Collage and Mixed Media Art - tips!

I love collage and find it an exciting art medium. It gives the artist unlimited freedom to explore paint and paper and found objects in interesting new ways and create a unique style. Collage has an interesting history and goes back hundreds of years. It emerged as an excepted contemporary art form in the 1920's when artists, such as Matisse and Picasso, created exciting and popular collage art.

When I first started experimenting with collage and mixed media on my own a few years ago, I found several challenges even my experienced art instructor, who had not worked in collage for many years, couldn't help with.

Strong supports

Having the right tools and materials makes all the difference! If you are working in mixed media and want the freedom to use lots of layers, fabric, found objects, and more, make sure your supports are strong - I recommend going to the hardware store and having them cut a plywood board into desired sizes. This is cheaper than buying from art stores! Always prepare your surface carefully by sanding the rough edges and using gesso.

Preparing your surface

Gesso comes in white, black, and even clear. I love using white gesso because the light shines through when adding transparent paints! Start layering your board with colors that entice you. I use Golden acrylic paint in a variety of transparent colors and combine them with the opaque colors for contrast.

Use Matte Medium and a brayer to adhere layers of paper

Put down high quality images from magazines, computer images, etc. with matte medium. First, brush the side you are placing on the board and adhere it firmly using a brayer. Then go over the image with more matte medium to prepare it for adding paint. Use the brayer and your fingers often to make certain your images are flat and will not buckle! Next, you can blend the edges of your images with Titan buff. Continue layering paint and images as you create a pleasing design! You can correct mistakes by painting Titan Buff over them and starting over.

I love the book, Creative Paint Workshop for Mixed Media Artists, by Ann Baldwin

This book was well worth the price, and I highly recommend it if you are getting started with mixed media collage. This book guides beginning collage artists on how to get started in two-dimensional mixed media painting.

This really helped me break through the fear and just go for it! Here are some tips I started using immediately, and it made all the difference.

Paints

After properly preparing your support (described in my hub, Collage and Mixed Media – tips), you start adding paint and beginning the layering process.

The technique of layering with glazes makes your paintings come alive.

Acrylic paints are wonderful for this medium, and the I recommends them over other paints. Here is why. Acrylic paints can be thinned with water or matte medium to achieve greater transparency. But, you can also chose from a beautiful array of already transparent paints. My personal favorite is Golden Acrylic paint. I simply adore the hues. Also, Golden provides a thin strip of paint on the outside of each bottle, jar, or tube to help you judge its transparency.

Here is a list of words that indicate that the paint is by nature transparent: dioxazine, phthalo, or quinacridone. Other transparent paints are Transparent Yellow Iron Oxide, Transparent Red Iron Oxide, and Jenkins Green—all used as the palette for the mixed media collage shown here. I find these are a beautiful combination. They have a lovely earthy tonality. But, you will find your own favorites! This is just a tiny tip of an enormous iceberg of possibilities open to you.

Watercolor paints can be used as the background layer of a mixed media piece, but they are not ideal for painting over acrylic – if you try this you will find a problem with beading.

Oil paints can be painted over acrylics but acrylics should not be painted over oil paints, and since acrylic adhesives cannot be mixed with oil paints, it is hard to find ways to attach collage to an oil painting.

Adding 3 dimensional objects, such as: shells, jewelry, feathers, buttons, fabric, and ribbon make your pieces mixed-media art. I find using a glue gun is perfect for this step. Antiques stores, consignment shops, and yard sales are great places to find interesting objects for mixed media art. I usually add object after painting and collaging, but there are no rules, so discover what works for you. Just go for it!

More on Making Art:

Journal your Heart Out

by Gerald Brommer (Author) "The aesthetic act of pasting objects and papers to a surface has been practiced in various folk arts for centuries, including twelfth-century Japanese text-collages decorated..."

I found this an excellent resource for collage techniques and covers a wide range of topics and demonstrations on collage.

I loved the section on papers. The author describes in great detail how to find paper, alter paper, recycle paper, and use photographic images to create beautiful collage. The photography is amazing, showing many styles and techniques that can inspire both newbies and experienced collagists!