Stars and Stamps

Maths, geometry, science, stars - all on varying levels of geekdom have been flowing through my brain as I have been working on my new collection.

Following the lovely response to my last set of new cards, made from my 5x7" collage art pieces, I have been working on a series of 6x4" collages which can then in turn be made into blank greeting cards as well.

I've been wanting to use constellations in a series for a little while now but have not been having any luck at figuring out what I wanted to do. I wasn't sure whether I wanted to use the myths behind some of the constellations as the base and build on that, or use the physical shape that they make. I toyed around with trying to use the mythology but it became so convoluted that very few people would have seen the significance. I am still working on sourcing recycled materials that will work to do some large scale constellation pieces which have the mythology and character of the story behind them involved, but that's not for now.

The main thing that I personally enjoy about the constellations are the shapes. I have started with one of my favourite constellations. Cassiopeia. She would have been my favourite to try and use the mythology as well (much easier than Ursa Minor!) but she has a lovely shape and I like the significance of how she appears differently depending on the time of year.

I've been playing with different ways of showing the constellations and with different materials, so we'll see how it goes from here.
And now you're all up to date on what my week is going to be about! Hope everyone is healthy and happy.

Vick.

Round Up

I'm having a good couple of weeks. There's a lot going on, which I always love and I'm being busy and useful. This is unusual but lots of fun!

Firstly I sold my flat. I think most people know this already but it is now gone, I am no longer attached to London - which means I am really looking forward to visiting it again and trying to re-learn how to love a city that became a nightmarish reminder of estate agents and household problems!

This weekend Exlineal have organised a signing in Leicester this Saturday. Author Mark Chadbourn will be signing in the Highgate Waterstones from 12.30 until 2.30. This is a rather rare signing/sighting so definitely worth heading along to. There is even going to be cake, seriously - cake! And if Exlineal's charming company, cake and being in a bookstore isn't enough incentive, I've read the books and I can certainly recommend them. If you can't make it then I am honestly sorry you'll be missing out, but you can of course still get the books from the magical internet at least!

In other book-ish news the ever so lovely Zoë Marriott's books were storming up the Amazon charts last week. Much excitement meant that I decided to dig them out of the shelves and have a re-read. If you've not checked them out have a look. Also, she has a fab blog.  And a shout-out to Kaz Mahoney who's just had her first foreign cover through - completely fab news. I was introduced (over the internet, but it still counts) to Kaz and Zoë at the same time so it makes sense to me to talk about them together!

In Etsy news I have finally completed my mini-challenge to myself and my shop now has 100 items in it. The next step is to get as many items as possible up to 100 views. Then of course the next step will be getting 100 sales. I might be a litle way away from that still! My new range of cards seems to be popular and I've had some lovely comments about it so far.

Sticking with Etsy for a minute there have also been so many changes happening recently that I have been spending a lot of time catching up and making sure that I know what is going on and understand it fully. For those of you using Etsy occasionally there is a new way of organising searches on the site so that you will hopefully get more useful results. This is great news, in my opinion, for both sellers and buyers as well. I've certainly been seeing the benefits already. Well done, Etsy!

I have also opened my shop on Folksy. I'm not sure how to define it yet but I wanted to get a couple of my favourite pieces there to make sure my presence in the UK wasn't fading as I am doing fewer craft fairs now and focusing online which is largely US based still.

The other day I was very kindly featured in a blogpost over on Katy's site Far Flung Cards. She did a piece on me and my artwork and I am very flattered and deeply honoured, she's a wonderful person and I really appreciate having her in my crafting life.

I have a couple of exciting things possibly happening as well which I shall update about as and when they happen. I hope that everyone else is having a wonderful time,

Vick.

Cards from Collages

I have started selling a new range of cards over on Etsy based on my own small art collages. This is part of me trying to make sure I am keeping my Etsy shop full and updated. It's part of a much larger (and also quite long-winded and very businessy) business plan. So here are the new chaps. Say hello!

Vick.

