Alcohol Inks

Alcohol Ink art layered with a fluid ink background, subtractive texturing, and alcohol ink marker detail.

Children's Book:  "See inside the sea"

Artist Statement

“Evolution of Alcohol Ink,” has exceeded all my expectations in creating lively scenes with rich hues.  The fluid movement of the ink takes on a direction of its own.  By allowing our minds to fill in the gaps of the naturally occurring organic flow, shapes will form and playful scenes will emerge.  The medium leads me, as I see hidden objects that wait to be captured and revealed.

Digital photography is an essential tool in the creation of my abstracts.  I can control the perspective by bending the paper and experimenting with various angles.  Using programs like Adobe Photoshop and Procreate allow me to further design the piece by altering hue, saturation, brightness, value, and vibrance as well as applying additional filters.  The digital file is my canvas and the settings are my paintbrush.

My grandchildren play a central role as the inspiration of my children’s art.  I choose bright colors and whimsical compositions that make people smile!   My goal is to spark the imagination in a child-like fashion as I create the unexpected.

I love exploring the entire color wheel to achieve color balance and harmony.  I am especially drawn to the calming effects of blues, greens, and teals which I like to contrast with bolder colors for their joyful energy. 

When making art for myself, I look inward and explore themes of my own spirituality.  It is a way to work through my feelings as I form an emotional bond between me and my art.  This often leads to a pairing of my poetry and songs as I fully explore and capture what my soul longs to express. My personal art leans toward abstract realism as it touches on the everyday with a bolder palette and a hint of surrealism. 

To me, creating art is about releasing my inner joy and then extending that emotion to others.  Publishing my work in Art Books and Children's Stories allows me to expand that reach and fulfil my simple mission statement: "To have fun!" 

Influences 

Freya Kotchakorn (Procreate® Digital Art) - https://freya.art/    https://procreate.courses/procreate-masterclass/enroll

Eric Carle (Children's books like The Hungry Caterpillar)  - https://eric-carle.com/ 

Concept

"Evolution of Alcohol Inks" chronicles my journey of discovery into this fluid art medium.   I started by pouring and moving liquid inks in the traditional fashion.  I gained valuable insight and dramatic results by experimenting with digital photography of the inks in motion as well as the physical manipulation of the paper.  

By researching products and testing techniques, I continued to enhance my art pieces through textures.  The addition of alcohol ink markers elevated my work to a new level of creative expression.  I then combined my art digitally, to further my compositions and layout my first, space themed children's book, Space Explorers.

My digital work continued as I used backgrounds from my original alcohol ink pieces to cut out shapes for a reimagined assembly as a Digital Collage.  Using subjects from my previous watercolor and acrylic art paintings, I designed my next children's book, See Inside the Sea. 

Process 

Step 1:  Created digital files of my previous artwork from my paintings of Sea Creatures, Fish, and Shells.  Original artwork was done with watercolor and acrylic.  Used Photoshop®  to to remove backgrounds and make minor adjustments.

Step 2:  Imported my previous art of alcohol inks into Procreate®.  Used tools in Procreate® to digitally cut backgrounds to be used for collage.  Resized, reshaped and otherwise modified all aspects of the cut shapes to fit the look of each design.

Step 3:  Purchased and imported additional brushes for Procreate® specific to simulating effects of alcohol ink.  Used these brushes to visually tie together the collage art with the backgrounds.

Step 4:  Imported Procreate® files into Adobe Illustrator® for final book design.  Exported completed pages as a single Adobe PDF file for uploading to Amazon Kindle Direct Publishing (KDP).  Repeated process for Book Cover design.

ARTIST BIO

Atlanta Marie Carrera is a multimedia artist based in Wilmington, North Carolina, whose work bridges traditional craft and digital innovation. She explores color, texture, and emotion through media ranging from acrylic and watercolor to collage, photography, and alcohol inks. Her practice extends into digital fabrication techniques including laser engraving, woodcutting, and 3D printing, blending tactile artistry with contemporary technology.

A Studio Art major at the University of North Carolina at Wilmington, with minors in Art History, English, and Psychology, Atlanta approaches her art with both technical skill and narrative depth. Since founding Atlanta’s ART in 2012, she has cultivated a multidisciplinary practice informed by her background in design and illustration. She is proficient in Adobe Creative Cloud and holds a Master Class Certification in Procreate.

Atlanta’s solo exhibition “Exploring Alcohol Inks” was featured at the Ann Flack Boseman Gallery, and her work has appeared in multiple group shows at the Cameron Art Museum, the Ann Flack Boseman Gallery, Fort Fisher Aquarium, the CAB Art Gallery, and Bellamy Mansion.

In addition to her studio work, she has written and illustrated art guides on alcohol inks and published several children’s books available on Amazon. Through all her creative endeavors, Atlanta seeks to inspire curiosity, emotion, and connection through the vibrant interplay of art and imagination.

Follow her work at www.AtlantasART.com