I enjoy looking back through the year end review blog posts from previous years because it reminds me of things I’d forgotten about. I think all of the posts are filled with photos of nature and artwork, and this year is no exception.
January
February
March
April
May
June
July
August
September
October
November
December
May 2015 be a good one for us all!
Part two is for sharing the remaining three TerraSkin paper cuts exploring circles. Part one can be found here.
The series of six explores circles in new ways for me, as well as allowed me to work with TerraSkin paper more extensively. It feels slippery and light but is super easy to cut because there is no resistance to the knife. Each piece is 9″ x 11″, and each circle is about 7.25″ in diameter.
I backed these in black for the purposes of the photos but these will actually be displayed without a backing paper and unframed.
This work will be on display as part of Toronto Design Offsite Festival in January 2015 along with other designers and artists as a window display called, Vancouver Outside The Box. More details available on the website.
I’m going to share this small series of paper cuts in two parts because it feels like too many images for a single blog post. I shared in November about creating a paper cut using TerraSkin paper, which is made from stone rather than plant fibres. Over the last week and a half I created five more to meet a deadline for an upcoming exhibition.
The series of six explores circles in new ways for me, as well as allowed me to work with TerraSkin paper more extensively. It feels slippery and light but is super easy to cut because there is no resistance to the knife. Each piece is 9″ x 11″, and each circle is about 7.25″ in diameter.
I backed these in black for the purposes of the photos but these will actually be displayed without a backing paper and unframed.
This work will be on display as part of Toronto Design Offsite Festival in January 2015 along with other designers and artists as a window display called, Vancouver Outside The Box. More details available on the website.
I’ve had a few small commissions to work on for clients who ordered things during Culture Crawl. One of these is this small three dimensional paper cut for a good friend. She liked one of the pieces I had on display but wanted something similar in yellow rather than black.
The piece is small, only 5″ x 5″ from yellow card stock and backed with a lighter yellow in the framed version (which is too subtle to see in the photos). It resembles wheat blowing in the breeze rather than a wing as these pieces sometimes do. I’m inspired to do more work like this but on a larger scale going forward.
These are two recent commissioned pieces I created for clients over the last few weeks. This is the second paper cut letter C I’ve been requested to make, and the first Z (that’s zed not zee).
This is one of the offerings I have available on Etsy as a made to order item. The client chooses the letter and colours, and I do the cutting.
My friend Jasna of Dear Human has asked me to participate in a small project with a group of Vancouver artists and designers happening in Toronto early next year. The one requirement is for the work to be small and compact, so I’ve decided to use this as an opportunity to experiment with a new paper.
TerraSkin is a fiberless paper made from a combination of mineral powder and a small quantity of non-toxic resin. The paper has a slight gritty feel to one side, but the surface is smooth and easy to work with. It is also said to be water-resistant (not that I’ve tested this out). When cutting the paper there is no resistance to my blade because there aren’t any fibres to catch the edge upon.
The piece pictured here is the first of the small series of work I’m planning to create with this paper. It’s a lovely surface to work with, but I found myself working at a slower pace because it felt too easy for the blade to slip through this smooth paper and make a mistake.
I haven’t tested it out yet, but I’ve read TerraSkin is lovely to work with for printing and paints. I’m curious to test out my acrylic inks on the paper, and I’ll share more once I do so.
This is my favourite piece that I’ve made for the Eastside Culture Crawl. I love how the three larger shapes fit together, the flow of the small cut shapes, and the bright colours. I’ve titled this piece, Propeller.
As with all of the others for this series, the work is cut from a 14″ x 17″ piece of white drawing paper, and mounted to a piece of 16″ x 20″ Canson Mi-teintes paper. It’s all framed and ready for the Crawl, and I can’t wait to share it in person with people.
My show at Kafka continues until December 1st, and the Eastside Culture Crawl is coming up fast on November 20th to 23rd. And then I’m taking a break….
I was thinking about a pinwheel when I started this piece and though it ended up not becoming much like an actual pinwheel I am keeping it as the name. When I work on these I often can’t tell how the larger form is going to work until most of the paper cutting is done.
The work is a 14″ x 17″ paper cut mounted onto 16″ x 20″ Canson Mi-teintes grey paper. I added the blue circle because as I was framing this I felt it needed a contrasting shape and colour to make the design stronger.
This is part of the same series of work I created for my show at Kafka, but it will be on display at my studio location during the Eastside Culture Crawl, November 20th to 23rd.
This is work I have been sitting on for months while I waited for the advertisements to be approved by the client and go to print. I was commissioned in June by ReThink Communications to cut and fabricate by hand two illustrated scenes created from ten layers of paper to advertise So Nice soy and almond milk.
Around the time I completed my part of the work I shared two tiny details of a bird and a maple leaf, one from each scene. It gives an idea of the scale I was working at, though both scenes once assembled were approximately 9.75″ high, 3.75″ wide, and 8″ long.
Work in progress of the Yoga pose diorama, just after all the layers were cut.
Work in progress of the Yoga pose diorama, fully assembled in my studio.
Work in progress of the Gardening diorama, just after all the layers were cut.
Work in progress of the Gardening diorama, fully assembled in my studio.
The paper I worked with was 100lb watercolour paper, which was a heavier paper than I was used to at the time. The agency wanted a handmade look and feel to the pieces, to suit the organic focus of the products. The blank cartons were provided by the client, and skinned in post-production by the agency.
The final version of the artwork used in the advertisement can be viewed in my portfolio.
This piece was originally going to be a square made of smaller squares, but as I got closer to completion I felt the idea was really boring. I left the two opposing corner squares uncut for a few weeks while I contemplated what it needed to feel right, and I chose circles over squares.
Looking at this now I begin to wonder whether all of these recent geometric paper cuts would be stronger if they were cut away from the surrounding white paper and floated against the colourful background. Food for thought in the work I create in future. I should mention the colours in real life are not as bright as pictured here.
The finished piece is 17″ x 14″ cut from Canson drawing paper, and backed with Canson Mi-teintes coloured papers. This is but one of the many new works on display in my show at Kafka opening this Friday.