I Am Woman (another funky artdoll)

I am woman, indeed!  It amuses me to view this piece of art I made a few years ago.  I seem to be in the mood to revisit some of my older art that was done before I started my blog, that has never been posted on it, and post it now.  Well, I admit that I haven't been posting nearly as often or consistently this year as I did last year.  In a way, I'm disappointed in myself for that, but in another way, I'm okay with that.  Life happens, it ebbs and flows, that's just the way it works.  I haven't been making a lot of new art lately, but would still like to post on my blog and keep it interesting.  Hence, for now, I'm posting some older art of mine.

Regarding this piece, I think it was one of my first ventures into using found objects in my art.  The frame was found at a yard sale, and was the kind that had no glass over the picture of flowers.  I liked that part, because I knew I could use it for art.  So I used some Paper Perfect by DecoArt painted over the picture.  It's very cool stuff, described as paint that creates the look of handmade paper.  It looks and feels like wet paper pulp in a jar.  I'm not sure if it's still manufactured or for sale, but I bought two jars at Joann's when they were on sale and being discontinued.  I still have them, and they are still good, the pulp is still moist.  That is rather surprising, and I should use them again before they dry up.  Anyway, I painted that over the picture for some interesting texture, then painted over that with acrylic paint.

The head is another painted papercast that I made.  For some reason, the expression looks rather angry and belligerent, which isn't the case with the actual mold.  I'm not sure at all why it came out looking that way, but it did.  Maybe it was the painting that gave it that look.  Or maybe gluing crystals into the eyes.  Then again, the stance, with hands on hips, adds to that impression.  It brings to my mind the anger of so-called "feminists" of the 70's, which was not my intent in this piece, but hey, I guess I'll go with that.  I find that rather comedic, and laugh about it.  This may have been a more conventional, attractive piece if I'd used an attractive face....but it is what it is.

I used rusted found objects (scavenged from my local truck stop parking lot) for the torso, arms, and legs.  And lace for the skirt, beads for the hands, and buttons for the feet.  That's a dangle earring on the front of the body.  Surrounding the woman (or rather artdoll) are pieces of a chain mail necklace and earring set found at a yard sale.  And last but not least is the poodle, Pierre, on the right lower side, a pin found in my vintage jewelry stash.  I used gold glitter glue around the edges of the picture.

I do love artdolls, and the idea of making them, but have made only a few so far.  But this theme is coming up for me lately, so perhaps my muse is trying to tell me something???  I really don't know.  I'm not always that clued in on what my muse is up to, ya know?  I guess only time will tell.  What I do know is that I love using found objects in my art, and that includes jewelry.  I have an interesting stash of old and not so old jewelry I haven't looked through in a while.  Who knows, that could be a start for inspiration.  Inspiration can be anywhere and everywhere, hiding or right out there in plain sight.  Here's to inspiration, any which way you can find it!!!

Funky Artdoll -- Puzzle Art

Oh my goodness, I almost forgot I made this.  I was browsing through my past art, and saw this piece, and decided to post it on my blog.  I made this over three years ago.  A fine lady and artist in our local art group was involved in an Puzzle RR, and her theme was Artdolls.  However, she had a few puzzle pieces left over and asked for volunteers to help her finish her puzzle.  So I jumped in and volunteered, although I'd never worked on a puzzle piece before, nor made an artdoll.  So all of this was new to me, but it presented a challenge I relished.

This is what I came up with.  The background was "grunge paper" we'd made in our art group at one of our meetings.  Totally love that grunge technic, which is in my labels on my blog.  The face on this was a paper cast I had made, and I just painted it and used crystals for the eyes.  The arms and legs were made from felt wrapped around a wooden skewer and zapped with a heat gun to melt it, as far as I can recall.  I'm a bit foggy on that technic.  I used beads from a dismanteled necklace for the hands, and rusted found objects for the torso and feet.

Gee, now that I've revisited this piece, I really like it.  Well, the idea of wild artdolls excites me, but I've only made three.  So maybe I should revisit that idea and theme???  Ahhhh, there are so many themes and choices out there for art -- it gets to be a bit overwhelming, does it not my dear artist friends?  Perhaps accidentally stumbling on this piece of art I made years ago can inspire me now to make another artdoll.  Well, God knows I could sure use some inspiration about now.  Who knows?  Will I act on this, or file it away for a future time?

Anyway, I hope you enjoy this piece.  And if inspires you, or gives you some ideas, so much the better.  Perhaps sometimes visiting old art can be a good thing, a catalyst for renewal and new art.

Addendum:  Some people have asked about the size of this piece.  I don't still have this piece, because I made it for another artist.  So I'll have to guess about the size.  My guess is it's approximately 5-6 inches wide and 5-6 inches tall.  My particular piece to work on was more like a square, but of course not all the puzzle pieces were like that.  So, this was a large puzzle piece puzzle that was used for her Round Robin.  I'm not sure where these large puzzles can be purchased, but they're out there.  And probably also online.  And maybe at some thrift stores and yard sales.  I hope this helps.

