Haunted House Swap

Last fall I participated in a fabulous "Little Monsters" swap hosted by Alpha Stamps (one of my favorite places to buy mixed-media supplies!).  It started with a Masonite house blank book, which was turned into a haunted house.  Below are the pages I created for the swap, which have since been sent off and (hopefully!) enjoyed by other participants.  Some of the photos are only so-so - I took them as I was working - but this was one of my favorite collage projects, so I thought I'd share them.

Page 1, front (the house's "front door"):



Page 1, back:


Page 2, front:

(the poem on the front of page 2 was written by yours truly!)

Page 2, back:

 But the poem on the back (which is much better) is "The Haunted House" by Thomas Hood.

Page 3, front:


Page 3, back detail:


Page 4, front:

You can't really see, but the skeleton holding the lantern is saying "time to party!"  I like to imagine that most haunted houses just consist of a bunch of skeletons drinking absinthe and doing the Charleston.

Page 4, front detail:

Apparently I don't have a picture of the back of page 4.  Oh well!  I can't wait to see what this year's Halloween swap will be.  If you can't already tell, I love Halloween, and I always have fun with Alpha Stamps products & swaps.

Grey Skies

 

  

Grey Skies.  Bracelet of impression jasper, seed beads, Swarovski crystals and ultra-suede, 2009.

This was the first bead embroidery piece I ever attempted, and it's still one of my favorites.  Blue, grey, bronze, brown and green are probably my favorite colors to work with, so I absolutely flipped when I saw these impression jasper cabs.  The seed beads were selected to match and/or contrast with each individual cab to varying degrees.  The embroidery & assembly techniques are those of the amazing Sherry Serafini.  She has published two books of her own, and her projects regularly appear in Beadwork magazine.

Ode to Alfons Mucha

Ode to Alfons Mucha.  Mixed-media slide mailer, 2010. 

This piece is literally just a little ode to one of my favorite artists. I was intrigued by these cardboard slide-mailers; they reminded me of lockets, or of daguerreotype folders. I decided to juxtapose the artist with one of his ladies, regarding each other. The exterior images are just flowers clipped from a few of Mucha's works, along with one my favorite Mucha pieces, Sarah Bernhardt as Medea. 

Mars Orbit

Mars Orbit.  Mixed-media on canvas, 2010. 

This piece started out when I noticed this odd-shaped canvas for sale at my local art supply store.  The long, slim shape reminded me of a desert horizon.  I started the piece by selecting a few samples from my collection of cacti images.  The large cactus "pile" on the left is actually many stacked images, embellished with acrylic paint, colored pencil and gold ink.  The central image was made from a star chart used by the Aztecs to track the orbits of Mars and Earth; the angles of Mars and Earth's alignments informed the eight "points" of the Aztec calendar stone.  The centerpiece itself is a ring from Dior Joaillerie. I'd been saving this image for some time - I'm very in love with it for obvious reasons.  I've always wanted to use it as a god of war.  It seems like a good anchor for my Mars orbit chart.
 

Woods Witch

Woods Witch: mixed media on canvas, 2010.  

This was inspired based on the poem "The Wood Witch" by Madison Cawein, about a witch or perhaps will o' the wisp who lures travelers into her swamp.  It's in a collection of Halloween poems I regularly go to.  This was actually the first painting/collage I'd done in many years.  I'd been wanting to explore mixed-media work, and the idea of a haunted bog seemed to be a good place to start playing with layering techniques.  Below is a close-up of one of the lady slippers:

For a first attempt, I was very happy with this.  I really loved how the lady slippers turned out.