Paper Dolls On Paper Stages

Textured paper flew between my left hand and the determined scissors in my right. I checked the clock - almost midnight. Security would be around any moment to kick me out and lock up, but I had just enough time to finish trimming Amaterasu’s sleeves and just enough caffeine to make the drive home.

Tissue paper, canvas, paint, and various tools littered my space in the Big Basement art studio. It had been months of creative mess-making, and my final critique was in two days. There would be time to sweep up my process later. For the night’s work, I just needed to make sure that acrylics were drying and my basic pieces were prepped. Assembly would come in the morning…

The idea of large scale paper art struck me hard in the last year of my degree. I was finally allowed some freedom in choosing my projects, and I was a very tactile person by nature. A six-month wander into the world of collage seemed like just the vacation I needed, far away from still-life-stasis and portraiture purgatory. I didn’t know I would come to find something I’d so dearly love.

The project was defined, both to myself and to a skeptical teacher, as a mixture between hard research and old fashioned storytelling. Six collages, all on fairly large canvases, depicting female figures from history and folklore. It meant work, stress, and sleepless nights. I would have to research these women, plan my composition, dye and paint various paper materials from scratch, build, prime, and paint canvases, and finally cut and assemble my elaborate paper dolls. I was reminded of my grandmother, and of afternoons cutting out couture to stick to her own collection of paper debutantes.

I would complete this project.

At the beginning, I had a long list of over fifty candidates for paper figures. Cutting it down was difficult, as was shopping for supplies. I learned I could dye other materials with special bleeding tissue paper, and then use the tissue paper itself. I painted for hours on raw materials, trying to get as many color options as possible. I built all my canvases from scratch, and left them to prime while I ran away to sketch my compositions. I didn’t start on my first piece in earnest until 4 weeks into the semester. My teacher was not pleased.

Mata Hari came first. It was almost like she demanded it, once I heard her story. She needed to be painted with acrylics I found in the cheaper section of the aisle and pasted with a glossy medium I shouldn’t have splurged on. She needed to be shaped with my mother’s scissors, borrowed items I never really intended to give back. And she was beautiful. Her translucent silk gown and jewel encrusted bustier had to be included, as did her crown of pearls and gold. She danced under the colors of the two warring countries she got caught between, a shadowy firing squad waiting in the background. I remember how hard it was to cut the pieces of her jewelry, and how sad her story made me. The tragedy built up slowly in layers of trimmed tissue paper. I hope they did her a little bit of justice.

Yemoja was next. An African ocean goddess with a canvas mermaid tale. It was difficult to cut, even for mother’s good scissors, and her seashell headband was even more challenging. I hoped to convey an ethereal figure encompassed in the movement of the ocean. I was always going back and adding something, even after I swore it was finished. She cried out for my attention, gorgeous and untamed as she was.

Maria Tallchief frustrated me for a long time. No matter how much material I added or subtracted, she appeared too static. It wasn’t until I happened upon the possibilities that a broken mirror afforded us. Her bodice & skirt became encrusted with the movement of anyone who walked in front of her. It gave her weight and presence and the correct amount of glamor. I could almost see her dance.

Wu Zeitan received some mirror fragments as well, decorating the cranes that flew behind her, but she also introduced threadwork into my pieces. I was suddenly snipping and trimming neon blue thread before my cat could snatch it, up far too late stitching dynamic lines into painted canvas. My fingers were impossibly sore. She took a lot out of me, but the work on her clothing remains my favorite. As historically accurate as I could get it, her period silks and elaborate hairpiece remain a source of great price.

Daphne, of Greek myth, was more abstract than the others, and required even more from the trusty scissors I had begun to consider mine. Countless thin strips of skin tone and green leaves, hundreds of stitches of gold thread. She was by far my teacher’s favorite. Apparently my decision to place Daphne upside down was “inspired.” I suppose that’s how I had always seen her, as a reflection in a sun-soaked river. She now hangs proud on my parent’s wall.

I think it was on purpose that I saved Amaterasu for last. The shinto sun goddess driven into a dark cave because of her brother’s mischief? I wanted her to have some peace. I wanted peace, after so much work. I wanted to sit in the quiet and know I had made something of value. So I let her be. I cast the sun’s glow on the walls of her cave and let her rest with it. A kind friend had given me a small case of crystal beads, and they glimmer softly throughout the scene. Amaterasu sits in my office now, providing me a moment’s respite from the day’s noise and hurry.

I passed the class with an excellent grade, just in case it was a small question in the back of anyone’s mind. But that’s not what I remember, not what I yearn for in the contemplative moments of my adult life. I remember the dye on my hands and my brush on the page. I remember pasting shapes together with my glossy medium. I remember my scissors gliding through material to create skirts and bodices and faces. I fell in love with these women in my attempts to cobble their stories into single scenes. I found the strength in my hands and the joy of building something new. As time cycles forward, I grow ever more grateful for the months I spent immersed in history and legend. My ambitious project, my elaborate paper dolls, taught me about myself. I would not trade that for the expensive paints or fine paper I could now pay for with my grown-up job. The tools, after all, are only as useful as I make them.

I no longer have the Big Basement art studio. My degree is finished and I’m thankful to be working day-to-day in the world of digital art. It pays the bills and allows for many new freedoms I didn’t have in college. I content myself with smaller artworks - the occasional tiny collage among them - for the sake of conserving storage space. But I held on to my list. I have plans for powerful, beautiful paper dolls roaming around my head. Someday in the not- too-distant-future, I will have space to give them the paper tapestries they deserve. I still have many of my supplies, and though the paint may have dried up, though I may need to mix new dye to get just the right colors, I’ve got all I need to begin again.

Mother’s scissors are waiting.