Practice book - prompt - when is a page a page?

Is it time for another challenging prompt? Since fall is in the air, and leaves are ankle deep on my patio tonite in the midst of heavy windstorm - let's think about the pages in the practice book as leaves. How could you portray leaves on your page? Draw them. Trace them. Cut your page into a leaf shape. Ink some real leaves and use them to print on your pages. Glue in some pressed leaves. Paint a page in a leaf color. Use leaf skeletons on your page. Cut out leaves of fabrics or paper and glue them in. Hmmmm..... Why don't you use one page with only leaves, or a leaf, and another page where a leaf image will be secondary to another image. Here are some pics where I have used leaves. I bet you have a lot of ideas you can share with us. Feel free to make a comment and link us to some of your work.

While we are thinking about leaves, it's time to dig out an old book and start pressing some fall leaves for later use. I often use an old phone book and put some heavy books on top of it. Sometimes I find partial skeleton leaves in my garden. They are so beautiful and so fragile. They need to be pressed also. And don't forget your camera. Take lots of pictures of trees and leaves. The light angles during our fall season makes dramatic shadows. Watch the light at different times of day and how the shadows fall. You can get wonderful shots off the cuff, but also by planning what time of day a particular subject would be the most spectacular.

Have some fun with your leaf pages. Let me know how they come out.

Time in a Frame - new pages

I've been down in the studio with the doors wide open so the dogs can come and go, and the fresh air can pour in. Temperature in the 80's today, and as sunny and bright a Fall day as one could ask for. Here are the next couple pages I did today. The gentleman shown in the previous post now is transformed! And on the page across from him is an old mining photo which is altered to look like a ride down to Hell. The children are lined up to get their tickets when you see the two pages side by side. The photo of the woman is a typical Victorian portrait which has now been altered by layering white paint over her face, gluing on the skeleton head and finding a little tiny fork in my embellishing stash box. I used the page preceding her portrait to cut bars so it would look like she is imprisoned. this page is opposite the creepy house shown below.

New Project - Time in a Frame

One of the things I look for wherever used books are sold - are old books with lots of photos I can play with. In this case, I found a book of 19th century photographs. I really bought it to cut out some of the images of impoverished people for another altered book in the planning stage. And some theatrical images which are very expressive.

Because it is close to Halloween I checked Ebay to see what artist Gus Fink is up to. He spookifies (is that a word?) old photos as well as draws weird pictures. My friend Jackie and I each have an original Gus Fink in our collections, but now I can't afford his prices, so I am trying my hand at making some images along his style. He has inspired this book. Jackie and I will be exchanging this book. We'll each work on a few pages and then we'll switch artists. Just the two of us, as we do with found words books. This time it's a found images book. These are some of my first pages. I just thought it up yesterday, so you will see that I believe in following your muse! If you are inspired to do something, for heavens sake - just do it. The art you make when nudged by your muse will be fresher and better than the work you do when you think it out and plan it for weeks or months. And - if you don't like it, you can throw it away, or cut out the pages you don't like. The book goes to Jackie tomorrow when we meet for lunch.

The house picture was very pale with light background, but it seemed spookier to put black background with black gesso and some light touches of white gesso. The little mice are from a Martha Stewart punch I found at Michaels on sale.

The wagon was also on a very light but busier background, so to isolate the wagon I painted out the background, cut some slits in the top and put in pieces of cut up skeleton image.

The spooky soldiers have been isolated with white acrylic paint, and then altered. The werewolf looking guy looks like my dog Lulu. Shhh!!! don't tell her. The gravestone rubber stamp was in the $1 bin at Michaels this week.

The man with the line of children in front is part of a 2 page spread. I'll show the other side later. This is not done yet. The Eskimo children now have their faces painted out, and clothes colored in with colored pencils. The Man is actually a well bred gentleman. I cut around the children and put the man behind. He may turn into the devil by the next time you see him.

Freebies - more hats and aprons

This time I want to share some of my purchased vintage photos that have aprons AND hats!!! How good can it get? You'll have fun with these. I haven't used them in an altered book yet, but you can be sure I will one day. And the little girl is just so sweet. Again, please feel free to use them in your personal artwork, but I ask that you do not copy them to sell on CD's or digitally. and, by the way, if you are searching for an image and can't find it, my personal image database is huge, I might have what you need, just ask. I'm happy to share them.

Freebie photos - hats

These photos are ones I purchased which you are free to enjoy and use in your art, but please do not copy and sell them on CDs, digitally, on digital sheets or any other medium.

Altered books - waxing pages

The product I use is Dorland's Wax Medium. I spread it on with a cloth and then buff it until I like the feel and look of it. I have also just used sheets of wax paper to buff pages. It takes longer, but it is a pleasant way to occupy your hands while watching TV.

I bought some clear shoe polish I'm going to try sometime. Seems like it should work fine - but it might smell bad. Sometimes I use hot wax but do not have the knack for getting it on thin enough for just a light coating.

Why wax? The feel of the page. The look of the page. Protects the page. Helps solve sticking problems. It's fun.

Words, words, words...

Several people commented yesterday at the Book Jam, that one thing that set my work apart is the use of words and quotes. There are a lot of book artists who make amazing works of art from their books, and do not use words. But a book means words to me. So I use them. At times I will write a poem for a book or borrow text in collage form from magazines, etc.

Usually I turn to my faithful companion, The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations for help. I have it in several editions and it's one of my favorite books to read just for pleasure. Phrases are indexed by author and by subject. When I have a theme in mind, I look it up by that word, or by variations or associated words (keywords). In the index, part of the phrase is given, so I quickly read through them and take notes of the ones that sound like they might work. I put the page and phrase number in a list, in page order (sometimes I have really long lists). Then I go one by one, page by page from the list, and read each one. I scratch out the numbers on the list that are not appropriate. Some grab my attention immediately and I give them 5 stars. Others my rate 1 - 4 stars. If there is enough on the 5 star list, I dont' go back to the others. I then type the 5 star ones on the computer making sure I have the authors' names and the page numbers, just in case I need to go back and check something. When I'm ready, I print them

I have several other books I like to use. "the 2,548 Best Things Anybody Ever Said" by Robert Byrne; "Hodge Podge, A commonplace book" by J. Bryan, III; Crown's Book of Political Quotations" by Michael Jackman; "Amo, Amas, Amat and More" by Eugene Ehrlich; and many others. This last one as well as several books on translating English into other languages are fun to use. It's fun to mix it up and sometimes something just looks or sounds better in Latin or French - or Japanese! Keep your mind open to using words..... verbum sat sapienti (a word is enough for a wise man)