In this module we are encouraged to make a concertina book and also to consider making little pages within pages – I thought why not combine those two things!

I pencilled a 3 inch square on a page towards the back of my sketchbook. By slipping a cutting mat underneath the last few pages of the book I was able to cut the square out with a craft knife. I then glued those pages together so that the thickness of the cut out shape created a niche equal to the thickness of the concertina.

As you can see here, I also rubbed a little white oil pastel around the edges of the pages and flooded washes of watercolour all over. Looks more appealing already with a bit of colour! I gave a lot of thought to what I might feature on the pages of the concertina and decided that eyes would symbolise the importance of observation when drawing and painting. I took a strip of paper 3 inches wide and folded it into a concertina shape, scoring with the blade of scissors to make the folds lay flat in opposite directions. The strip was painted in the same way as the sketchbook pages – you can just glimpse it in the photo at the top of this post.

It’s easier to work on the little pages before the concertina is attached to the book so I started to draw and paint a number of different eyes. This one is black and white fine liner pens and will form the first page of the concertina. This is a great opportunity to use all the various media and techniques we’ve explored during the course so I’m attempting to make every eye different.

This next one is a watercolour painting – it sits on the inside page of the concertina.

I won’t show every eye in detail but you get the idea – so far I’ve used soft pastels, oil pastels and acrylic inks as well as the pens and the watercolour. Still plenty of scope for collage and printing! This is beginning to look more and more weird but I’m happy with a bit of weird! It’s not something that’s easy to show in a still photo but when I open the book at this page the concertina springs out like a jack in a box. I love the surprise!

Hope you enjoy bringing your own thoughts to your pages now you’ve got this far in the final module. Sketchbooks can be fun and exciting as well as beautiful to look at can’t they?

Bye for now,

Linda x