I'm in love...not with a person or a place...but a process! Let me explain...
My art friend, Wendy Lee Lynds, is queen of this collage technique that uses gloss acrylic medium for the adhesive in lieu of any type of glue. She did a fantastic demo of this technique when we collaborated on a booth for the Everett Home & Gift Show in October. I was fascinated by the technique and have been itching to try it out since then. We made a plan to get together - but alas Wendy fell ill...I decided I would give it a shot on my own.
With Wendy's urging, I picked up a copy of Collage - A New Approach by Jonathan Talbot. Mr. Talbot is the mastermind behind this technique...his book was informative and inspiring. Watching Wendy's demo helped to solidify the steps of the process...I decided to tweak things a bit since I did not want to buy new art materials (aside from the gloss medium...I had tons of matte medium but its the gloss that does the magic!)
Here is a super-condensed version of what I did...Wendy offers fantastic hands-on workshops and demos on this process...check out her blog for all the info...you really need to learn from the pro!
First-
I gathered an assortment of collage papers/bits/scraps...covered each side with a layer of gloss medium. Also used the gloss medium to coat a couple of pieces of corrugated cardboard and a mini canvas frame - these would be the foundations to build each collage. Best to do this step earlier so that everything is dry once you begin.
Next-
I composed my collage and contemplated placement...laid down the first layer of scraps, covered it with the transfer paper and "ironed" it with my quilting iron...since I was working on such small scale (no bigger than 6" square), my quilting iron worked perfectly. The heat from the iron activates the gloss medium...essentially, the paper is fused to the cardboard. I purposely extended beyond the edge of the cardboard so I could sand off the excess paper and have a clean edge when completed.
I added a few more elements...it didn't look complete...I remember Wendy mentioning that lightweight elements didn't need to be pre-coated (such as tissue paper or fibers) and could just be added as-is.
Finally -
A heart formed with vintage package twine was the finishing touch!
Feeling confident, I completed the "Amore King" collage pictured at the top of this post. I wanted to get a feel how this process would react with different kinds of paper - old book pages, magazine ads, wallpaper scraps...and with old photographs...I have a project in mind for using old vintage photographs - the original print - and wanted to make sure that the surface of the print would not be destroyed by the gloss medium nor the heat of the iron.
Success! the photo was not harmed by any step of the process. I can't wait to tackle my next idea...I wonder if gloss medium comes in an economy size...
