52 Weeks of Collage

52 Weeks Of Collage with Moon Full Art.

In this year long weekly collage series I will focus on sharing collage techniques to beginners!   52 weeks of no fancy arts supplies or techniques.  Aaack can I do it?!!!  We all started as beginners.  And when I was beginning to be interested in collage and art journaling, youtube was NOT a thing.  And AOL was were all the cool kids hung out.  So I started out using magazines, clear tape, and ink pens.  And by ink pens I mean bic ink pens, no gel pens, or extra fine felt tip markers in 126 colors, or alcohol markers or dual sided brush markers.  It was the Stone Ages, I tell ya.   We also didn't have a wide variety of various price point "dollar Stores".  To keep this series Beginner Friendly I am using mostly supplies from the Dollar Stores, primarily Dollar Tree with some Dollar General and Family Dollar here and there. Except my glue stick which came from dickblick.com and my journal, which came from Arteza.com. Let's start with the Weekly Prompts and then we'll get into the supplies.  You Ready?

Weekly Collage Prompts

My goals for the list of prompts was for it to be beginner friendly, everyday words that would be easy to find images to represent your individual interpretation at that time you decide to do your collage.  

Supplies

My journal came from arteza.com I'm using the Arteza 110 lb, 68 pages watercolor book.  Square format of 8.25 inches x 8.25 inches.  When journals say x number of pages, think:  pages in a book.  If it says x number of sheets, think single sheets of paper.  I don't know why its not consistent!  Even across the same brand, some journals say pages, some journals say sheets.  Since this journal has 68 pages, it has 34 sheets.  And in order to get all 52 collages I will have to put collages on both sides of the 34 sheets.  

image property of arteza.com

Truth of the matter is you can make your collages on whatever you want.  I personally wanted all the collages together in one book, so I'm using this bound journal.  If you also want all your collages together in one book you can use a bound drawing sketchpad, from the "dollar store".  The quality of the paper is less of a issue since we're not drawing or painting.  We're mostly covering up the paper with collage, uhh more paper.  Some things to consider for collages is that the act of collage will make the book thicker and in a bound book such as mine it will no longer stay closed because the pages are so thick.  If that bothers you, consider a wire bound journal it will give you more lead way.  But it will still not stay closed the way that it did when it was new.  Also consider if the paper is thick enough to hold up to the weight of collage.  I have seen some lovely journals made from standard composition books which have notebook paper in them.  Some things to do to help thinner paper hold up is glue two pages together and run a line of tape along the inside bound edge to strengthen it.   Another option is to make your collages on letter size sheets of drawing paper, cardstock or scrapbook paper, then put them in a page protector and in a 3 ring binder.  If you have more questions about paper and selecting a journal feel free to leave a comment below.

All you really need to make collages is 1) a surface to apply the collage to.  2) something to stick the collage to the surface.  3) something to collage such as images and words.  4) I need scissors without them I tear the images that I'm trying to tear out.

Basic supplies.  Journal.  Scissors.  Glue Stick.  Pens and pencil. Five magazines from Dollar Tree Store.  Patternworks catalogue, (old this website no longer exists).  Burpee Gardening Catalogue to use as my gluing surface. 

Basic Supplies +1. Stickers. All from various "dollar stores".  Who doesn't love stickers?  You don't need stickers to make a great collage.  But they are fun.

Accessories.  More things you don't need to make a great collage, but they are fun to use.  The yarn scraps are from my stash, I knit, crochet and handspin, I have yarn scraps!!!  Don't hate me because I'm beautiful..err multi-craftual. What else is did I bring along for our year together?  Tissue paper from presents.  Bubble wrap two different sizes from various shipped items.  Makeup sponges to spread paint and to press down on glued pieces.  Craft paints from the "dollar stores".  Black, blue, green, yellow orange, orange, gold, silver.  Plastic fork for making marks with or in paint.  Parchment paper (waxed paper is great too) for protecting below pages from glue.  Also for preventing pages from sticking together when you need to close the book before the glue has dried.  Does it look like a lot of supplies?  Don't be nervous.  Nothing and I mean NOTHING in that pile is precious!  Everything except the journal and glue stick is either recycled or came from the "dollar store". 

Organizing and wrangling. 

Attempt at staying organized!  A gift bag and some plastic containers.

Everything fits into its own little bucket.  Having all the supplies for this collage series together will limit me from randomly grabbing other supplies.  And just keeping it real I absolutely have some 'fancy' supplies.  But I built up to those after using supplies from the 'dollar store' and learning what I do and don't like.  And learning what the limitations of craft paint and glue sticks are.  Start where you are and build  from there.  And have fun learning, exploring and sharing.  

Share your collage journey with us at:  #52collages2021

#52collages2021