Creative Artiste - butterfly shadow box

Good Morning everyone

Its the first friday of the month so time for a new challenge over at 

Creative Artiste where the theme is anything goes 

MIXED MEDIA

using at least 3 different mediums

Ive made a bijou project this month, a little 4x4" butterfly shadow box.  I had these little wooden boxes which came with little wooden shapes in them that my nieces crafted with but i kept the boxes as thought one day they would be useful.  I found both them and my pack of acetate butterflies at the same time while looking for something else and thought they fitted together perfectly. 

Kind of like the old butterfly collections but thankfully in this case no butterflies have been harmed!

Box size approx 4x4" (10x10cm)

See below for how i decorated the box with photos.  To finish the box i edged the front of all the slots with gold - which sadly the photos don't pick up but really shimmers in the light.

I then added a butterfly to some of the slots, bending them in the middle and adhering with pinflair glue gel.  I went through a large pile of aall&create chat stickers until i found some i felt suitable - these are pre-coloured, i matted onto charcoal card which i edged with the same gold used to gild the box edges.  These i added into place again with glue gel so they stand proud.

We should all RESPECT nature and help it to THRIVE for it brings us SERENTIY & FREEDOM 

You can make out the gold edges a bit better here

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and onto the box

The pack of butterflies are predominately green in colour with flashes of yellow and orange, so for the box i went with a bright green, teal, yellow, orange and splash of pink in random areas.  I did coat the box first in white gesso to stop the wood absorbing too much of the colour. 

Then i toned it down by dry brushing on off whites...here you can see what a difference it makes.  You might say its a waste, but if i just used pastel paints they look completely different, whereas using the brights and then knocking back you still get the true colour coming through rather than a muddy pastel....dry brushing on the white just softens it all into the background so that my butterflies stand out....if Id kept the colour so intense you wouldn't see the focal point.  I used a matt/chalk based white acrylic so you only need a very small amount.

For some interest I added some torn pieces of texted washi tape once the paint was dry

You might want to click on this photo to make it full screen to really see the difference.........Id decided it needed something more and as the sections are too small to get in with stencils or stamps i decided to doodled with paint pens - well i didn't much like that and thought 'what have i done' but as is usually the case with artwork - its a process and never finished until its finished.....i added a very light layer of white over the doodling which helped blend it into the background a little and made a massive difference - photo on the right is after ive lightly dry brushed on the white and its just softens the doodling.

Items Used:

4x4" wood box

Acetate butterflies

Acrylic paints

Plaid Folkart - 515 vintage white, 455 med yellow, 628 orange, 2553 lime,

99257 mystic turquoise

Andy Skinner chalk paint - Ice blue, cool mint

Marabu Crea - Fuschia Pink

Cadence Dora Paint - Rich gold

Posca Paint pens

Aall&create chat sticker

Black card

Hop over to Creative Artiste to join in with all your mixed media creations be the little or large, atc or home decor, anything goes with mixed mediums.

Id Love to enter the following:

https://www.simplyellibelle.com/2026/07/i-spy-with-my-little-eye-something-with.html - things with wings

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https://dd-tripleb.blogspot.com/2026/08/tb-august-2026-challenge.html

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https://tuesdaytaggers.blogspot.com/2026/08/make-it-colourful.html

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https://tolanythingbutacard.blogspot.com/2026/07/the-outlawz-anything-but-card-august.html

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https://thefourseasonschallenge.blogspot.com/2026/08/summer-season-august-2026.html