All Hail Etsy

Etsy has been all change recently. The virtual labs have gone! Now, I read everything that the Etsy admins said about this and I understand, but it still makes me sad, I learnt so much in the Labs. Livestream is great but since they switched I barely ever bother going in to listen - I am going to make more of an effort from now on. There is a wealth of knowledge on that site and one of the best things about it is that almost everyone is willing to help others out.

Everything is changing. I am taking lots of advice, actually that's not new. For people who know me outside of Etsy they might be surprised at how much I seek out advice on Etsy and crafting/art in general. I love hearing other people's ideas and have a new page (called a lens for some bizarre reason) over on Squidoo after taking the advice of a lovely Etsyer.

I am also looking to bulk out my shop. I'm not sure what this will be with but this was the reason behind the 100-100 post a little while back. I'm aiming to be posting much more often, of  course as soon as I determine that I am going to do this a whole host of other things happen to get in the way!

I realise that there is a lot of a mixture on the blog so if people haven't had a poke around Etsy (I'm not trying to drive you to my shop now!) there is an awful lot of amazing stuff on there and it is very well organised. There are so many different ways to find handmade and vintage products, I highly recommend giving it a try.

Vick.

p.s. The pictures I used today are the ones that I used as the background to my latest collages that I was working on over the weekend! See - not entirely random.

One Year

I hadn't realised but last week I passed my Etsy anniversary. I started my site over a year ago and for the first five/six months all that I sold was jewellery. Now there is no sign of the jewellery as I only sell it at craft-fairs and there's a whole bunch of cards and art pieces along with lots of room for more of both.

This inevitably made me think about the past year. I can't quite believe how different things are. I never wanted this to be an overly personal blog so I won't write details. All I wanted to say was that a lot of things seem to be very similar but all of the little things that matter a lot have subtly changed. I've got a whole new bunch of friends that I have managed to find, steal, borrow, etc. as well and it does no harm to say that I really appreciate them, a lot. I am doing something completely different now and have a range of interesting things coming up in the next few months from commissions to entirely new businessy ideas. I'm also playing around with some new places to sell my art pieces so hopefully there will be more on that when I know a little more. It's an exciting time.

I'm going to go and get back to work, because I have a lot more to do. I'm not as far with Etsy as I had hoped I would be but I'm still enjoying it and I'm still improving - I think!

Vick.

p.s. The Etsy anniversary was a little while ago now but this looking-back post was delayed as I realised there were other things I wanted to put up here first...

More Hundreds

In an update to my 100-100 blog the other day I have been posting on Etsy and trying to decide what to make next. I'm debating a series of A3/A2 finer art pieces. Or maybe some more geometric shapes again. Hmmm. So many options! Anyways, rather than spamming Twitter and Facebook with links to the new cards I've put up I thought I'd just put pictures up on here.

So many cards - I'll probably promote a few of these in the usual places as well. Just because!

Vick.

100 - 100.

I've set a new goal for myself on Etsy. I want to get 100 pieces in my shop and then get as many as possible with over 100 views. Maybe even one day I can be aiming for 100 hearts as well!
I know that the more items in a shop the better chance you have to stand out from everyone else so this is the new aim.

I'm putting lots of greetings cards on at the moment and once this section is done I'm going to spend a couple of weeks making a whole group of new collages. I've got some fun ideas to play around with so that's pretty exciting too.

I'm still writing the poetry but it felt like too long without an art blog post so here's what I've been doing with this part of my life!

Vick.

Consignment

I'm still collecting great genre quotations over here but here's something a little different for today!
 
This week I've mainly been working on consignment and wholesale packs. This is a whole new world to me. For those not in the know wholesale is when an artist/crafter sells a large amount of work to a retailer for a reduced price. Consignment works on a sale-or-return basis where you draw up a contract and the retailer sells your work and both the shop and the artist take a percentage of the price paid.

