Art recycling

I’ve got soo many old photos, mainly negatives, that I really still quite like. And never really done anything with after clicking and developing. Yes, I have some harebrained assumption that I’ll one day scan them all in super dooper quality all ready to use, show off, play with, manipulate in Photoshop.. I also have some old 3D images that I might like to revamp (haven’t done any 3d graphics for years), old notes keep surfacing with sketches and ideas. I even have a roll of old, half finished paintings somewhere (the garage probably).

So I’m wondering if it would be fun to mix and match, use oldies but goodies in new contexts, print out photos and sample them onto paintings or fabric, use 3D art as background for masked photos – or should I let bygones be bygones? Always look ahead for/at fresh ideas, let old horses have their rest and ride the young ones?

I’d like to hear from people, apart from recycling actual materials, do you ever revamp old finished or unfinished pieces? (I have an ulterior motive for asking – I think my camera is close to going on the blink. Exposures seem to be happening at random, so the shutter could be suffering from the over 30.000 exposures that I’ve seen as the first likely breakpoint on the Canon 20D. I’d love to get a new one, but that means $$ have to happen…)

New photoshopped background

And speaking of old canvasses, my acrylic paints survived 10 years in an uninsulated garage, the oil paints did not. I do however have some very nice quality canvasses that are either halfdone or I don’t like the motif, colours are great to build on. I know I can’t use my acrylics on top, so what, apart from investing in oil paints (which is ridiculous in a tiny house like this unless we want a perpetual headache and cat hair built into the paintings), can I do to salvage these? I hate to just throw away perfectly good materials…

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Jeg har længe haft en ambition om at scanne alle mine mangemange negativer ind, fordi jeg aldrig rigtig har fået brugt mine billeder inden det blev digitalt og mange af dem er jeg egentlig stadig glad for. Der er sikkert også mange som er kandidater til Photoshop collager eller andet lir, man kunne printe dem og sample (har vi et dansk ord for sampling?) på malerier eller stof, blande dem med (gammel) 3D grafik osv.

Jeg finder også tit gamle noter omkring billed- eller farveideer jeg har haft og nogen giver mig stadig billeder på nethinden.

Det kunne være sjovt at høre fra andre, uanset om vi taler strik eller billedkunst, om I genbruger jeres gamle ting eller om I kun ser fremad. Ideer får man jo nok af… Og hvordan genbruger I det så? Det kunne være fedt med noget inspiration…

Vidste du, at man kan kommentere min blog uden at være wordpress medlem? Bare udfyld navn er nok. Det er så hyggeligt med dialog fremfor monolog!

4 thoughts on “Art recycling

  1. A suggestion – why not use collage on the old/unfinished paintings, and allow parts of the original work show through? You could even cut up the old photos and collage them! =D

    1. That could work I guess – I’d just have to find a glue/medium that works on oil? (don’t know if that exists, but that should be easy to find out) Fabric scraps, feathers, anything really. My old photos are mostly negatives though, so I still have to scan….

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