Extended Gelatin Leaf Print

I made an abstract piece with cities, a scepter, and tentacles. I put ink on a gelatin pad, put foam, string, and paper scraps on top of the ink, and then pressed pieces of paper on it three times. Then I chose one of them to extend. I chose the second one I pressed on the ink pad. I used pencil, and then colored pencil to make an abstract drawing out of it. I chose to make it look like this because that was what I saw in the ink spot, and I chose some of my favorite colors to fill it in.

I wouldn't say I used any techniques, except for maybe shading and blending colors with colored pencils. This is shown on the scepter, the buildings, and some of the tentacles. My project evolved by how I kept building on to the piece: adding more shapes and colors.

The story behind the extended gelatin print is that I saw the big space left by a piece of foam as a wand or a scepter, and the tentacles were supposed to look like magic, but that didn't work out. So now the ink is supposed to be water, and the piece is about using the magic of the ocean to raise the lost city Atlantis. This project relates to my life because---just like raising Atlantis would be super hard and unrealistic, especially the magic part---you have to work hard and think out of the box to get what you want; to make your dreams come true. And I've found that works for me. ;)