of the flame and applied some texture paste to the candlestick to emulate dripping wax. Once dry, I spritzed the textured candle stick with Antique Linen Distress spray to age it a little.

The two flames for my skull "eyes" were prepared with the same Maya Gold paints used to prepare the candle flame, as described above.

I die cut a bunch of Mini Tattered Floral roses in various shades of red, burgundy, grey and black....rolled them up with the quilling tool per these instructions from Mr. Holtz.

The completed roses were strewn from the jaw of the skull, in gradations of color from blood red through black..... I envision these as prophecies or pronouncements from the skull which issue as living roses in deep red, but which rapidly fade out to black.  Ok, so humor me here!

I also cut a spider and "31" out of black cardstock from this mini magnet die, and heat embossed them with clear embossing powder so they were nice and shiny.  While I was at it, I cut the raven and cat from this mini magnet die set, and also heat embossed them in clear powder.  I did not end up using the cat (alas), but the raven provided the way to hang my lantern.

The spider was embellished with a bit of Viva Decor Pearl Pen in gold, which I also used for the eye for the raven.

And here is the final page, at last!

Thank you so much for stopping by (and hanging in here!)   Please do leave a comment, as I always love hearing from you!  xxx Lynn

I am entering this page into the following challenges:

• Anything But Cute 31 Days of Halloween
• Our Creative Corner Halloween Horror
• A Vintage Journey Art Journaling with Tim
• Mixed Media Monthly word challenge - I am using"Skull"

• Frille & Funkie Something Wicked