It's next week...

Wow, time is already flying by. Another Sunday is upon us. No matter if you consider Sunday the weekend, or the first day of the week, time is marching on.

I thought I might touch some more on Artist Trading Cards (ATC). There is actually quite a bit of history on these works of art. Some say that ATC's are the modern day version of miniature paintings of the past. The invention of the camera certainly changed the need for small portraits. Whatever the reasons, ATC are popular ways to create and obtain original works of art.

The main rules of ATC's are simple. The size is that of a traditional trading card....think baseball, football, Beatles cards.... 2.5" x 3.5". They are for trading only. If you want to sell them, you are supposed to call them ACEO's, Art Card Editions and Originals...same card, different name.

I was going to post pictures of all of the ones that I have created, but I can't find them, I guess they are stored away somewhere. Here are a few that I have posted in the past.

I mostly draw mine, like this series called Sprites


Here I drew my images onto paper then tore them down to size and pasted them on black ATC sized card stock.

There are lots of artists that used mixed media in the creation of their art, and that certainly spills over into their ATC's, here is my version of mixed media miniatures...

I used stickers, polymer clay charms, a design cut from a fancy shopping bag and some words clipped from a newspaper article.



I'm not one for lace and such in my art, but I tried here in Meet Rose. I do have lots of beads on hand, so she wears a band of seed pearls for adornment in addition to a piece of lace cut from a strip and hand colored with markers to match the background.


The background for this ATC was created by placing watercolors randomly on a piece of 140# watercolor paper. You can buy pre-cut papers for ATCS, you can cut your own to size. You can also repurpose your art by taking a drawing that you weren't happy with and cut it to ATC size and add little bits of ephemera.

Here are three that I cut from a drawing that never did much for me, but it just might be the workings of some ATC's...


These last ones were done using an interesting technique. I chose various faces from a fashion magazine or catalog, lightly applied white gesso and them embellished them with paint markers, before gluing them to my card. I used YES paste as it handles thin paper quite nicely without causing any rippling.

This is a great way to get started on faces if you aren't happy with the level of your portrait drawing skills. You, of course, cannot claim someone else's image as your own, as I know you never would. Just remember about copyright infringements when using art other than your own in mixed media pieces. When you are done looking at mine, why not pop over to Flicker and look at some great ATC's from artists from all over.

While drawing this weekend, I happened upon a piece of conditioned Cernit in my pencil drawer and played with it while watching the tube. This is the result of that mindless kneading and rolling. A little doll pendant (about 3") that I baked and then painted several times, sanding each layer after it was dry to get an aged look.

That's all for now. I hope, this week, to be doing the seemingly constant cleaning and reorganizing that all artists have to do, so I may be back later with some wonder that I have gleefully uncovered from it's hiding place. If not, I will certainly create something fun and hopefully blog worthy.

Take care as you get ready for the new week. Stay healthy, happy and creative. Until then...