We finally moved last week and came upon bags of the girls’ artwork and realised that I really need to sort them out and collate and display them in some way. Claire previously shared about creating your own photobook of your child’s artwork and aside from doing that, I’m very inspired by the work of New York based designer, Jan Eleni. She creates collages of children’s artwork and their paper treasures, taking highlights from what would no doubt be a vast selection and making them into one stunning piece to treasure. Her collages start from US$950 and go up to $3800 and I can’t stretch to that but I can certainly stretch to a spot of scanning, printing, cutting, and framing, albeit not to her level!
I shall get cracking on this project this week and update with the finished product in a few weeks time. I reckon you will need to scan to a high resolution (600 dpi on your scanner setting if possible) and if you’re trying to achieve the same look, you will need to size all of the images the same. If in doubt, test the chosen size with pieces of paper in the frame to see if your proposed layout will work.
If you’re in doubt about your printer, PDF the images into a file (save as a high-res PDF) and get them professionally printed. Paper/card weight will also change the look of the collage so experiment with that too. You may find some pictures are easier to work with if you choose a favourite element of it as opposed to using the whole image plus if you’re including pieces that they’ve made (e.g. junk modelling and other arts and crafts), you’ll need to get your camera out. I’ve made this lightbox (thanks Flax & Twine) several times and it’s quick and simple to make – it needs to be as the kids and husband bust it up! Good luck!
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