paper dolls

Yesterday a special delivery came for me. I had completely forgotten that I scored an amazing piece of art on ebay last week and was giddy when a large box arrived at my desk. 

The piece is a framed pair of children in a sort of oversized paper doll style. Each child is dressed adorably, but the best part of the whole piece is that the dolls have real human hair. I love that someone created this so many years ago and took such care in making these dolls come to life.

The back of the frame revealed some information about the artist, which makes the piece even more special. The frame was old and dirty and the paper backing peeling and flaking away. It needed a bit of restoring, so I did some cleaning and replaced the frame backing with an archival mat. I also tidied up the hair because it too had flaked off underneath the glass.

I thought is was neat how the artist had decided to mount the dolls. A stretched piece of silk over a recycled piece of cardboard with old graphics. The silk was not glued or taped to the board, but was zigzag stitched from side to side and top to bottom. It made me smile at the artist's cleverness.

Of course I saved the only reference of the artist in its original form and re-adhered it to the back.

What a cool piece of homemade art!

Now I need a place to hang it!