Fabric Collages
The idea for this card came from the pile of fabric scraps that I have. I began to wonder: could I use these instead of papers to create fabric collages?
Fabric Collages – A School Project from the Past
I also remembered one happy moment from the childhood. I was about 10 years old. A teacher asked us to bring fabric scraps to school. We were asked to cut the fabric into pieces and create a collage from them. My schoolmates were not excited but I was thrilled. I cut the fabrics into tiny pieces and began to glue them on a paper.
When I had finished the collage, I was very pleased with it. I had also had such a good time. Little did I know that I would be cutting tiny pieces whole my life – that the moment I picked the scissors was to follow me many times afterwards!
1) Cut and Glue the Fabric Pieces
The supplies for fabric collages are simple: scissors, glue, paper, fabrics.
2) Add a Layer of Gel Medium
Because my collage was small, I wanted to add some fine details and extra layering. To be able to do that, I covered the first layer with the gel medium. When dried, I would be able to doodle with markers and create dimensions by adding more layers.
My favorite is Golden Soft Gel Gloss but any gel medium will do. Even if I am not a big fan of buying more stuff, purchasing this is a good investment. You can use gel medium not only to create surfaces but also glueing paper pieces when making paper collages.
3) Add Doodling
When gel medium dries it becomes transparent and you can doodle with thin markers or gel pens on it. Make sure to dry it first throughly!
4) Add More Details From Fabric Pieces
After doodling on the first layer, I wanted to add details like the house in the middle. After constructing the house with fabric pieces and glue, I added gel medium to the details to add some doodling on them.
The photo below shows how the fabric is layered. A part of the card is covered with gel medium and feels like plastic. There are also fabric pieces without any coverage on the top and they feel soft.
You do not need a sewing machine to enjoy working with fabrics!
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How to Draw a Rose?
I have had a bit tough time in life so I wanted to create a page for the art journal where I show some gentleness towards myself. I created this page with photos of me as an adult and as a child. Sometimes being an adult is necessary but it’s good to remember that we still can hold onto the playful child, even if she needs to go to the background from time to time. I had a crazy idea to cover the characters of the page with roses. Many roses! Which brings in the question:
How to draw a rose?
And I needed a quick version because I wanted to have plenty of them on the page. Roses can look pretty complicated, like this one that I took a photo of when I visited a rosary last summer.
When looking at the rose photos, I soon discovered a very quick way to draw a simple rose. Start with the spiral. Then continue to transform the round shape to a square and finally think about a hexagon or octagon. I made a short video which shows how to do it in practice.
These roses are very easy, nothing fancy, but if you make a lot of them, they will look great!
I used markers to color the roses. If you make the center darker and use many colors, they will look more natural. If you don’t want to cut your roses, they will work great as a background paper motifs too.
This rose garden costs nothing! Have fun covering yourself or your loved ones with roses!
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Creating Collage Mandalas
If you like cutting papers with scissors, create collage mandalas! And if you need more inspiration for cutting, read this post first: 5 Reasons to Enjoy Cutting Paper with Scissors)
Circles Are Everywhere
For some people, mandalas have spiritual meaning. They usually represent universe or unity. As the word “mandala” means “circle” they can be almost anything and seen almost anywhere. I am often inspired by the circular shapes that I see in nature. Mandalas are usually symmetric, so they are surprisingly fast to make. The mandalas that I made are very straight-forward, yet eye-catching.
Basic Instructions for Creating Collage Mandalas
1) Cut a centerpiece and other pieces (3 to 5 different shapes, 6 to 12 pieces each) from decorated papers. I cut the pieces freely with scissors not worrying too much about their similarity.
2) Glue the pieces on the solid background paper. I used Golden Soft Gel Gloss gel medium, but you can use almost any glue. Measure the middle point of the background paper and start attaching the pieces from there.
3) Draw some more shapes with color pencils.
4) Doodle the finest decorations with a white gel pen and a thin black marker.
If you study my mandalas carefully, you’ll see how carelessly I have cut the shapes. They are not identical or perfect. I think that the result is more human when using scissors instead of cutting machines or shape cutters. Look at that photo of the daisy flower again, doesn’t the flower look more like hand-cut than machine-cut?
I made my mandalas as greeting cards. I think they would make great gifts!
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A Formula for Composition
You can create wonders with composition. Many worry about the balance but it’s also important to add interest. In this post I will show you how this still life was created and give a formula for a balanced composition that is also appealing and interesting.
1) Create a background without color repeats.
The background was painted with watercolors. I avoided repeating the same color. It is good to create separate colored areas instead of color repeats. That way our mind begins to associate colors with meanings. The areas seem to be individual elements and their relation to each other is more interesting than if we repeat the same color over and over.
(Did you notice that I have a new set of watercolors, White Nights! Love them!)
Few tips on watercolors: I never wet the background paper first but use wet brush instead. That way I can control the areas better even if I use a lot of water. I also prefer to mix colors on background paper. The way the colors mix is beautiful to watch and the result is more interesting than when the color is even. Let the background dry before the next step. If you use a lot of water as I did, drying might take a while. I often make backgrounds on the previous day.
2) Change colors and brushes when adding elements.
I continued with watercolors. Much drier brush was used than when painting the background. And more importantly, I changed the brush! Use at least three different brush sizes in the same artwork. In my still life you can see the difference of brush strokes between the red splashes (flowers) to the other elements.
Also, change and mix colors as often as you can. Especially subtle changes in color look very appealing. (More tips to choosing colors)
3) Create focus with fine lines.
I love fine lines. They make the picture sharp and focused. I used Uniball Signo white gel pen for details. I love the way the watercolors get new shine when the white is added. And if the watercolor is slightly damp, it will also color the white, which I think is adorable!
4) Include a variety of elements.
Even if that white gel pen is enjoyable to use on the watercolor background, do not decorate everything in the same way. I added some details with color pens to add variety in colors but also to create new elements like leaves.
I often purposefully create a composition that is not in balance and only finally add the balancing elements. Here you can see how I left the blue area empty for a new kind of element.
Next I chose a new colour, yellow, and picked a paper that was painted with acrylic paints. I also added few other elements like some details on the bowl and a leaf, by cutting them from my big stash of hand decorated papers. When you create your own papers, they always fit seamlessly with your other art! Also notice that I used various papers to avoid too many color repeats.
5) Maintain a slight off balance.
I used to create very balanced compositions until it hit me: a slight off balance is more interesting! The difficult thing is that it must be so slight that it’s almost controversial if the composition is balanced or not. Bringing that white tulip a little bit to the left would create a perfect balance. But with this still life I wanted to tell you that we are all human, we make mistakes, nobody is perfect or pure. When you notice your mistakes and allow them anyway, that’s when you stop copying and start creating unique art.
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