I realised with a start yesterday that the deadline for iHanna’s DIY Postcard Swap has crept up on me while I was tied up doing other things! So I got my ass into gear and made 8 postcards…actually I made 11, but as the quality of subsequent ones got better, I found myself throwing the very blah earlier ones away.
Which is not to say that I consider these 8 to be the pinnacle of my creative abilities…I was tempted to discard a few more from this group. But let’s be practical and realistic: I have two free days left. I’m running out of time. I also need to make some journals for the craft fair this weekend, as a matter of urgency. So these will have to do…and I hope I can make another two postcards this morning, so I can get cracking on the bookbinding.
“Please upgrade your output levels to Panic Mode…and thank you for flying with Seat-Of-Your-Pants airlines.”)
It quickly became clear , as I put these collages together, that I deeply dislike using commercially printed papers. Although I have my own small stash of scrapbook papers and other decorative elements from the scrapbooking craze of several years ago, when it came to putting collages together, I almost always tossed the pre-made decorative stuff in preference for papers and media that I had made, myself. I still used some patterned papers or magazine pages for some cards, but I tried to keep them minimal.
This lady with a cactus, for example, uses commercial papers for the cactus pot, and the floral background. The paper clay face was made in a Sculpey doll mold. Everything else was painted, printed, drawn or stitched by hand.
This one doesn’t look like much, but I’m very proud that everything used for this collage is my own work: painted textures and fragments of old lino prints that I did during a printmaking course many years ago. Totally organic.
A cartoonish painting of a cat that was in an old sketchbook…I love finding uses for odds and ends like these.
An unsuccessful little painting on canvas got cut up and I drew the bottle around it, and stuck it down to commercial scrapbook paper and a scrap of Thai ‘money’ for the dead.
The other half of that underworld bill, on a page from one of my favorite drawing magazines, Le Gun, and another unsuccessful painting of…toothpaste? Go figure.
A second paper clay character…I’ve nicknamed her Little Zen Riding Hood. A stencilled background, some linoprinting, a coloured photocopy of some cross-stitching I did on paper, and the red cloak is cut from Unsuccessful Painting #3 (I did a whole series of these lumpish duds).
In emulation of a line from one of Joanna Newsom’s songs (Bluebeard) I wrote “What a woman does is walk paths of the unconscious…it is not a question of straying or not straying.” Deep, huh? LOL
these are wonderful. so much interest going on here.
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Thanks! Just playing with old works, nice unpressured way to make things…
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I love your super creative cards!
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Thank you! I found it a great way to loosen up with a bit of basic collage, which I was never very good at. 🙂
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My favourites are the one with the lighthouse, the one with the cat (the cat is awesome) and the lady with cactus. The people getting any of your postcards will be super lucky! 🙂
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Thank you! I hope to get some good ones, too! Everyone’s style is so different, I love how other people approach the same project and make stuff that would never have occurred to me to do.
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These are gems!
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Thanks! Any handmade postcard in your mailbox would feel precious, I think. 🙂
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Your paper clay faces are amazing! Truly works of art.
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Hey, Dinny, Thanks! But they are just faces pressed into a commercial Sculpey mold, so I really can’t take any credit for these. All I did was paint them a cream colour, and then tiny dots (blended in) of magenta for the cheeks, nose, chin and eyelids. Also, some drawing pen details on the eyelashes. Easy-peasy.
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I’m now hoping to get one of these in the swap. They are great!
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Awesome postcards, all of them! I’m in love with the cat, and the not-art-bottle!
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I would buy these!
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LOL That’s awesome, thank you!
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Lucky people, the ones who will eventually get your postcards, I love all of them!
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Thank you! I’m excited to see which ones I’ll get, too…I love getting fun mail!
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I looked it up and got inspired, perhaps I will try it out, make a few cards and if it goes well, join for the autumn session. Well, I will see. Just being inspired about the idea is a first step! … as if I have the time… 😉
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Busy people always have time…because they make time. 😉 How wonderful that you might have a go this Autumn, I hope I’ll be around to do it, too!
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All of these are wonderful! There isn’t a single one I don’t love!
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They are all lovely but the 2nd one is my favorite.
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Love the kitty and the paper clay woman! In other news, I finally picked up my Society6 shipment yesterday. Can’t wait to get it framed and hung on my wall. 🙂
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Thank you! Is the print up-to-standard? Which one did you get? I hope it is everything that you expected.
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Wait, Ninay, ikaw pala yan! Ooooh! New blog! Excited for you!
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