The Cinnamon Peeler's Wife

I made a gift for my beau for our anniversary and I thought I would share. 

 It was actually a variation on a 21 Secrets project that focused on using handwriting in your art journal entries. The text I chose was called "the Cinnamon Peeler's Wife" my Michael Ondatje. It is my most favorite poem. It's so sensual and evocative.

The project was to make a little keep-sake book based on the text. It was time consuming, but a really fun experience. It's not completely finished, but here's what I've got so far. 

You start off with a massive sheet of water colour paper and a sheet of black card paper. China marker text creates a resist to watercolour washes on the paper (both sides) and white gel pens, white paint markers and guache paint decorate the black card. The card become the book cover and the watercolour paper becomes the pages of the book.  I also experimented with sumi-e rice paper and watercolour paint (my new favorite colour is carmine).

When everything's done, you cut out what you like from both the card and the various papers, and bind it with a thick needle and thread (I used red of course). Below is the mostly finished piece.

Here's a little gallery of the whole process and the (mostly) finished piece.

You put your belly to my hands "I am the cinnamon peeler's wife, smell me."