Random acts of paper

Lately, I've been lucky to receive terrific paper donations from friends. The gifts have ranged from vintage greeting cards and stacks of savings stamp booklets to strips of vintage wall paper and dozens of vintage paper dolls.

The circa 1952 birthday boy on the tag above came from a box stuffed with treasures that Cincinnati Enquirer TV/radio/media reporter/critic John Kiesewetter had carried around in his trunk for months. The material was lovingly and selectively packed up from his late father's home. 

A zippered linen bag crammed with savings stamps came courtesy of Barbara Henshaw, who had seen my highly-organized stash in the studio, as well as the Mad Women collages in which savings stamps play a prominent role. I'm just starting new Mad Women pieces, so the stamps arrived at a perfect time.

Speaking of Mad Women, I just finished some new tags, above, that are Mad Womenesque and that include some of the vintage wallpaper that graphic designer, printer, Seed Bomb entrepreneur and blogger Maya Drozdz dropped off last week. They'll be turning up in some larger pieces, too.

Finally, there are the 1960s-era paper dolls that marketing wiz Mary Lynn Tangi gave to me a few months ago. They're now on the work table - those are three of the four, singing Lennon Sisters above - and will be starring in the new Mad Women collages. It was easy to tell by how carefully the dolls had been stored - with clothes, accessories, original books - that Mary Lynn cherished them. 

I find it fun giving new life to just about any paper, but there's an extra layer of satisfaction when the paper comes from people I know.

Sign o' the times

Just had to post an image of the spiffy sign that I had printed for last week's City Flea. It's 2 feet x 3 feet and is propped against the wall, because I couldn't get the easel I brought with me to stand up on the little bump out in my space.

The original design was postcard-sized and announced my move this spring to a bigger studio at Brazee Street Studios. With a bit of tweaking, the designed morphed into a general poster. This is one reason to save graphic files at a high-resolution ... you never know how they might be used!

Cards With a Past ® are downtown now

The newest spot to purchase greeting cards from my Cards With a Past® lines is 5th Street Gallery - my first downtown outlet. Last night, I loaded one arm of a card rack with 21 styles, and plan to switch them out as we go along. They are printed on thick card stock, and packaged with an envelope in an acid-free clear bag ($3.50 each).

The cards use copyright-free images from my archive. So, how can I copyright them? Good question.
It may not look like it, but a LOT of work is done on the images after they are scanned - at a high resolution - into the computer.

Generally, the originals are dense engravings and I get in between the lines to make sure they reproduce with clarity. Some are still works in progress as I go back in and clean them up further by removing part of the image. It can take weeks to get an image where I want it. But it's more than worth the time in the end result - and that end result is a new image with my stamp on it.

There's another twist to the cards. The back of each card includes an excerpt from the publication the image is from, along with bibliographic details on the original publication. Sometimes, there is an additional image, such as below on the back of the "you can handle it" card.

I'm still dreaming up more and having so much fun doing it!    

Costume drama, and mystery

Wish I could tell you where these spectacular women are from, but I haven't a clue. They're part of the humungous new stash and were in a pile of pages that had been a book about costumes. But, no title page. No engraver listed on the pages. No publisher either. If you have spotted these some place else, please, please, please let me know.

Each is hand-painted and a fairly sizable 9" x12" or so. My first thought was to have them floating. Now, I am thinking they'd be swell cake toppers. I have an exhibit coming up in February at Cincinnati's Bonbonerie bakery's cafe and had been thinking about a new collage take on cakes anyway - and calling the exhibit, wait for it, yes, Let Them Eat Cake ...  

The stash just got larger

What can I say?!? I succumbed when a friend told me that he was destashing his long-time print collection. Once the drawers of the flat files were opened, I was a goner. Not a good time to even think about sorting it all, but it MUST be done. There are Open Studios at my studio home - Brazee Street Studios - Friday night. Aieeeeee.

The art of adornment

Victor/Victorian
Geoffrey Firmly Believed in the Maxim that
the Ability to Accessorize
Is What Separates Us from the Animals
mixed-media collage: antique engravings (The Delineator, April 1894 & June 1898),
photo (J.H. Meyer Photographic Studio, 465 Vine St., Cincinnati) and endpaper,
recycled bead catalog, vintage button (Polly Pearce collection), watercolor, ink.

I offered a preview of the new Victor/Victorian series a week ago and am circling back to it now, because it's done. Well, almost. Going to the framer tomorrow.

Some of the  photo collages are inserted into antique album sleeves, while others -  like this one - are on antique endpapers. The endpaper collages may or may not be trimmed, depending on the frames selected. I'm checking out a local framer with a stock of antique frames. Cannot wait to see what they have on hand.

You'll note that Geoffrey is even more adorned via the addition of the colorful hat pin, some feathers and a rhinestone button from my late mother-in-law's button collection. Oh, and the has title changed, too. Could even change again ... you know how I am.    

Another new cast of characters, Italian-style

A few weeks ago I wrote about a food-related collage that I was struggling with. It was a commission loosely based on a piece created for an exhibit earlier this year. A print of the original would have been fine BUT I had forgotten to scan that collage into the computer. Well, the final piece - above - came out fine, even though I had to take it apart to get it there.

An armored knight was central to the earlier collage, as well as this one. The difference though is that the first one was a black-and-white engraving of a standing knight, while this one is a splendidly-outfitted and beautifully-colored knight and horse.

The image is from Costumi Dei Secoli, a spectacular book of hand-painted engravings published in Florence, Italy, in 1837. The two-volume set is falling apart and heavily foxed, but the prints are in remarkably fine condition once you get past the edges.

The art details costumes worn by people depicted in well-known paintings, sculptures and monuments of the time - and each is accompanied by a description. In Italian, of course. I've been scanning the images into my archive - there are close to one hundred 8.5" x 12" plates - and wanted to share a few that you're sure to see popping up in future collages ...