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| By now I think you all know how much I love to take a trip....I love the planning and the packing (sort of) , the plane ride (amazing, I know) or road trip. I like actually being there -- wherever that is-- and I like being home with lots of paper ephemera to play with. I like editing my photos and printing them and making mail art and collages and re-living the whole darn thing! |
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| So -- come on into my studio and see what I've been playing with..... |
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| OUTGOING (to Kelly P) I think a letter is always more interesting when it is written on interesting papers and lots of postcards and menus and ephemera is all tucked in.... |
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| OUTGOING ....so all of that got tucked in to this map origami folder and put in to a vellum envelope and sent out on its way... |
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| I like to make collages while traveling -- and I do -- but sometimes I am just too busy exploring and having fun to finish them so I bring an envelope of stuff I have torn from tourist brochures and collage when I get back home. It seems to make the trip last longer. |
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| VIRGINIA After eating the boxed lunch at Sally Bell's I flattened the box -- and that cool checkered black and white paper -- and took it home. Reconstructed the box and filled it with ephemera from my trip - postcards, matchbooks, menus, transit tickets....a nice little souvenir of the trip....(and easy). |
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| Collaged Postcards Now put me in an airplane seat and give me a SkyMall catalog to tear up and I'm happy. They have some crazy stuff in those SkyMall catalogs and I know how to use it! The various airline magazines are fun to tear up too. |
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| Boston Now -- just pick up free stuff wherever you find it. I took the Dunkin' Donuts coffee bean bags and made envelopes out of them. And these little free booklets (for kids) at the Boston Museum made great little collaged booklets of the trip... |
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| DC page |
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| DC page |
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| Boston page....you get the idea....or you could use the small hotel stationery pads and write a letter on them and stick the pages inside the booklet for a letter? These are just a few of the projects I've got going....I am making a book for all my Turkey/Italy photos and a Chinatown book of ephemera/photos in a vintage Chinese school book and I'm making envelopes and collages and writing letters. I sent off almost all of the little art pieces to be hidden in a book. (Still waiting for a couple of you to email your addresses to me so I can send you one). (Want to see any of that? Let me know) What are you working on? |
Goodness, Pamela! When do you sleep? :) I was thrilled when my art pieces for a book arrived. I have to show it off in an upcoming post. Mine might find a home in a finished journal or one of my art books, possibly Vermeer or Rembrandt. Or even a book at the library. No. I'll create something to keep it going. No one ever picked up one of my Bookcrossing books. LOL. I can't seem to give ANTHING away.
ReplyDeleteChinese red is a favorite color. The gold makes it pop. I bought paper with Chinese paper lanterns. I'm trying to do calligraphy for a fan. Imagine a letter written on a fan. It would have to be in English though. :) But I could paint cherry blossoms or a dragon, except my dragons aren't very good.
Do you have a great filing system? I tend to mislay goodies or morgues. We are truly sisters at heart, but you're the more experienced sister. :)
I like the way you think. You and Karen could be related. LOL.
Hi Limner--I like being the "experienced sister"....haha
ReplyDeleteMaybe we are all related in some way. I just love the process of making art...
A great filing system, you asked?
Ah...nonononono.....I am a mess and can never find things. Sometimes it works out and I make interesting connections from just picking up random things. But I have been looking for the folder with the mail art kit entries for a month now so I can make a zine and have yet to locate it. Ahem.
You will find it when it is meant to be found. :) Continue doing what you do just the way you do it. :)
DeleteThanks for the post--I enjoyed seeing your trip ephemera. I've been doing something similar in my own personal journals for years and I really enjoy looking back on the memories.
ReplyDeleteCindy -- I'd like to see what you do with your travel ephemera. The Russian cookbook will be going out today or tomorrow....
DeleteI have a trip to Hawaii coming up next week, and I really like the look of these. Another option that I like is a lot of the time I make and send my mail art to my husband each night along the way so we have it at our house and it reminds us what we did each day. :) There's the occasional risk of losing one in the mail, of course, but that's also part of the ephemeral nature of the medium.
ReplyDeleteFor our Hawaii trip, I ordered 60 of the Hawaiian shirt postcards to bring with us (and the necessary one cent additional stamps to make them the right postage). I was not a fan of those stamps in general when I was sending them on postcards from the east coast, but I have a feeling they will fit in nicely on postcards sent from tropical islands. :)
Melissa--OooOooo Hawaii.....so lucky. I never liked those Hawaiian shirt stamps either but you're right - they are perfect to use from the islands. I remember pressing a lot of flowers in books when I was there. That is a terrific idea to send mail art back home to your husband. I bet they all get delivered. Have a wonderful time.
DeleteI keep all kinds of stuff from my travels too, but I never made such original art with them. I'm working on a reply for a mail art call, I hope I can finish it without thinking I messed up. ^^"
ReplyDeleteTomoyoHime--that reminds me of the rubber stamp someone used that said "It's ART if I say it's ART". Just have fun and enjoy the process of creating.