Victoria -- Lady of Lace

I don't normally title my art works, but I'm going to try to do that more often. Anyway, I have had "lace on the brain" for a few weeks now, even to the crazy point of dreaming about it. Good grief, can you believe that? Because I can't. The reason I've been so obsessed with lace lately is because in our local (Denver metro) book arts group, we have an upcoming project to make a lace book cover for a fabric book we'll be making in the future. Our talented and fearless leader, Karen Campbell http://karensaltereddreamz.blogspot.com/ ), came up with the idea after she was inspired by a gorgeous lace book cover made by Val Orner. I wish I could give you a link to it, but I don't have one right now, and am trying to find out if she has a blog. If I get a link, I'll post it. Anyway, her lace book cover is beautiful and inspiring, and now our book arts group is going to do that project soon.

So that's why I've had "lace on the brain", and why I went ahead and made this art piece. I wanted to experiment with lace, and get a head start in preparation for our group project. I worked on this for two days, and this is what I created. I'm happy with it, but it was much harder than I anticipated. I mostly had difficulty, and much frustration, figuring out how to arrange the lace on this piece. It just didn't seem like I had that many options, and the ones I tried I wasn't happy with. At least until I came up with this composition, and once I did, I was ready to go with it and felt relieved.

The lace used on this piece is the more dimensional cotton lace. I painted each piece of lace before I glued it down, and I used Liquitex Gel Medium for that, which I had to re-apply a few times to make the pieces glue down. After they were glued down and dry, I sealed the whole piece with Future Floor Finish (FFF), and then sprinkled fine purple, pink, and yellow glitter all over the piece. So, I learned that FFF can be used as an adhesive for glitter. After the FFF dried, I sealed again with FFF, to make sure the glitter would stay put.

The glitter doesn't show up that well in the digital photo, (except as white spots), but up close it looks very cool on this piece. I love the look of glitter, but only on certain art works, when it's appropriate, and works, to use glitter. The other thing about using the fine glitter is that I tend to get it all over everywhere and everything, even when I try to avoid that.

As you can see, I used two lavender buttons on this piece, and tied yellow thread, that I frayed off some yellow fabric, through them. And Victoria.....is a paper cast I made a few years ago, from a brass mold I got on ebay. (Hmmm, I'm wondering where in the world I put that mold?) I also wrapped a pink chenille stem with some neat purple yarn, cut in two pieces, and glued that down. I got that idea from Sherill Kahn, in her fantastic book, Creative Embellishments, published last year. She has other ideas I want to try also, and I highly recommend her book.

I'm glad I got to play with the lace, and experiment with it. I've been haphazardly collecting lace fabric and trims for several years, but I wasn't sure exactly what I had or how much I had until I took an inventory the other night. I didn't have them stored in one place, but many places, and now I have all my lace together. I've used lace in some of my art, but I don't use it often. Now, I'm thinking I should use it more often, in different ways.

And also, I hope I don't continue to dream about lace. That was pretty weird!

As far as the rest of you reading this, do you collect lace fabric and trims, and if so, how do you use it in your art? I'd be interested to know.

Using paper casts in art

This is a spread I did in my first Altered Book, back in the spring of 2004. The main reason I'm posting it now is because I'm entering a blog give-away on GPP Network Street Team, having to do with paper casts in art, and so I need to post this piece on my blog. And also because I haven't been making much new art lately, due to increased work days and hours. I did create a spread in the AB of a friend from my local book arts group this week, but I haven't taken a digital picture of it yet, so I can't post that. And I haven't been posting much on my blog lately, so I figure at least posting something is better than not posting at all.

Thank you, Michelle Ward, for your great tutorial on paper casts on your blog, and for the give-away you are having. You have a great blog! I didn't know about it until recently, when an art friend pointed me to it. I'm so glad she did.

Okay, so now a bit about this particular piece. I was a total "newbie" to altered books and altered art, when I made this. However, I like it -- although my art today is different and not what it was four years ago. And that's a good thing, because hopefully, as artists, we are constantly learning and growing, right?

On this piece, I used a sheet of my handmade paper that I made on the left page. I used purple copy paper and coffee filters for this handmade paper. I made the paper pulp in a blender, and didn't blend it very long, so the white coffee filters would show up in the paper sheet. I used the border of a woven table place mat, and yarn unraveled from a sweater, on that page also, along with a button and some flowers cut from a necklace.

On the right page, the main background is a piece of sheer fabric from a fabric sample book, and of course the painted strips of corrugated cardboard. Those are more buttons at the bottom of the page. The women's faces are the paper casts, painted with metallic purple paint. I lucked out and found the plaster mold for these at a thrift store. I've never seen another mold like it, and I really like these faces.

So that's how I made this piece, a conglomeration of "things" I had on hand. I still have the plaster mold, as well as two others I bought that day, and I'm thinking maybe I should get busy and make some more paper casts. I have lots of different molds, some I've never used. Most are the plastic candy molds, but I also have some flexible molds for polymer clay, and some terra cotta cookie molds. And I have lots of unmounted stamps that would work for paper casting, as shown on the blog mentioned above.

I wouldn't say this piece ranks in the best art I've ever done, I know it doesn't, but I think it's not bad for when I was a total newbie to altered art. And it does speak well to using what I had on hand when I made this piece. And lately, I've been thinking about using paper pulp in my art, or at least experimenting with that. I haven't made handmade paper in years, mostly because I still have piles of it left over from several major marathon paper-making sessions I did years ago. I haven't used my handmade paper much in my art, and I think I need to do that too.

So in closing, if this post encourages any of you to make handmade paper or paper casts, that's great. I hope it does. I know it has caused me to reconsider using them more in my own art. Whether or not that actually happens, I'll let you know.