Artist's Tool Kit: Game Pieces
Hey! Don't throw those away!! Use them in your art!
It's happened to us all. We've got three or four game boxes with that, that or the other thing. Why keep them? It's trash, right? No way! Use these game pieces in art!!
I don't think I've met a person in my life that doesn't own one or more games that are missing pieces. (Yes, decks of cards are included in this little poll.) Why do we keep these games? They're trash, right? They're certainly not worthy for a garage sale or eBay auction, right?
Wrong! I was introduced to a group of artists in 2003 that used game pieces regularly in their art. Then, I discovered bags of miscellaneous game pieces and game boards sold in mixed lots on eBay, etsy.com and other "for sale by owner" type-sites. I was amazed. I was intrigued. I was inspired.
So, I got to work!
I went through every game I owned and, before long; I had a shoebox full of odds and ends. What happened here? I just "from trash to treasured" my home and now I was the proud owner of a new variety of art supplies. Now, what am I going to do with all of this stuff? Here are some of the projects I worked on using game pieces:
1. Collages: I found myself working with these more often than not. I like creating collages that don't follow a particular theme, then incorporating the game pieces or playing cards into the work as the layers are applied.
2. ATC’s: I've used the game pieces both on themed cards and random collage cards. There was also one opportunity where I collaged a piece of card stock completely with paper elements and game pieces, then cut it up into ATC’s. That was a very interesting project because you're not quite sure what you're going to end up with.
3. Altered books: This, of course, requires "flat" game pieces unless you're affixing many pages together and doing a cut out. It doesn't matter if your game pieces or plastic or paper or any other material so long as you use a very sturdy adhesive.
4. Assemblage paintings: I had SO much fun incorporating game pieces into an assemblage painting. I covered the entire canvas (stretched 4x4) with a solid color, then layered on magazine pictures and text. Then I layered over some more paint and affixed the game pieces. On went more paint and some more text. It was exciting to see how different the painting looked between each manipulation.
5. Art Journal pages: Like the altered books, it's important to use "flat" game pieces in your work. Particularly since the pages of an art journal are turned on a more frequent basis (at least in the case of my art journal). I do a lot of mixed media artwork in my art journal, so adding the game pieces in certainly adds to the look and feel of the finished pages.
I'm going to continue to experiment with different mixed media art projects involving game pieces. This is all I've worked with so far, but I plan on doing much more and presenting those experiments to you in the future.
