Sunday, May 18, 2008

Regarding my beeswax collage (posted below)

I thought I would mention what I used for the base in this piece. (And no, it's wasn't frozen pizza cardboard, amazingly enough -- since I use that so often as a base for my work. I doubt that would've worked well for this kind of collage.) I used a flat piece of styrofoam, which was packing material for something I bought. I think it was a half inch thick, or maybe 3/4 inch thick. I cut it to the size I wanted, and then frosted wallboard joint compound over the top and let that completely dry. I tried to make it as smooth as I could, but it did have some minimal texture to it. That's what I took to our group meeting for this project.

I wasn't totally sure it would work, but I thought, why wouldn't it work?, and took a chance. I think all the other members who made collages that day used either stretched canvas or canvas board. But I know no one else used what I used for a base.

Thankfully, it worked just fine. The technic we used is featured in one of Claudine Hellmuth's books, I think her first book. We used melted beeswax, melted in potpourri pots, and then quilting mini irons (with the long handles) to keep melting the wax when we needed to, after it was painted onto the base and over what we put on our collages. Basically, it was a simple technic, not too difficult, and a great technic. Thank you, Claudine!

I was very happy with how my collage turned out, but as I said before, I got some much needed help from other group members. Had I been left alone to do this, I doubt it would've turned out as well. That's why working in a group can be advantageous, and also lots of fun, and I love my local group.

2 comments:

mary schweitzer said...

This is great! I haven't tried beeswax yet. Beautiful work as usual!
Mary

shauna said...

Hi! Joint compound does work great on styro! That's what you use to make those stryofoam pieces that look like stone, or wrought iron etc. I saw the technique on Carol Duvall years ago and had to try it. After you cut out your design from the foam (it's often called craft foam) you coat it with a rather thin coat of the joint compound like icing Then you build it up thicker and leave or add or smooth out depending on what kind of texture and look you're going for then you paint, stain, etc. to get your faux finish or color you want. If you go to the HGTV site then to Carols archive you could good craft foam and/or joint compound and probably find it so you can see pics. Your blog is very inspiring!
Shauna