DeleteI have had stacks of ephemera sitting around from my trips for years and I decided it is much more fun to use the stuff and make things rather than let it sit around. So I made books and collages and put the photos and journals and everything all together in boxes or tied up with a ribbon and I have a wonderful souvenir.
What a fun family reunions we'd have if we were all related. I love what you do with all your travel ephemera. I'm in the DC 'burbs right now, heading to the postal museum tomorrow!
ReplyDeleteThe DC burbs -- you gotta get to that darn Postal Museum and you'll sense my spirit there! Have a great time and of course we'll need a full report!
DeleteThis is the right day for me to read a post like this one. I'm off for five weeks soon and am tossing book-and-mail-art-kit concepts in my head, trying to balance off weight and bulk with the need to have art and book making stuff at hand.
ReplyDeleteDo you know I was actually tempted to buy a new set of 25 pastels in pencil form??!! despite suspecting that your old media will be upset if you take new media on your trip and leave them behind.
I can figure out the basic kit: scissors and gluesticks. But what to add next?? Perhaps I'll just be a minimalist and buy stuff there (Barcelona, Normandy, Amsterdam.)
I'll be sure to visit each post office.
Wow! That sounds like a fabulous trip! I always put double stick tape in my kit. It is very useful -- and a couple of rolls of washi tape and good pens. It is tricky to bring what you need but not too much. Of course you are right -- you can buy supplies when you are traveling. A good excuse to visit art supply shops. I always bring some pre-cut postcard blanks so I can collage on them while I'm traveling....Have a wonderful trip.
DeleteMarvelous all, your mail voice is so clear and I always love all your work.....studio happiness I would say. xox
ReplyDeleteThanks, Corrine! Lovely comment as usual.
DeleteLooks like you're having fun! I ADORE those little booklets (LOVE...LOVE...LOVE). I'm going to my Library today to see if a HUGE, OLD Nat Geo book is still there- for sale ($2.00). I want to fold a page or two...like you.
ReplyDelete$2 for a huge old map book??? Millicent -- how could you pass that us??? Go get it. can't wait to see what you do with it.
DeleteBook was gone- Darn it!
DeleteOh no....that will teach you to pass things up...lol...I bet you will find another one though. I do see them around. Or come to SF Library Big Book sale in September. they always have lots....
DeleteHi Pamela! Very good Ideas! I love to collect ephemera from trips, but once I am home I seldom get anything done with them. I am bad to have a stack of stuff to make up into mail art from a trip that get shoved somewhere in a white tornado cleaning binge only to be found months later in some obscure location. Right now I am looking for a stack of menus I have collected from the Vegan restaurants my son took me to when I visited him in Dallas in Dec. I really want to find them, since they remind me of my happy trip out there, but also because there are several entrees I would love to reproduce at home. Thanks for your peek into your studio! elle
ReplyDeletewww.artofaletter.blogspot.com
www.aviewfromthecottgae.blogspot.com
ElleMental -- Don't feel bad -- I am still looking for my folder with "What's In Your Mail Art Kit" entries so I can make a zine. I absolutely know it is here somewhere!
DeleteI just saved stuff too but now I try to make art with my travel ephemera and put it to good use! And get rid of the duplicate stuff that I don't need...
I'll show a few other projects-- maybe it will help inspire you.
I just entered a comment for this fabulous blog and it went to the wrong date. I am just hopeless about these things. But what I said was how much I love seeing your postcards, envelopes and collage material all displayed. It makes me just want to get up and go to my drafting table and create something and many times that is exactly what I do. Now let's hope I can remember how to do this more often. ju
ReplyDeleteOh Stop -- anyone who can make fabulous artistamps as you can knows their way around a computer! Thanks for continuing to try to comment, aoumiss....you know I appreciate it a lot. And i happen to know you are often at your table creating because i get wonderful mail from you.
DeleteThank you for the lovely letter with all the surprises!! :D
ReplyDeleteYay! you got it pretty quickly, Annejo. Good thing since I was way too slow in getting it written and in the mail to you....
DeleteWhat wonderful ideas. I think you are right that the cutting and pasting when we get home is a fun way to extend the trip and will be very enjoyable when we revisit the times in years to come. I hope that by getting creative with some of this memorabilia will cement it better in my memory as well.
ReplyDeleteYou are inspired! and inspiring....
Thanks, CJ -- you are sweet to say so. It really does extend the trip and it is such fun to have some really creative souvenirs of your travels.
DeleteI'm counting the days to our summer vacation in Hawaii .... I will definitely be doing this! I like the idea of saving all those odds and ends to make something later
ReplyDeleteThank you for your nice comment on my blog, it was a pleasure to meet you :)
Kim--thank you! Lovely to meet you too. I'm sure you find find lots of wonderful ephemera to play with on your Hawaii trip. Stay tuned because I'm going to post more ideas.
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