Finishing Up The Collage Class

I've just finished the bonus class included in the free Collage Breakthrough series taught by Catherine Rains. Essentially, it was a repeat of lesson 4 but using magazine pages rather than scrapbook papers and your own papers made with a variety of methods using paint. For me it was a lesson in not being drawn to images on the page, which is the way I usually decide to add a paper to the bin, but to the blocks of colors in it. A well chosen ad, perhaps even large enough to spread across facing pages, would already have colors that work well together, and include a variety of values and textures. Printed on heavier paper would be a bonus as magazine pages can be quite thin which would complicate the gluing process. I pulled several pages from articles in our local Sandpoint magazine (couldn't find ads that met the bill) and decided on this one, because it seems to have the most variety of values with both quiet and patterned places. 

Again, we were to randomly cut a variety of rectangular pieces or other shapes from the page to be sorted into values and then quiet or patterned. I realized I could quickly do this using this Fiskar cutter. True confession, there weren't enough pieces for me to feel it necessary to do the sorting, just spread them out on the table somewhat grouped. This particular page was a challenge in terms of delineating values as there really wasn't really light areas and some of the dark areas were very close to some pieces I deemed medium. But as I worked through placements, I could tell I was getting better at it, but had to constantly remind myself about the suggestion (rule) to group not only different values next to each other but place two patterned and a quiet together or two quiet with a pattern.

I liked leaving the spacing between pieces on this one with the different spacers, both narrow and blocky, across pieces. I also liked that some of the randomly cut pieces showed discernible parts of the mammoths. It didn't make any sense to me to just think of the pieces as swatches of color. This collage tells a bit of a story I think. One downside of working with magazine pages though is the glare from the overhead light, which is why this picture of the final product is taken on the slant. I had to keep looking from the side as I worked to see what the piece I was placing looked like.

So that's that, or so I thought. My intention was to whisk the leftover pieces of magazine into the trash and clear the table of all this collage stuff. I turned the page so I could glue in the bonus class directions and the picture of Kat's demo piece only to have that facing blank page and the few mammoth pieces calling out to be used to make one more. I think I want to dispense with the boundary of a square and do my collaging to fill the entire page. I laid a few pieces out and yes, it's just like quilting and you can never quit working with the scraps!

I do think these exercises in paper have really helped improve my eye for thinking value first, which is something I've always struggled with in my quilting. Too enticed by the pretty fabric. The work with the magazine pages in particular pointed out to me how quickly I fell into old habits of not even thinking about it. I think I also learned a lot about working with and arranging odd shapes. That lesson with the floating triads was my favorite and I'm planning on doing it some more using fabric scraps in this sketchbook. I do think I can use that knowledge now when designing art quilts. It's another place where I've struggled; I'm thinking of a particular piece I've never been able to resolve that I may be able to now. So, very happy to say this was not a waste of my time.