Saturday, January 3, 2009

. . . used more brown




to make a companion piece for the collage I posted yesterday. I feel like I should make collages in a series, but my attention span only lasts for about two at a time, which is not much of a series. Then I want to move on to something else, another color combination, just about anything that has inspired me as I wander around my basement.


I attach the collage elements to the watercolor paper with gloss medium, just because I happened to have a large bottle of it around. It is pretty much transparent when it dries, and leaves a varnish-like finish on each piece. But the pieces are still tactile, bumpy, textured. Is that the way they are supposed to be? Or should I put another finish on them to make them smooth, if that's even possible?

7 comments:

Jeane Myers said...

honey combs and polka dots, nice....

Anonymous said...

Mary, I happened upon your blog and the phrase "What if I used more brown" really caught my eye. For me, it's orange. I am using it everywhere! I don't remember asking myself, "What if I used more orange?" but I MUST have!

Mary Buek said...

Hi, Jeane: Honeycombs, yes. That's what they are. And I gotta quit with the polka dots, don't you think?

Carol: I'm glad you found my blog. I love orange, too. It's a happy color, I think. I'm forcing myself to limit my color selection, with varying degrees of success. I hope you decide to visit here often.

Anonymous said...

Mary, these are great! And I like bumpy. Gives them character.

But there is a way to make things flatter and smoother if that's what you really want. But there's no way they're "supposed" to be.

I learned this trick at a Jonathan Talbot workshop, link provided here. This workshop attendee details how this is done. Scroll down to Paragraph 5 under "Back to the workshop" and she describes it.

http://www.talbot1.com/workshop/reviews/montreal.htm

It's a fun way to do collage. Now dammit, you've really got me wanting to do some.

Mary Buek said...

Martha: I will go to the link, but I wonder if it's what Talbot describes in his booklet. . . have you tried it? I really can't wait to see your collages. I have so much fun making them.

Anonymous said...

That's also in his booklet I believe. Got it with the workshop.

I have tried that. I much prefer it to wet gluing a piece of paper onto a surface. However, It requires enough patience to apply a couple of coats of the stuff to both surfaces and waiting for it to dry. And you know me and patience!

Mary Buek said...

Martha, I'm with you on that patience thing. . . and it would seem to require a lot of advanced planning, which I'm not too good at either. I tend to grab anything that catches my eye to use in a collage. I would have to coat almost every piece of paper in the place in order to do it right. But Talbot certainly has the collage technique honed, and maybe I should try to corral my baser instincts and give his way a shot. I don't mind the glue so much, but it's really hard to get off my hands. . . they look like they're peeling, not matter how much I wash them.