April ATCs

My Artist Trading Cards for this month were inspired by a tutorial on the site of lynne hoppe. I read the instructions and then, in my own way, adapted the technique.

I started with a square piece of regular cheesecloth
and applied lots of different colors of water-soluble acrylic paint.

This I let dry and then cut it into slightly larger than ATC size pieces.

I gave each piece a light spray of water to soften it and then
spread it onto a blank ATC card
already prepared with a layer of liquid matt medium,
allowing the cheesecloth to make irregular patterns by bunching and stretching it.

When the cards are dry, I apply a layer of cream colored acrylic paint.
Depending on your choice of paint, a second layer might be good: dab away at the paint where it seems too opaque.

The acrylic paint colors will seep through the cream-colored layers for that dreamy effect.

When the cards are dry again, I trim away the stray threads.

For this series I felt like "framing" each card with a line of India ink.

These cards were titled "Indra's Net". They remind me that all beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

Beginning Monday, May 3rd, my ATC collection will be on exhibit all month at the Pointe Fortune, Quebec post office! There will be one binder of originals kept from every collection I made since November 2002. Also, one binder of scans of whole collections made since June 2007 and a binder of cards that I collected through trades. Of course, there will also be a poster explaining the Artist Trading Card phenomena in English and French!

March ATCs

March 28th was the date of our most recent ATC trading day. There was a huge turnout, so I'm glad I made a lot of cards. Here is a sample page from my first series.

I titled my cards "Batik" because I used the classic color resist method. All of my cards were made with beeswax on card stock, but I used 3 different methods. For my first series, I painted designs with a #6 brush loaded with melted beeswax and I also made some finer lines with Windsor & Newton masking fluid on the ivory card. Then I covered the marks with a layer of "Arylide Yellow" liquid acrylic by Tri-Art. Step two was to make more marks with the beeswax and cover them with a layer of "Alisarin Crimson": these two layers created the brick red color. The third layer of marks was covered with "Indigo" acrylic paint. When I went to iron away the beeswax, some of the paint that had stuck to the wax melted down into the card and created the unusual spots.

My next series was made with an Indonsian Tjintang tool. The beeswax is poured into a little brass cup with a tiny spout that is attached to a wooden handle. I held the Tjintang over a candle to melt the wax and the wax flowed out onto the card stock. Careful! If the wax gets too hot it gushes out and if it's not hot enough, the spout is blocked. For this series I used watercolors: Cadmium Yellow, Cadmium Red and Prussian Blue.

The third series was done with the Tjanting and liquid acrylic paint. I thought it was the least successful but they turned out to be the favorites at the trade.

February ATC

The Artist Trading Card group met again today in Dunvegan, Ontario and we had a great turnout. It was a sunny and extremely cold afternoon as we began our trading punctually at 2:15. I made a dive for Brenda Kennedy's multicolor woven yarn (card#1), Evelyn Fortier's felt pen and tinted paper collage (#2), Chuck Stake's "Nakusp Tartan #0617" (#3), Dot Pisarro's "Dollars and Sense" (#4), Bernard Gauthier's digital art (#5), Susan Jephcott's "Hidden Hearts II (#6), Ronna Mogelon's "Your the Cat's Meow" (#7), Barb Glen's thread-and-textile-on-decorative-paper collage (#8) and finally Perry Bedbrook's "potato head" portrait (#9). Perry is 91 years young!




My cards showed a miniature "birth chart" of the dawning of the Age of Aquarius in Greenwich England at 7:25 a.m.( see my post of February 22nd ). Above the chart is a stylized rising sun, colored in with Sakura Gelly Roll pens. Some visitors may remember the 1968 musical "Hair" that included a song called "Aquarius". The intuitive text was:

When the Moon is in the 7th House
and Jupiter aligns with Mars
Then, peace will guide the planets
and Love will steer the stars.

Harmony and understanding,
sympathy and trust abounding.
No more falsehoods or derisions,
golden living dreams of visions,
magic crystal revelation
and the mind's true liberation.
Aquarius! Aquarius!

This sounds like a tall order placed 40 years ago. What can we do to manifest this vision now?