Monday, June 09, 2008

Chinese Collage Swap - Play Along!

I have a great group of friends I swap with and we have swapped for a few years together. One of the fun type of swaps we do is called a Collage Swap. The hostess will send each participant a package of similar goodies and then we all make something with it. I decided to hostess this time since I came back with such cool items from my vacation.

If you want to play along at home I will be posting spoilers and some images that you could print to use for your own art. If you make something, I'd love to see what you made. Please post a link! The rules we are following are pretty simple: Use at least three of the items (in whole or part) to make an ATC, but feel free to bend the rules or make anything you want. It is so fun to be inspired by what others did with the same items!

Here's what was in my package:
1. A piece cut from a modern map of Hong Kong
2. An old Chinese coin (the kind that is round with a square hole in the middle)
3. Some pages from a small vintage book that looks like a small comic story
4. An old Chinese postage stamp
5. A printed copy of some old Chinese images—each player got a different image
6. "Hell Money" which is fake money that is traditionally burned at a funeral
7. Decorative papers that are also burned at funerals
8. A page from a beautiful book that was illustrated with three drawings per page
9. Some ATC bases; one glossy base and two vintage playing cards from Las Vegas (obviously not from my trip, ha ha!)

Click the image above to see number 7, which I posted for your first image share. Once you can see the larger image, right-click to save to your computer for printing. This is funeral paper so you can give your loved one a good send off to the afterlife. I can't remember all the characters' meanings, but I do remember that part of it is supposed to mean "smooth sailing" which seems like a nice sentiment for a port city. The original papers are printed on soft paper with a metallic foil finish to the center. These were purchased in a small outdoor market on Taipa Island, Macau.

1 comment:

Pearl Maple said...

Nice idea and that is a great collection of peices to do some fun things with.

Can't play this time as we have a few other commitments but good luck and hope to see more of this type of swaping in the future.