Saturday, April 10, 2010

Alice In Wonderland Theater

First of all I have to apologies for not posting this week but I was just so obsessed with the making of Wonderland.


I have wanted to make this one for some time and I am celebrating its completion 

 The graphic's for the facade front and all the puppets are entirely from John Tenniel illustrations, who illustrated the Lewis Carrol books. There is one exception... I did use scans of the book spines too. The columns are taken from an illustration in "Threw The Looking Glass". I overlaid the column over the book spines from the image where Alice and the frog stand before the door that says "Queen Alice". The rest of the theater graphic's are from various images from both books. In the making of the puppets, I tried to stay true to the artist but did make some necessary line changes by combining two or more original images so that I could articulate them. The graphic's for this is available in my etsy store. This is a little larger than you would think. I saved the images to my camera disk (but you could use a flash drive) and took it to my local printer and had the theater facade printed on a large format printer 11 X 14. I did not enlarge the puppets, they are just printed on standard paper the size they come. I left them large in case you wanted to use them as paper dolls. If your going to make a smaller theater you will need to size them down 50 %

I used an old jewelry box found at my local thrift shop for the base. After cutting slots in the top for the puppets to dangle through, I covered it with scrapbooking papers and added some model railroad turf on the top.

I made wire wands to manipulate the puppets with (you can see them laying in front of the theater in the last of the theater photos) However since I wanted to display it like a diorama when it was not show time, I also made little stands for each puppet. The little tea table is available to print below!I have indented to do a tutorial on how I do the theaters and there puppets but life just keeps getting in the way and I still don’t have it done.
Here is a quick synopsis of how I do it... I use spray glue to attach the graphics to a light weight matte board...like the gift boxes you would find at the dollar store. Then I cut them out and sand the edges with a emery board. I then use a marker or paint pen to color the edges of the cardboard ( I use a skin tone for the dolls but for the theater I would use a matching color ) ... angle the marker or pen from the back side so you do not accidentally mark the front of the image and color the edges. On the theater facade, I covered the backside with scrapbooking paper so that the edges that extended past the “theater box” would still look nice from the backside of the theater. I did the little table much the same only I spray glued it to a light weight tin. I just bought a large tin at the thrift shop and used the lid from it. Then I cut it out with kitchen shears and sanded the edges smooth with a metal fingernail file. This way it will support the weight of the tea set.
I had two copies of the facade printed on photo paper then laminated them to chip board. The I cut out elements from the second copy and glued them on top of the first layer. Like the frog and fish. This popped them out of the background and gave it a little dimension.
The little flower faces were made last year at an art retreat I went to with Artistic Souls. I knew I would use them someday :)) The tree was purchased at hobby lobby's floral department. Then I untwisted the bottom and re-twisted it to look like tree roots.



Now for the goodies! Below is the Tea Table I used ... be sure to click on the image for the larger printable version.

Enjoy!

15 comments:

Elaine A said...

Inka -

Oh my God! This is just beautiful. What a monumental job you have done here! Absolutely amazing - I just love this!! BRAVO!!

Elaine Allen

Tolegranny said...

Wow...what fun that is! It's an amazing piece of art. I love it Inka.

Carolyn said...

Inka, it is a marvelous masterpiece. I would celebrate too if I were you. The details are extraordinare along with the colors for each element. Will you sell it or is this one just for you?

I don't think I could part with it to be honest.

I'm in awe.

Jan said...

Wow, this is astonishing, I think you have really outdone yourself this time. Such detail. It is wonderful.

sweetsue said...

This is simply wonderful. I am in awe!

Gypsy Purple said...

Fabulous!!!! Just love it!!

Lisa Bommarito said...

Inka you amaze me! It's all so breathtaking and seriously fun! I love it!

Lis~

Amber Leilani said...

OMG!!! that is the most amazing thing i have ever seen! sooooo beautiful... took my breath away!
i've been too scared to try the fairy theatre i got from you, but now i am feeling very very inspired!!!
thanks for sharing your amazing work and for the downloads. awesome!

Priti Lisa said...

I am speachless. WoW!
What a FANTABULOUS work of art!

I love the picture of you with your goodies...I am such a fan of scarves
xox, Lisa

Michelle Frae Cummings said...

this is WONDERFUL! I love it...come by my blog to see some Alice charms from a recent swap!

Jen Crossley said...

Wow this looks amazing Inka hope you are well
Take care
Jen

FILIGREE MOON said...

Such a beautiful creation! And many thanks for sharing the petite theaters! ~ Angela

Netty said...

I am thrilled to have found your blog it is brilliant. You have done a fab job making this theatre, love it.
Annette

Paula said...

Love what you have done with the Alice in Wonderland illustrations.

Cheryl said...

THANK YOU!! I just purchased your alice theatre! I am very excited to do this project! It was very generous of you to also have the mini theatre available. Thank you thank you!! I will be back!!