I've spent this Sunday afternoon playing with fabric and my sewing machine. I wanted to have a go at making the Junker Jane style art dolls after making the ATC's a couple of weeks ago. Now I have a stash of fabric which have been left over from other sewing projects and like most artists I hate throwing things away and in this I found some light cream/beige material to make the body. I added some lace, buttons and a fabric flower which I painted with some acrylic paint. The arms and the patch on the body are bits of canvas that I painted. I used embroidery thread for the mouth using back and chain stitch.
The one thing I found with the body material is that it frayed which meant that it didn't hold very well when sewn up - hence the grey patch on the face and the odd stitching on the side. It was a good learning process as I've never made a doll or any other kind of soft toy. I think this one will be living with me so it doesn't matter if it's not perfect.
I think I'm hooked on this style of work which is quite different to the style I usually go for. I think the attraction is that anything goes and that it has a grungy "creepy cute" look. I didn't know about the Junker Jane style of work until one of my friends from ATCsforAll started a swap and invited me to join. To date I have made 7 ATC's and a paper (I used watercolour paper) art doll. There is another trade happening as well on ATCsforAll which involves making cloth dolls in this style. That is my weekend project.
These are the first 6 that I made. 4 are headed over for trading. The 7th one isn't quite finished yet.
Artists Trading Cards.
Art doll.
