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I love paper!

So, on we go with the PaperLove Bloghop!

my chaotic paper storage paper piles

This is part of my paper storage – as you can see it is a bit in need of a clearout.  I got the metal racks in Poundstretcher or a similar shop and they are a bit prone to collapsing without warning and causing an avalanche.  In those shoeboxes I’ve got all my smaller pieces of decorative papers or printed Gocco papers arranged according to subject and the larger pieces are on the top.

paperspapers

I have lots of different papers: corrugated paper/card (that is good for printing too); thin, translucent Japanese washi paper; strong thin lokta paper that can be stitched into (made in Nepal); old paper used for legal documents and old maps, with a sort of stringy mesh texture; printed paper bags (the one in the picture is a William Morris design).  The black and white photo on the top right is masking tape – I used it as a resist when I was printing Birth of a City; when I took it off, I stuck it randomly on to paper.

different language newspapers papers3a

I love printing and painting on old newspapers too – here are a few in my collection.  Great for using in collage! I just love paper because it is so versatile and, like fabric, can be made from all sorts of plant material, cut, torn, stitched and used in lots of projects.  The yellow swirly pattern (top right) is a Gocco print – I made the screen from a doodle – and various other painted papers.

papers

So what do I do with them?  Here are some more of the painted papers – the orange and black one was decorated when I painted old train tickets with black and white gesso – I put the orange painted paper underneath rather than use old newspaper or something else to protect the table and it made a very efffective design.

paperspapers

Left photo is Japanese paper I got from Falkiners in London – they have the most gorgeous paper and bookbinding equipment too.  Right photo is a double sided wrapping paper I bought somewhere, I love it!

papers

Tissue paper painted with fluid acrylics, blue art paper printed with corrugated card to produce the white stripes.

papersprint Left: mostly packing paper that produces amazing texture when painted.  Right: Gocco printed skyscraper screened over some paper that I’d already smooshed paint over (I think it was one of those paint effects where you splash paint on, put another sheet of paper over the top and pull them apart to produce that smooshy texture).

papers

birds gocco printed on various papers

More gocco printing, birds this time – on various surfaces.

altered tickets
This is what I’ve done with some of the old train tickets – I can never throw anything out! I’m planning to use them as tags or perhaps even business cards.

So what do I use these papers for?  Well, here is a pile of handmade journals for a start…

handmade journals

Or see my tutorial on How to Make a Concertina Book…

checking pages are not stuck together where they shouldn't be

Hmm, this post is getting a bit long; think I’ll continue the paper theme for a few more posts…

 

bloghop button

Here are the other participants in the Paperlove BlogHop:

Majo Bautista / Tona Bell / Louise Best / Cathy Bluteau / Jennifer Bomgardner / Giova Brusa / Lindsay Buck / Beka Buckley / Joanna Caskie / Jonathan Chapman (Mr Yen) / Halle Cisco / Sarah Clare / Cathryn Clarge / Dawn Clarkson / Rhiannon Connelly / Jenny D’Fuego / Molly Dhiman / Ian Dudley / Ayisatu Emore / Akmal Farid / Monika Forsberg / Claire Fritz-Domeney / Louise Gale / Chrissy Gaskell / Julie Hamilton / Emma Hawman / Rachel Hazell / Holly Helgeson / Claudine Hellmuth / Kim Henkel / Sarah Hoffman / Joanne Hus / Paula Joerling / Beth Kempton / Julie Kirk / Eos Koch / Katie LaClair / Kristy Lankford / Michelle Manolov / Doreen Marts / Rosie Martinez-Dekker / Tori Mears / Maria Mederios / Lise Meijer / Debbie Miller / MaryJane Mitchell / Suzy Naidoo / Grace Noel / Hannah Nunn / Camilla Olsson / Jo Packham / Rachelle Panagarry / Monette Pangan / Melanie Paul / Nicole Piar / Jen Pitta / Liz Plummer / Julie Reed /

The PaperLove Blog Hop is a celebration of all things paper! Follow the links to discover more bloggers who love paper and use it to inspire and delight. And if you want to explore a whole world of paper, and stretch your paper passion further with a host of creative projects, why not join the innovative new online course PaperLove (starts March 31). Led by book artist Rachel Hazell, PaperLove is a five week creative adventure for paper lovers. Find out more here

I’m back!

Time to revive this blog, I think!  I got fed up with the sound of my own voice so had a break….

