Bird Collage with Handmade Papers

Plaza Arts has a Hands On Creativity Day every fall in Nashville.  I've attended for the last two years.   I met a wonderful artist and teacher there. Her name is Beth Grubb. I started this collage at her booth and then completed it at home. Beth does a lot of work with handmade papers from around the world.  When I took her first class, she said, "Let the paper speak to you."  That was scary advice at first.  Now I love that she gave us so much freedom to follow where the beautiful paper led.


The papers are Black Ink Papers and are all handmade.  There is amazing freedom in having access to so many lovely types of paper to work with.  Thank you, Beth!!  The two birds on this piece were cut with a Sizzix die.  The gold under the bottom bird is a piece of Christmas ribbon I've had for years.  The background was done by layering papers of different textures and colors.  I could play with this kind of paper all day.