Santos Cage Paper Dolls

I had never heard of Santos Cage Dolls, so I had to do some research when JoAnn Robinson, who leads the Roses On My Table paper doll art group, posted the theme. Well, I was hooked. I liked the combination of religion and folk art, and the idea of having an openwork base--which serves like an altar--instead of legs was fascinating.

My obstacle was how to get that cool three-dimensional cage in a flat paper doll. After puttering around, I settled on using an antique dress form bottom as the inspiration, and created my own template.

I also wanted to get texture--I love the embossed look that some of my arty friends get with machines like a CuttleBug, but I don't have one. So, here's what I did: I applied modeling paste through a stencil onto heavy watercolor paper, then painted it (when dry) with Lumiere acrylic paint. I was happy with the effect, which I used for a couple of the cage bases.

I also love aged-looking images, so I painted the New York Times with a combination of Derwent watercolor blocks and Lumiere to get a rusted effect, which I used in another cage base.

I went a little crazy with this style, and made a bunch of dolls--some vintage looking and some more modern. I had a hard time deciding which ones to keep and which ones to trade with my art group.

Experiments with Embossing and Derwent Blocks

Lately I've been puttering with new materials: one is embossing powder, and the other, Derwent Inktense Blocks. They are both a lot of fun. the embossing powder is kind of messy, and I have tried it on both paper and fabric, and used both ordinary ink and slow drying ink to adhere it. I have more luck with the ordinary stamp pad ink even though it dries fast, mainly because I can see the image. The slow drying ink is not really ink...it is a clear liquid that is kind of oily, so it is hard to tell if the image is where you want it, and if it is fully covered.

The little energy symbol on the bottom left was screen printed, the beige were stamps on recycled teabags, and the top right has a stamp on a batik. The best image was the one done by screen printing an image on fabric using a thermofax screen, then sprinkling on the powder and zapping it with a heat gun. Over the weekend I didn't have my heat gun handy and substituted with a hair dryer--which did not work well at all.

I bought a few inktense pencils recently, and used them on my "Around the World" atcs. They were great--strong color that stayed strong after the pieces dried. So, I splurged and bought some blocks this weekend. They worked pretty well on fabric, and even better on paper. I tried them out on a recycled coffee filter and was pretty happy with the color.