Altered Silver

Here are four more spreads from my Angels Among Us altered book project (named after the title of the book). I've tried to alternate ideas a little so that every spread doesn't look identical, but still, they are pretty much following the same pattern. And as before, I can't say that any of these are finished yet, but they are finished at least for the time being.


 
 





Technorati Tags: altered books, art journals, collage, angels, mixed media

This altered book project, Angels Among Us (named after the title of the book), is really just an excuse for me to play with colors. It's a small (5x8", 127 pages) hardcover with many Gustave Doré woodcuts and various clip art angels used as spot illustrations. This book found its way to me by being a remainder under $2 that I selected sight unseen, solely on the basis of its title (if you've looked around my blog or website, you know I have a thing for angels). When I later held it in my hand, I could see how thin it was and couldn't imagine putting a lot of dimensional embellishment into it. I decided to go with some light collage and color - lots of color.

This book's paper loves water. It loves it so much, it just soaks it right up and shares the bounty as far as it can. Not a good trait; it's like trying to paint watercolor washes on thick newsprint. After that discovery, I chose to first cover each spread with a base coat of acrylic medium. That seals the paper and provides a great surface for the media to follow.

The next stage is to cover each spread with watercolors. Different color choices are made for each spread.

Then I dig into my digital stash, pick out a photo of a cemetary angel, prepare it to be used as a base sketch (very unlike a photograph), and print the alteration. I cut it out from the paper and glue it into a waiting spread. I really like bringing this digital aspect into the physical book. Sometimes additional items are glued to the spread as well, including quotations, other images and punched shapes.

The real color fun comes next as I go over the angel sketch and the entire spread with crayons and colored pencils. Other media can come into use also, like Zig markers, as long as it doesn't add bulk, although I may add a few dimensional items later.

I'm not sure any of the spreads are officially finished as yet, but for now there are these few worth peeking at and more to come.




Keywords: art,altered book,angels,collage,mixed media