Art in Your Pocket

I'd been asking around, not many artist/crafter in Malaysia knows about Artist Trading Cards, so far, none. I am not sure why this fun art exchange activity is not popular among the artists and designers in Malaysia.

For those who is still wondering what is ATC, here is the definition I found from Wikipedia.

Artist Trading Cards (or ATCs) are miniature works of art about the same size as modern baseball cards,^[1] or 2 ½ X 3 ½ inches (6cm X 9cm),^[2] small enough to fit inside standard card-collector pockets, sleeves or sheets.^[3] The ATC movement developed out of the mail art movement and has its origins in Switzerland.^[4] Cards are produced in various media, including dry media (pencils, pens, markers, etc), wet media (watercolor, acrylic paints, etc), paper media (in the form of collage, papercuts, found objects, etc). The cards are usually traded or exchanged rather than sold.

Recently my art nerves suddenly surfaces and I'd been digging back some of my ATCs. Most of them are dated in 2005. wow....5 years ago. Wow...I can't believe it! 5 years. and I'd not been creating anything (except the two bird illustrations and mixed media). Shame on me :( I'd been riding on the craft horses and forgotten about the smell of acrylic paints, sticky fingers with glues, messy table full with papers and ephemeras.
This year my one and only resolution is create more art.

ATCs I created, mainly collage and rubber stamping.

Artist Trading Card - Restored

Recently I restored my infatuation with Artist Trading Card (ATC) by signing up a few ATC swap at Swap-Bot. What is ATC? Read it here : very thorough introduction to ATC.

Here are some of my previous ATC, made by me, for my own pleasure and collection. Back in my hometown, I have a few more dozens of ATC sent to me from other artist. I am looking for a way to store them, but they are slightly larger than business card size, so I can't keep them in business card file. Right now I just tuck them away in my craft drawer, some inside metal boxes, some became my bookmark.

I love vintage style collaging and mixed media.

Chinese pin-up girls. I collected alot of those ephemeras and images.

The tea ATC is my personal favourite, there is real Chinese tea leaves inside the handmade tea bag.

Do you notice that I use a lot of butterfly and wings images? They are my favourite.

And stack of ATC blanks and cardstock, some I cut out from cereal boxes and some sent to me from my swap friend.

So tonight I have an ATC challenge to complete, alphabet theme, D and E. Hmm...what to make?

Shiori Ningyo Bookmark

Finally, I finished making 25 (+1 extra) shiori ningyo bookmark for my customer. Shiori means big sister, ningyo means doll so it's a Japanese big sister doll bookmark, suitable to give to friends, students and small children to encourage them to read and do well in exam. All those papers are washi chiyogami paper imported from Japan. It is very difficult to find in Malaysia, even though we can find them in some craft shop but is very very expensive, selling for ~RM8 per piece of A4 size. Usually I got them from Etsy and Ebay, best place to look for rare craft material. Malaysia still lack of craft material and supplies.

So, I spent 5-6 hours making them, while watching drama (A Chip of the Old Block-super super funny TVB drama), my speed was slow by half if I were crafting while watching something on the laptop but that's how I like to work. :p

I really love washi paper. They are so beautiful.


Kimono....
Aiks...no head??


Here they are, all pretty with yukata and hair bow, ready to go to their proud owner in the USA.
Hope you all will have a fun time there and meet great children!!

If you like to have one, I am selling them for RM5 each.
But need to re-stock my washi paper now.

Orange Delight

Made these for Swap Bot's Orange theme handmade postcards.

F&N Orange Freecard. Boring

I pimped the postcard and I made these. I quite like them but I have to send them out to my partners. I hope they will keep them in nice place. :)




Not much description today. Am busy with my Etsy shop. No, it's still not ready for sales yet. Sigh....