My cat, Ziby, sitting on some newly ironed African fabric

My cat, Ziby, sitting on some newly ironed African fabric

 

My new website design is in process of getting thrashed out and I have a new blog theme with lots of options for customization to incorporate it, so you’ll probably see quite a few changes over the coming weeks.  My life is a bit like that at the moment too – by the autumn we should be empty nesters as my youngest son has been busy visiting universities and if all goes well he should be starting physics with astrophysics at some academic institution or other.  Last week we went to a Birmingham uni applicants day, – as it was half term we stayed overnight and while he went shopping the second morning, I visited the archives based in the new library building.  It is pretty spectacular and has some great views over the city.   Here are a couple of pics:

new Birmingham library building birmmus2

To give myself a bit of an incentive to keep writing, I have joined a bloghop where I can rant about my love of paper and the stuff I do with it, so look out for lots of papery pics next Monday!

bloghop button

The PaperLove Blog Hop is a celebration of all things paper! Follow the links to discover more bloggers who love paper and use it to inspire and delight. And if you want to explore a whole world of paper, and stretch your paper passion further with a host of creative projects, why not join the innovative new online course PaperLove (starts March 31). Led by book artist Rachel Hazell, PaperLove is a five week creative adventure for paper lovers. Find out more here

Chiaroscuro Exhibition

It’s been an age since I wrote anything in this blog – life has been rather stressful family-wise and I’ve been doing my best to keep up (and catch up!) with Module 2 of the pattern course I’m doing.

DS1 is currently on a backpacking holiday round the world so September was spent  helping him prepare for that – he spent the first month ‘doing’ Eastern Europe and flew to Kathmandu earlier this week.  He is planning to travel around Nepal, India, Thailand and a few other places before ending up in Perth, Australia in the New Year when he hopes to get work to fund more travel!  He has a blog which is quite entertaining.

Chiaroscuro, the exhibition I mentioned in my last post opened today and the opening night starts at 7pm tonight – if you live locally (South Wales) you’d be very welcome to come along to chat to the artists there!  All the details are on our Facebook Page, including several photos of us putting the show up!  

Birth of a City wallhanging

 

It’s on for 4 days until this Saturday, 2 November, 2pm – 8pm each day, Pontrhydrun Baptist Church, Cwmbran, NP44 2ND

Moyo Directory and Diverse Manners

I’m looking forward to next Monday – Module 2 of the pattern course, The Art and Business of Surface Pattern Design, is starting!  I really enjoyed Module 1 and it got me designing again, drawing little sketches and playing with Photoshop (and cursing Illustrator!) and because I knew that the next module was coming it kept up the momentum over the summer. I could easily have been diverted and distracted by the presence of all three of my sons (or just been idle and got up at noon every day!).  This next module is about branding – Creating your professional identity.  So no doubt you will see lots of tweaks and changes here!  You’ll notice, unless you are reading this from a blog reader, that I have changed the WordPress theme of the blog – please let me know if anything isn’t working for you.  I’ve also installed a plugin to give you the choice of reading the blog in a more pared-down, mobile-friendly format on smartphones or tablets – it is supposed to be quicker to load (and, more importantly, uses less data if you’re on a mobile contract) but there is a button at the bottom to switch to the traditional browser layout if you don’t like it.

If you would like to see some of the patterns I’ve been creating, I have a profile page on the new Moyo Directory: here is a quick screenshot of part of it:

Liz Plummer – Moyo Directory - Google Chrome 15082013 211521

I would love it if you could click the ‘like’ button on the page when you visit!

Also at the end of October some of my textile work is going to be in an exhibition in Cwmbran (near where I live) as part of the Diverse Manners Arts Group annual exhibition – if you would like to be notified when it is happening, click on the link and ‘like’ our Facebook page which I helped set up earlier this year.  The theme is Chiaroscuro which is an Italian art term for light and dark and I am exhibiting Birth of a City and also four smaller screenprints which I printed a while ago using a paper stencil (once I’ve stitched and mounted them!).

shadows

shadows

The exhibition is being held in a church and there is a nice tree-lined graveyard next to it with lots of space for bunting so in a mad moment last week I decided to make some and stencil the words ‘ART EXHIBITION’ on them.  Here they are drying on the clothes horse:

screen printed letters on bunting

Of course I couldn’t let all that spare paint go to waste, so I printed it randomly on this piece of dyed fabric!

printed fabric

And here is the rest of the bunting all piled up ready to be stitched together – so far I think I’ve got enough to wrap round the house several times and I’ve run out of bias binding so need to cut some more!

bunting

And finally, I couldn’t resist putting in this photo of a gorgeous lily growing in our garden – aren’t the colours yummy?

pink lily

Patterns and blogging experiments

I’m just experimenting with using the WordPress app on my android tablet and if it is successful it will hopefully encourage me to get blogging again!

The ease of adding photos will be the crunch point to this experiment so let’s wait and see.

The last few weeks since the first module of my pattern course finished, I’ve been busy getting to grips with Photoshop and building more patterns. You can see one in the Graduate Showcase of the course on Rachael Taylor’s blog -  I was so excited when it turned out to be the first one!  It was based on a thermofax screen design I made from some Markmaking. Here it is:

image

This week we were excited to go up to Warwick University where DS1 was graduating from his degree in PPE – here he is in all his finery (sweltering in the heatwave!) with his proud parents :

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