Journals & Collaborative Projects

Below you will find a sampling our members' work from previous collaborative projects.  Click on images to view them larger. We hope this will inspire you to come and play with us! If you are interested in joining our group, please visit us at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Paper_Traders/

Tutorials & Techniques

Below are some of our favorite tricks for adding depth and dimension to your art.  We hope you have fun giving these a try!

Current Group Swaps & Projects

Below is a list of current swaps and projects available to group members. If you are interested in joining our group and participating in these projects, please visit us at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Paper_Traders/.  

For existing group members, you can sign up to participate  in these projects here: Swaps & Current Projects.  

We look forward to swapping with you.  Happy Arting!

Member Gallery for Group Swaps
 
Below you will find a sampling our members' work from previous group swaps and projects.  Click on images to view them larger. We hope this will inspire you to come and play with us! If you are interested in joining our group, please visit us at: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Paper_Traders/.
 
Come play with us... Join today!

Paper Traders is a friendly online community of artists from around the world. We nurture and value creativity, embrace new ideas, products, and techniques yet also value tried and true methods of artistic expression. Our projects consist primarily of paper arts, mixed media collage, artist trading cards, altered art, assemblages, collaborative journals, mail art, and more.

We are interested in creative individuals of varied skill levels who wish to challenge themselves artistically and help build a supportive community. We are at our best when we can share our creative efforts as well as techniques, resources, feedback, and insights. We encourage conversation about art, the art process, and what it means to be an artist.

Paper Traders is hosted on Yahoo Groups at http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Paper_Traders/.
We hope you will consider joining us on an artistic journey!

In order to prevent spammers and to insure that all applicants are actual persons interested in creating art, a questionnaire will be sent to all potential members. When applying, please submit digital examples of your work or direct us to a website where we can view your art. The intent of the questionnaire is not to judge the merits of your art but to safeguard the integrity of our community.

Free Images for Download
Below you will find images that are owned by our group members and offered for your personal use as well as images found in the public domain. Images may be freely used in your personal artwork but may not be used for commercial purposes of any kind without written permission of the owner. No images may be used to create collage sheets or image collections for resale.

To download, follow the link provided. In some cases, you may be able to just click on the image to enlarge it, then right-click and select "save image as". Content changes frequently and many images are available for a limited time.  Please check back often for newly posted images to use in your art journey.

Open Art Challenges !

We're changing things up here at Paper Traders. Instead of the monthly challenges of the past, we'll now be hosting special challenges that might feature a specific technique or product and will be rewarded with actual prizes sponsored by our group members.

Our new challenge for 2013 is a year long word prompt journaling project/challenge. Each specific challenge will be open for one month and all art bloggers can participate, whether you are a Paper Traders member or not. Each artist will comment with a link to their blog post that features the artwork for that particular challenge. For each challenge, a winner will be selected whose art best exemplifies the challenge. The winning artist will be featured here and get a "Trader Treasure" blog button to display on their own blog. They also will receive one chance for each entry for the end of the year prize drawing. Watch this page for more details and challenge announcements.

Saturday, August 25, 2012

A New Blog Challenge - Found Poetry

We have been intrigued lately by the concept of Found Poetry.  This is defined as a type of poetry created by taking words, phrases, and sometimes whole passages from other sources and reframing them as poetry by making changes in spacing and lines or by adding or deleting text, thus imparting new meaning.  The resulting poems are interesting but even more fun is the artistic way in which people embellish their text.

 Beckie is hosting a swap for group members this month and has  set up a Pinterest Board to spotlight some Found Poetry art that caught her eye.  You can check it out here:
http://pinterest.com/artbeckons/found-poetry/.  We also found an entire book altered in this manner by Karen Hatzigeorgiou of Karen's Whimsy.  She has shared images of it here:  http://karenswhimsy.com/altered-books/happiness/.  We also found a nearly 200 page book that was altered by Tom Phillips, called The Humument.  You can view the slideshow and/or gallery here: http://humument.com/.

Hopefully you are inspired by this artistic method as much as we are.  We  invite you to join us in a PT Blog Challenge project using a single torn page from a book of your choice.  Highlight in an artistic manner the words that make up your Found Poem and decorate the page with the theme of your poetry.  You may cut, collage, paint, layer, etc. - whatever inspires you!

 You don't have to be a member of Paper Traders Yahoo Art group to participate; but if you would like to join us and be privy to even more great paper crafting swaps and challenges, plus better-than-ever artistic support, that would be super!

When the challenge closes, we will pick a winning piece that best showcases the theme of the challenge and/or supply requirement. The winner will be awarded the following prizes:

Art from Beckie H.

Two collage digistamps from Cathy C
(will be sent to your email as jpg. files)





Challenge Rules
  1. Make a paper craft, mixed media, or digital piece of art ( any size). The theme is "Found Poetry".
  2. Post your art to your blog, Flickr, Picasa, or other online album.  Mention our name PaperTraders Art Blog with a link back to this post. You are welcome to grab our button and share it on your blog as well.  The last day to post for this challenge is September 30th, 2012.
  3. After posting your "Found Poetry" art on your site, come back to this post, and leave us a comment with a link to your post/image.  You must include a direct link to your image or post, not a general link to your album or blog. All you will need to do is copy and paste the url address of your post found at the top of your browser window.
  4. The winner will be announced by the October 5th  and,  in addition to the prizes shown above, will be awarded our "Trader Treasure" blog badge which they can choose to feature on their blog. Their art will also be posted on the PaperTraders Art Blog for a month.
  5. For the winner to claim the Challenge prizes, please make sure there is a way for us to contact you by email so that your prizes can be sent to you.
Inspiration:
Picasso






Posted by Cathy L. Calamas at 7:58 AM
Labels: ,

3 comments:

artbeckons said...

Well obviously, you have seen mine =) But here's a link to my blog post: http://artbeckons.blogspot.com/2012/08/poetry-found.html

September 10, 2012 at 7:07 PM
fairyrocks said...

Here's the link to mt Paper Traders Post
http://fairyrocks.blogspot.ca/2012/09/trading-paper.html

September 15, 2012 at 10:54 AM
Anonymous said...

Here is the link to my Found poetry on my blog..
http://journalmelissa.blogspot.com/2012/08/altered-book-page-found-poetry.html
Loved this Swap!!!

September 18, 2012 at 9:22 AM

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)