Magical collage ATCs with security envelopes and a hat trick

 The theme for my little swap group this month was magic and/or secrets. We make artist trading cards (ATCs) based on the theme (or prompts, you could say), and everyone is free to not only interpret it however they like, but to disregard the theme altogether if it's just not working for them or they are jazzed about something else.

I decided to do two different kinds of magic — stage magic and the mystical stuff usually spelled "magick." But I started with a nod to the idea of secrets by using security envelopes for my background.

I often save security envelopes for their interesting patterns — not my original idea, but inspired by other artists who have used them. I included with that collection part of a paper bread bag that had a nice pattern that just kind of went with the envelopes. That's the light brown with blue dots above on the left.

I pasted the strips onto a piece of 100 lb card stock I had cut to 7-1/2" wide by 7" high to make six ATCs. I had drawn the cut lines on the card stock before glueing the strips so I could place them with that in mind.

So here they are all cut and ready for the next step. I wanted to feature a magician with a rabbit that could be pulled out of a hat. I drew the rabbit, then scanned it and shrunk it down (the original drawing was about 6 inches high) and printed seven of them on some white card stock (in case one got damaged when I was cutting them out). 

I searched online for an image of a magician, found a free one that was quite low resolution, so enlarged him to about 600–700% in Photoshop and traced some of the lines to make them sharper before making him the size I wanted, then printed seven of him too, on fairly thin paper that had something else printed on the back. I printed the rabbit on previously printed material as well.

  I sketched a top hat on a scrap of card stock and cut it out to use as a pattern, and traced it onto the back of some decorative paper with a black background and spattered gold and silver metallic splotches on it. I had some shiny gold paper I may have salvaged from an envelope lining (I don't really remember), so used that to make a hat band.

I cut the slit for the rabbit after glueing the hat in place, making two cuts so the slot was about a millimeter wide. Hopefully, you can see that in this detail. (Maybe if you click to enlarge it you will see the black strip by the ears, which is the pocket on the back of the ATC that holds the rabbit.)

The righthand card is the back, as you may have guessed. The vertical rectangle on the right side is the pocket that holds the rabbit, attached along the edge on all sides. On the left, a band of the same paper holds an accordion fold booklet, which you can see more of below.

To represent the other kind of Magick, I did a little searching on Etsy and bought a PDF called "13 Witch's Runes" from a shop called Like It All.  Although she had it nicely set up in narrow columns and two rows on a single page, I tinkered with the format first in Photoshop and then in InDesign so that I could print them at about 3-1/4" high, back to back. To make all the columns the same width, I added one and made a "cover" using assorted glyphs available in my font collection.

I am very aware of how lucky I am to have all of these tools at my disposal!

Here's the skinny booklet opened up: 

I really have no idea how one is supposed to use these symbols and the information about them; perhaps with some sort of oracle deck? I just like the symbolism and the mystique and thought it would be a fun addition to the cards.

By the way, I had to look up "grimoire" — it's a book of magic spells.

It was fun to start with a vision of what I wanted to create — a rabbit that could be pulled out of a hat, with the extra trickery of the creature being bigger than the hat — and then go about making it happen. The six doing the swap this month included myself, so I did make one to keep. I've actually picked it up and pulled my little rabbit out a few times, just because. Maybe I'll do a little research to learn what one is supposed to do with those runes, too. It might even inspire some additional art projects.

 

I Am a LoLa Artist Too!

The LoLa art crawl is this weekend, August 23–34!! I will be participating this year at the Minnehaha Professional Building, 3960 Minnehaha Avenue (site No. 39 on the LoLa map), with artists Jymme Golden and Laura Burlis.

What's the secret of secret Belgian binding? I will show you at the art crawl.

Stop by between 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday to enjoy shelter from both rain and heat in this comfortable air conditioned space on Longfellow's main drag, as well as refreshments, cool demos (Laura Burlis on making millefiore canes, me revealing the secret of secret Belgian book binding, and Jymme with her sketchbooks open to show her process), and a give-away drawing by Jymme, and maybe me, too.

I have been making a few new things for LoLa and I thought I would give you a little preview of some of them.

A fun series of projects I started this spring are little hand knit pocket doll critters to tell your troubles to or play with (for children older than 3) or display on your desk to remind you to lighten up.

Each of these is knit by hand without a pattern or instructions. I just wanted to have fun with free-form knitting without having to follow directions or take notes. As I finished up knitting them, I pulled all "tails" of yarn, and sometimes a little extra yarn, to the inside to serve as stuffing.

Then I put them in mesh bags and sent them through the wash several times to felt them, which makes them even smaller and "knits" the fibers together for extra firmness and body. After they're dry, I add wooden beads for heads and sew on their hats and embellishments.

They are all less than three inches high.

I've also been making more journals, some from beverage boxes and some repurposing the covers of vintage books.

Then I've taken the text blocks from the books and have been turning them into little stand-alone art pieces of their own.

I've also been working on some upcycled decorated tins. I have been making these little kits or treasure boxes for kids for a few years now, each one is unique and is filled with assorted small toys and other objects. I have several of them ready to bring to LoLa.

But sometimes people give me their used mint tins to repurpose, and so I thought it would be fun to try something different: to fix up the tins but sell them empty so that other people could have the fun of putting together their own treasure boxes, whether as gifts (for kids or adults) or for themselves.

One of several tins-in-progress

In fact, there are a few stops along the LoLa art crawl where you can pick up some fabulous tiny things to put in your own tins, and I will have information and tips about them available for you.

Finally, I designed a DIY "mindfulness cube" with sayings on each side, to use as an object of contemplation or even as a small gift box. I will have a few of these assembled as examples, but will be selling only the flat sheets, printed on card stock, for people to make their own.

I hope to see you at the crawl!