30.1.11

Recycled Doll





My friend Libby and I decided to do a monthly art exploration. We will choose a monthly theme or idea and see what we come up with. January's project was to use things you would throw in recycling to make a doll.

I had a plastic milk bottle which was the perfect shape for a body, a toilet paper tube extended the neck and while the styrofoam egg wasn't in my recycling, it was something I had so I didn't have to purchase a thing. I decided I would try my hand at paper mache, something I hadn't done since about fourth grade. I remember not liking it very much because the stuff got everywhere and I had cold mush running down my arms. Well, that was how it was in fourth grade, but I thought maybe I could be an adult and do it differently. I found a great website, Ultimate Paper Mache for recipes and hints. I decided to use warm water to mix up the paste and that was so much nicer to work with...no freezing fingers! I will say it was better than I remembered and I would probably do it again but as you can see I didn't get the surface very smooth. It was a fun experiment though and all in all I think it turned out pretty well.

After three layers of newspaper strips were applied and thoroughly dried, I drilled holes in the sides to put a wire through to string the beads for the arms and then painted everything and added the wooden beads for arms. Some glass flowers finished her off! Next month is making a two dimensional piece inspired by things in the kitchen - stay tuned!




3 comments:

thecatalanway said...

Great idea and I LOVE that you are doing this with your friend. SOmetimes it is so hard to motivate myself but if I had an art buddy I think I could get going again. there are some wonderful recycled things here at the Fiesta in Gracia every year - fish and octopus made out of old water bottles and stuff. I'd like to have a go at making animals. There is an artist in Cornwall called David Kemp http://www.davidkemp.uk.com/ have you heard of him? He uses all thrown away stuff. K x

Magpie's Mumblings said...

Great concept Susan - and a wonderful doll as a result. It's such a motivator to have an artist friend to play with.

layers said...

what a fun idea- to recycle stuff and end up with a creative colorful doll.