Assemblage Art

It’s A Shoe In

| JP Dawes Artist

Assemblages don’t have to be cogs and wheels, nuts and bolts or heavy metal. Sometimes an assemblage can be sweet. Gosh I dislike that word since it makes me think of ‘chocolate boxy’ crafts work, full of crochet and flowers. I had purchased this pair of antique leather Mary Janes simply because I loved them. They evoked days gone by and sweet childhood memories. I hope I honored that feeling with these two assemblage pieces. And OOPS, there are flowers and bits of crochet edging. The tiny beaded flower is from a broken necklace of my mother’s. Funny how I keep finding uses for the bits of her life that are left. The yellow base is the lid of a luxury soap tin and the red bird base is the cover of an antique book. These will eventually be for sale in my Etsy Shop.

Coffee Time Tin Tile Assemblage

| JP Dawes Artist

The starting point for this tin tile assemblage was the center Beech Nut vintage Coffee paper from the front of a matchbook. Next was the paper clock face and the clock hands to represent a vintage clock. Because I knew I was going to use the vintage sheet music, I wanted to turn the whole tile into an interactive artwork that can be strummed. I don’t think you can actually make music on it but it does make sound . I punched holes in the tin with a nail and hammer. Then I individually strung silver wire top to bottom.

The music is again from my mother’s sheet music from the 1940’s. The Coffee Song (which wasn’t originally about coffee) reads ” Love while you may, too soon youth fades away, so come, come, sing for awhile my song.” All us coffee lovers remember how we could drink gallons of coffee in our youth but youth fades away along with our ability to drink gallons of this stuff. Nostalgic.

BLUEBIRD LAND ASSEMBLAGE

| JP Dawes Artist

I bought these wonderful antique tin ceiling tiles from someone on Facebook Marketplace. They were just too good to pass up. Most ceiling tiles you see are squares or circle patterns, these are a little rarer. I can think of a lot of assemblage compositions using these.

This first one is named Bluebird Land. If you can enlarge the photo of the finished piece you can see the antique music decoupaged at the top. My mother was a singer on WSOY radio when she was young and I have most of her music from that time period. It hasn’t fared well and is pretty ragged and crumbly. I don’t mind using it for projects like this since it gives it new life.