Tissue and FIRE CHERRIES MASK

 Tissue runs the show in today's post.

Mulberry paper is a thin, translucent paper containing wisps of white.  The paper itself usually comes in white (as shown in the link above) and at some art stores it can be bought in a choice of thicknesses.  The very thinnest version is nearly transparent, and is delicate to work with.  It was the thinnest mulberry paper that I used in today's first art-making process....

Above:  In the lower corner rests my supply of ultra-thin mulberry paper.  To its right and above it are two prints made using my newly released Fire Cherries Mask L879.  The bottle contains acrylic matte medium liquid.

Having allowed those prints to dry, I chose the one on sturdy, heavyweight paper, and brushed across its surface a coat of the matte medium liquid.  See below--

  

Next, I crumpled several mulberry papers, tore them to pieces, and covered the entire wet surface with these pieces, pressing them into the matte liquid medium.

Above:  Here is the finished piece after it has dried.  Notice than much of the mulberry paper has become invisible as it was saturated with the liquid matte medium.  But the remaining wisps of white add a nice touch to the overall image.

One word of warning -- don't make the mistake that I did!  I used gouache paint instead of acrylic paint.  Since gouache is nothing but opaque watercolor, it will re-hydrate when touched with any wet medium.  So the layer of matte medium liquid caused the red background to soften and bleed into some of the white areas of the print.  Moral of the story:  If using this technique to make art, use acrylic paint as the base coat!

Another approach to using tissue calls for a totally different kind of tissue.  I have on hand some sturdy tissue paper originally sold as giftwrap.  It looks like this ....

... and as you can see, both types are printed in metallic ink with butterflies, silver on the blue paper and gold on the beige paper.

I used a translucent acrylic paint to make my following two prints with Fire Cherries Mask L879; this translucency allowed the metallic butterflies to remain visible in the finished prints:

Above:  This print was made on the blue tissue paper imprinted with metallic silver butteries.   The layer of magenta paint lets the butterflies remain visible. 

Above:  This print was made on the beige tissue paper imprinted with metallic gold butteries.   The layer of red paint lets the butterflies remain visible, altho the butterflies stand out better in the areas that had been covered by the mask.

Thank you for coming to check out my blog today!  To scroll thru the pages of my StencilGirl masks and stencils, please start here.