Jigsaw Puzzle Piece

I haven't had time to make any ATCs these past few days - too much going on at home and up the allotment - but today I almost finished my piece of jigsaw puzzle.

It is approximately 6 inches by 6 inches - huge for me when I am used to working on little works of art!



So those of you not familiar with Altered Art will probably be puzzled as to why on earth I would would to make a piece of jigsaw puzzle.

The idea is to create a unique puzzle and work of art, but engaging fellow artists whose work you greatly admire, to each alter a piece of puzzle, (Oriental was the theme for this) each using their interpretations - and colour schemes.

This was my first ever altered art and I found it really difficult - I am on a learning curve!

The photos or scanning do not show up how it really looks - which is a shame.

The whole thing is covered in layers of enamel which give it a lovely textured look - and there is a sprinkling of tiny gold glitter - which is really subtle in reality and just catches the light when you move it.

Here are close ups of sections.


A tiny part of a print, which I have painted over to suit my colour scheme - and added a background and foreground to represent the Cherry Blossom celebrations at this time of year. She is sitting on a carpet of red cherry blossom petals.



Textured gold paper, collaged together with a piece of parchment sumo wrestling poster aged, and I have drawn in ink some bamboo stalks - again all enamelled.



A small piece of 'Crane' paper that came from one of my son and daughter in law's wedding envelopes. Again I have painted it to suit my colour scheme.



A collaged wistful Geisha - the shadows on her face are made by the enamel which is shiny and does not look like shadows in real life.



I recently traded ATCs with Momiji (you can see these on my Allotment Lady link under ATCs swapped). Included in the envelope she sent me some little origami hearts she had made, which was so sweet of her - I just had to include one in my jigsaw puzzle. I added the calligraphy. You can just make out that it is raised and shiny where it is covered in the enamel.


Here some tiny pen and ink work I did - again now covered under the enamel.

I want to add some ribbons, but am leaving that until I get all the pieces back - so that I can colour co-ordinate them.

I think, when I do my next piece, I will have a bit more confidence and a bit more of an idea how to do things.

I will let you all see the finished puzzle pieces when they all arrive.

Touchy-Feely - Textues

This is the start of an experiment and it is not finished yet - you can see that the glue isn't dry!

I only got an hour late afternoon in my studio - had a busy day - so this is as far as I got.

I need to tidy up the thick glue and the gold paint, and maybe add a framework - if I can. I might try blanket stitch all around if I have some suitable thread - and if I can get it to go through the card and the thick material!

Face the Music

Time to get back to my 'homework' and try to make another 'Faces' card.

A sad face inspired me to do a Face the Music ATC

I had read that stamping on tissue gives a good effect.

So my first attempt was to glue a miniature music sheet onto an ATC - (I had aged it so it wasn't gleaming black and white. Next I covered it with tissue and stamped the face on it.

It did look nice and I was both proud and relieved that at last I had made one I was happy with.

So much so that I even celebrated with a few liquorice sticks my husband brought to my garden shed/studio for me!

I sat there gloating - then looked carefully. Oh No! After covering the music sheet with tissue, I hadn't noticed that I must have turned it before stamping on the face and the music behind was upsidedown.

You can guess where that one ended up.

Now here is the one I did finally make. The scan does not show that the face is embossed, so is shiny copper in real life.



I looked through a little old book of music scores with words and found a suitable sad one. Cut out the ageing page (sacrilege)and stuck it on. Added a couple of bits of 'antique' scrap paper.

Retrieved a bit of the music score from the bin, added some tissue paper and stamped on the face and then the embossing powder.

Was it worth it? Not sure.

Meconopsis

I had a bit of paper left over that just happened to be the right size to fit an ATC sized piece of card.

So I spent the next hour or so, adding more and more layers of watercolour pencil work - and the above is the result - I quite like this - it is nice and cheery and full of texture.

Dragonfly on Meconopsis

Do you ever spend hours doing something and nothing works out how you wanted it too?

Well I have had a whole afternoon like that - so here are my mistakes and what I have learnt from them!

This one was going to be for a 'Faces' themed swap.

I saw a picture of a meconopsis I liked, and thought it lent itself to a child's face in the centre. I found a vintage face that was perfect. Cut it out and it wasn't quite round. (I wanted it to actally tuck into the poppy centre.) I cut a bit more off - and yes, you know how it is. It never was perfect enough for me so it went into the bin.

A flash of inspiration - I would stamp a face onto some acetate and tuck that in. Well I tried all sorts of colours and all sorts of faces. Finally got The colour combination right - went to stick it in - when I learnt another very important lesson.

Ink pad ink doesn't seem to ever dry on acetate. So that idea was abandoned. I carried on 'playing' and added more colour and details and finished it.

Later I thought it lacked focus so decided to try stamping a dragonfly onto it. Thought that would look good.

Mistake number 2 - You can't stamp an image directly onto something that has any raised surfaces.

You can tell that I am a total novice with stamping - but I so want to learn how to do it

For a theme called 'Faces'

Vintage photo with 'aged' marks, scrapbook paper which I have given 'depth' to by enhancing the green background with shading and shadows and patterns - ditto the flowers.

Flowers Series