Final Assessment piece - Free standing book

6.10.1

I started my final piece last year.  I had thought I knew just what I wanted, but after a really big struggle through the first two pages of a book that would have been about A4 format, I realised I was not at all happy with it, the way I was doing it or the size, so it got ditched.

This book, called Pittescombe Farm is a little wider than A5.  The paper used was one large piece of wallpaper lining paper.  I like using this as you can cut it as long as you like and it is, after all,  made to take water.

The piece I cut was 40cm wide by 120cm long and I then folded it in half lengthways with the fold at the bottom. The applied covers are mount board with gesso.

The front cover shows a millstone, that is still here. it is made from fun foam, painted with gesso, textured and other medium applied.  The hand dyed strips of cotton have been glued on. The fastening is by means of the ribbon and a 'tie down' stuck to the edge.

The back cover is one of my favourite sample pages. I thought of doing an image on top, but in the end left it as it is.  I may make a slip case for the book as I would like to keep it in good condition.

This is an overview of the first side.

The farmhouse  It took a while to work out that I had to cut a slit in the bottom of the page to get the middle section to pop forward, but I got there in the end. The right hand border is supposed to reflect the weathervane shown top left.  The gates at the bottom are individually cut and applied. as are the cows.

Bat Hotel  I think perhaps this page is a bit busy. I wanted to show all the birds we have, then after our bat survey, all six types of bats we have here. We will probably make one of the barns into a bat hotel. The anvil is on a pop up, but doesn't really show as such. I had to include the baby bat we rescued from our living room and my favourite pheasant.

Foxgloves and frogs   Perhaps my favourite page. We had an abundance of foxgloves last summer, and thousands of frogs the year before. The largest foxglove in the picture is mounted on acetate and pops up. the others were individually cut and stuck on, as were the frogs. Hand stitched band along the bottom.

Sheep and stream  I chose some of my photos of the stream - The Lumburn - that runs through the farm and embedded them plus one of the pond onto the page with plenty of gesso. I learned from a past lesson that it works better with more.  The lamb is again a pop up. There are so many different types of sheep, some of them written up the sides of the page. Again hand stitching, this time of course, in wool.

An overview of the reverse side

Starlings I wanted to combine collage with stamping and painting, but the small format means that is can't be too elaborate. The birds are done with yet another stamp made from foam and the two large ones in the foreground are cut out of black paper.

Bird watching The window, cat etc are made as a smaller double page than the background, so when it is opened, it gives a 3D effect.  It was a pickle to photograph it in an open enough position. Some of the birds are torn paper, one stitched.

Swallows and eggs I love having the swallows here in the summer and last year found several egg shells under the nests.  Yet another foam stamp, plus collaged eggs and bird drawn and painted, then stuck on.

This book has been a joy to do and it was lovely to spend time on a subject 'close to my heart'. The time taken was approximately 75 hours, plus hundreds of 'thinking' hours spent on getting all the things I wanted onto the pages and how to solve problems with pop ups and making it a double layer.  I left the cutting of the top until the end in case anything got cut by mistake.

There were not really any safety issue, apart from using scissors and a craft knife. I always use my cutting mat and have one small enough to slide in between the pages. The cover always goes back on when I have finished. The glues were PVA and a very handy Zig memo stick, both very 'friendly'.

The paints were mostly Inktense, some crayon, gouache and inks. No health issues there.

What an enjoyable three years, thank you so much Viv for being an excellent tutor.