A few weeks ago, I sent Elizabeth St. Hillaire Nelson some Monsoon Papers. During her collage class, she told several stories about people who sent her papers and how they could show up in a collage of hers. I love sharing Monsoon Papers, so off they went. And then, today, I got an envelope of colored papers back from Elizabeth. Colorful, printed, wild, interesting. And after a week of 
doing paperwork and getting the work done, I wanted to play. Perfect excuse! Off to the studio I ran. It’s still got boxes from last week’s demoing I did for Arizona Art Supply. I pushed them aside and got to work.
It felt right to make the same kind of collage we did in class–almost. I inked the backgrounds instead of collaging them. But I did enjoy shading the flowers by using different colors of paper. And I loved ripping into the papers. I still have a little trouble getting the shape right, because I tear left-handed, which can confuse me.
And of course I had to do another pear. I think there are art least two in the book, although I made four. Maybe I’ll frame all the different pears, but meanwhile I have two more loose-leaf journal pages. Now I can use Barbara Abercrombie’s book from yesterday’s review to choose a prompt and fill up the back of the pages!
Hmmm, looking at the pear, I want to take that flower in the center, meant to be a highlight, and push it down one-quarter of an inch. The nice thing about collage is that you can paper over paper.
Thanks, Elizabeth, these papers are already fun!
––Quinn McDonald is a sucker for collage. She’s still working on white-on-white collages, but a burst of color cheers her up. She still has to clean up the studio, though.
QuinnCreative 