Foliage Love

A lady with maxi foliage skirt and foliage hair accessory.
Papercut for Day 31/100
of #100DaysOfHandmadepapercutsOrPapercutpatternsByLee for #The100DayProject

Hello friends!

Today I wanna share with you my fascination with foliage and why I always incorporate it in my paper cutting craft.

Let's also include my other favorite elements which are flowers, loops and anything organic-looking.

These elements are ever-present in my papercuts. It's like my silent signature. I don't know, it's like a natural thing that I do. And I feel like my artwork isn't complete without it. 

I hadn't really thought about it until it was brought up by a friend who told me that I already 'established' a brand or a certain look for my art. And it is some sort of 'Romantic-looking' (as she put it). And all I said was, 'wow, really? I like it'. And I do. I always wanted to be surrounded with flowers, vines and lush greens. And I wanted that to be the same with my art. It could be because I grew up in Antipolo, a city located in the province of Rizal. A place with lots of greenery and my work station is fronting a small farm full of old and big trees. A limitless source of inspiration! And we always hear the sound of birds chirping in the morning as well as crickets chirping at night. :) My surroundings play a big role in my art and I love it. 

And I don't just like the idea of it but the act of doing it. It's so easy and natural for me to add loopy and foliage elements in my art. I enjoy sketching and cutting it because it allows me to do a bit of 'playing' in my composition. There are no restrictions unlike doing typography where it has to achieve a certain look (a letter A has to look like a letter A). I can go wherever direction I please and I can play with scale and whatever organic shape I want. It's just so easy and so forgiving in case I made a boo boo. I'm the only one aware of it. Nobody sees my sketches at the back of the cut-paper and so nobody knows whether I made a mistake or not.  ;-)

Here are some of my papercuts with my favorite nature-inspired elements. 

Ginkgo Leaves

OM symbol
Papercut for Day 26/100 of #100DaysOfHandmadepapercutsOrPapercutpatternsByLee for #The100DayProject

'Oh Deer!'
Papercut for Day 30/100 of #100DaysOfHandmadepapercutsOrPapercutpatternsByLee for #The100DayProject

The concept/composition for this last piece (Oh Deer!) wasn't intentional at first. I was just sketching and cutting random foliage because I don't know what to make for Day 30/100 of my 100-Day creative project and since foliage is my default subject, I made 6 pcs of it. As I was arranging it for photograph, my vision shifted. Instead of just making it look like a plain foliage, I thought of arranging it like a deer's antlers(!). Yey! Why not? So I added a deer head and here it is.

I was very happy with the result and I plan to do more of like this (make random and individual foliage and arrange/make it into something grand, at least to me :)) for the remaining days of the creative challenge. 

-Leeanne :)