Making an orderly mess

I make mess daily - or at least try to. Since March I have been on a mixed media bandwagon, trying to understand the different media. But oftentimes it just feels so daunting and I resort back to my trusty gesso and easy colors.

I was paired with lovely Monika at a recent swap. She sent me a youtube video of how the card I received was made. Just to say - I followed her method step by step with totally different results. Color makes such a difference. And I am on one of my colorless, pale moods again. I get bouts when I need to clean my inner color palette and just make something very pale and monochrome.

This pair of girls - twins by the appearance of it - really intrigued me. There is the sun and there is the moon, you know what I mean? If you just see the moon you think she's pretty, but as soon as the sun appears moon fades.

 I am noble  -    I am bad.

There are lots of layers piled up on a patterned paper. You might recognize some red and blue air mail striping on some of the cards. I added stamped postage circles, they can still be seen faintly behind all that gesso and color.

Your eyes alight with laughter and play -- Your eyes inhabited by disease and death

I was exploring the dichotomy of good and bad and how it is accepted as a certain truth that the character is involuntarily showing itself through facial features. Now then, the pretty girl must be good and the other, not so pretty must be bad.

Victorian came up with this idea of 'facial profiling', reading the character out of a person's face. (I know I have been referring to Victorians a lot recently. They were such a fascinating bunch.)

I remember thinking I should really explore the good-bad dichotomy a bit more and make the second pair opposite: the pretty girl would be bad and the other good. But I really don't know how it happened, it must have been my unconscious working - but now the pairs are the same: sun is good, moon is bad.

entering this set into:
Our Creative Corner: A beautiful mess
Simon Says: Add some shimmer
Steampunk challenge: Anything goes. I say this goes: it's the dark side of Victorian era, not dark in colors as Steampunk usually likes to do it, but dark in thought, and all the more eerie because of the light colors used.