Altered books pages

One of the worksops I do is Altered Books and here are a few sample pages.  Techniques include stitching pages together, or just stitching on them, sticking lace etc on a page and painting over the whole thing, punching shapes out along the edges . . .

 

 

. . . sticking in bits of stitched stuff and printing and overpainting . . .

 

. . . windows, and something interesting to see in them . . .

 

 

. . . a series of graded holes, colour grouping . . .

    

 

. . . any other bits and pieces which give something interesting to look at.

 

Keep an illustration already in the book and add colour and more drawing, also 'ransom note lettering' cut from magazines etc.

 

Stick pictures in from magazines, brochures etc and extend the illustration by drawing some of your own.

 

A herb collection, stuck in or drawn . . .

Texture- masking tape, torn paper bits, stuck then painted over.  The paunt is taken up differently by the fifferent surfaces.

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Tissue over string, sticky bits . . .

 

. . . painted strips of crumpled paper with a matt side and a plasticy side . . . again, different paint take-up.

 

Lace etc stuck ready to paint over.

 

Fancy lettering, a cut frame, piece of embroidery on paper stuck behind frame.  Some pen work needs adding here, patterns (doodling?), or some printing in the background or . . . ?

I rather like stitching on paper, and mostly poke holes first if it is more than one layer of paper.

 

Colour gradation is fun too, and these zigzag bits will be partly stitched together and decorated in some way, eventually.

If you want to cover the print more then more paint needs adding, or gesso, enough to hide it.  I quite like the textural effect of leaving it at least partly visible.

Birthday book making . .

. . . at eldest granddaughter's 12th birthday party. She and 6 friends coloured paper with wax crayons and oil pastels washed over with metallic paints. They then stuck the paper (ably hairdryered by Dad and Grandad) to corn flakes packet card (her dad eats a lot of them) covers and stitched two signatures inside.

Making more books

Open spine books, with chain stitching linking the signatures and board covers together.

1. Plain board (sketch pad backing) and A4 sheets folded in half. Paper is from an activity pack for children bought at the Early Learning Centre so its a bit rough and ready! I'm using the book to make notes on the TAST series for which it is proving just right. 2. Grey board covered with printed and painted paper. The print block was made by incising a piece of polystyrene tray used to package meat in supermarkets. The paper is printer paper and thread a multicolour hand dyed mercerised cotton. A5 sheets folded in half.

3. Grey board again, covered with painted paper (back) and more painted paper backed with iron-on vilene and free machine-stitched with rayon threads (front). More dyed cotton thread for the stitching. The paper comes from a scrapbook. I reckoned on using a white gel pen in this book, but the one I bought doesn't show up, so what do I do now? Use it to stick things in I suppose. Bit smaller pages than 2.

4. More covered grey board, and activity pack paper. Bought thread though, a thick stranded cotton. I've tried to find a way of incorporating beads as the signatures are stitched together and have failed, so I stitched this book up, then attatched the beads separately afterwards. Also invented the ties. Pages are A4 torn in 3 across.

Closer view of beads and ties to finish this entry.

I love handling these books, making them is a real joy and using them even better!