In the beginning……was the beginning (original rescued altered book notes)

 

The start of the altered art book pages 1 and 1 2002

I didn’t realise just how old my altered book was until I found this bit of writing on an old disc!  This book is like the Marie Celeste!  Six years though………. that’s a long long time.

26th August 2002

Today I decided to attempt making an ‘altered’ book.  I had a choice of two hard backed books: ‘The Woodwitch’ or ‘Five Gates of Hell’.  I decided on the latter as I wouldn’t mind reading the ‘Woodwitch’.  From the opening chapter (first page), I chose two paragraphs.  The first one is about jets flying over an eerie sky and ghostly plant life.  The second described curtains with mermaids on, and the scull of a seagull with a coin in one of the eye sockets.  I have painted the background and am pleased that it hasn’t seeped through to the  pages underneath.  The background is similar to a background I used for my ‘Armageddon’ project.  I splattered this with white and silver ink, and drew in some ghostly plants which looked quite crap actually.

However, not to worry, I am going to go over all of it with some white ink, which will cover the plants and seaweed.  I am going to do a coin rubbing to represent the seagulls eye, and may do a drawing of a skull.

As usual, as with anything I do, problems are already arising.  Half of art is about problem solving though.  I do not want the work to be illustrated though.  I would like the quotes to be seen  in the way they are isolated – out of context, yet pertaining to the story (my story – not the original author).

https://echostains.wordpress.com/2008/12/04/the-gates-of-hell-are-back-but-for-how-long/

The Gates of Hell are back – but for how long?

These are the first pages I did...before I worked out what I was doing

 

Eureka!  I have found it! Again.  It was hidden in a box of papers in the cellar.  I have turned the house upside down for it.  Every time I find it and manage to do a couple of pages, it disappears again.  This time, I actually started 2 more books last week.  The first one, I soon started to realise wasn’t going to work as it wasn’t descriptive enough and the narrative was too ordinary.  The next one may or may not have turned out alright, but the pages were very thin for a hardback book.

 

So I have my old ‘Five Gates of Hell’ back now.  Already, I can see where I’ve gone wrong and ways of rectifying it.  One of the mistakes on the first couple of pages is that each page is a different colour and texture.  Although the narrative or the ‘story’ follows on logically (for me), the pages come across as separate entities.  Plus, a lot of information is being crammed into a relatively small space.  To rectify this, each page must consist of 2, giving a bigger page to work on.

 

I have been through the first dozen or so pages, marking down the sentences I am going to use.  Another mistake is to stick these sentences onto the page, before the background is done.  I have been writing in a journal which sentences I want to print out and which page they appear on.  I am using different fonts in various sizes.  This is yet another reason for preparing the background first.  When this is down, the text can be printed in a complimentary colour and appropriate size.  Very happy for now…but let’s see if it lasts or the book disappears yet again.