Sounds simple, right? Nah of course not. I'm terrified that I've missed something out of the packs or have come across as too flighty and artistic or on the other hand too businessy and therefore cold.
I've read so many articles this past week on the best way to approach shops, what you must and must not do, what each pack needs to have and my head is spinning. 
My consignment pack currently consists of a page of colour photographs of six examples of my cards, an artist CV, a page of information about my cards, my wholesale/consignment policies, my pricing list, environmental policies and my contact details. This is all presented in a clear folder so that it is protected if it is kept on file for later reconsideration.

It's a lot like submitting a manuscript (see examples of plays at the top of the page!) because you only get one shot to make your first impression and if you mess it up then it's unlikely that the shop will be interested in you again. No pressure then! I've spent a lot of time trying to get the balance of everything right, picking the right pictures to represent my work and enough information that people feel that they know enough about my work and my concept. At the same time I am trying to build up a bigger stock of cards both for consignment and also for the Etsy shop. So it's been a full-on week in the world of cards.


The next step is to find as many shops as possible and then research them to find the ones that are the perfect fit for what I am doing. Sometimes I forget how much I still need to learn and then I start doing something like this - it's scary but also exciting and a great way of learning by diving in head-first!

Vick.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/vclinde
https://twitter.com/vclinde

Green - Emerald - Jade - Chartreuse

There are many things that I like about making collages, as well as a few I don't. I can't remember the last time my nails looked even half-way to respectable or when I didn't have glue all over me. It is wonderful finding images, text, and other assorted oddments to turn into a completely new piece of art or a brand new card. 

I didn't start making collages just because they are an environmentally responsible way of crafting but it was a pretty big part of it. I love the combination of recycling and upcycling that goes into what I do.
I am going to link through to this blog-post from my Etsy shop so that anyone who wants to check out my green credentials will be able to see what I do.

I'll start by saying that I am an Ecocentric greenie. I am not now, nor ever have been anthropocentric. I have no doubt that if we damage the Earth enough then she will bite back and hard enough to finish us off and then heal herself. This is fine by me. I'm all for existing but I also think that a new ice age would fix a lot of things. I also have a bit of a Cornucopian buried inside me, but that's a debate for another time. I do love debates on Environmental Politics, to the point at which I think even my lecturer at Uni got used to me playing Devil's advocate. (This is one of his works on Green Politics if anyone's interested)

All of my collage materials are recycled.
The books are pre-read at least once and a lot of thought goes into which books I choose. Obviously they need to be out of copyright, not precious enough to me that I can't bear to cut them up, have nice text that will be visually pleasing and have enough of a pull that if someone wants to read the words they will be interesting.

The stamps which I use are from when I was a little girl and collected them. I mainly collected them because they were pretty rather than because I wanted a huge stamp collection. The ones that didn't make it into an album are now being used in collages. I am running a bit low and will need to restock soon but I won't be using new stamps but old ones that I will them upcycle into art.

The images that I use are taken from so many varied places that it would be silly to try and list them but all of them are recycled and repurposed. Magazines, photographs I have taken, postcards, newspapers, pictures, comics etc. All beautiful, colourful and with a brand new purpose in my collages.

Sometimes I do have to use backing paper for the base-layer of my collages (although this is clearly not the case with cards!) and I always try to make sure that this is made from recycled materials. I know there are a lot of 'try' in this and I wish I could guarantee that everything is 100% recycled but I just can't. I do promise to do my best though.

Postage and packaging is also a hot topic for Etsy recyclers. Wherever possible I will use recycled materials. I also often reuse packages for sending things. However, my main concern when sending either art or cards is that the item gets to a buyer in one piece. If someone is buying an item for a friend and wants it to arrive looking all shiny and new then I will very happily use a brand new bubble-lined package. If not I will sometimes use one that I've had things sent to me in. I buy *a lot* of books and it would be churlish of me not to re-use the packages when I am trying to be careful about my impact on the environment. Also it is another way that I can help to keep my shipping costs down for everyone!

I'm pretty sure there are more things that I will think of that I either do which are considered 'green' and I hope that I will keep finding new ways of making my little business a little more environmentally friendly. Because I like the Earth very much - just as she is.

Vick.
http://www.etsy.com/shop/vclinde