Naturally Preserved

Do you have a dried flower that is so fragile it might fall apart if touched? You really want to use it in your art, but you can’t turn it into amber, like a bug in tree sap. So what’s an artist to do? Let us show you how to do the next best thing: Simply encase your delicate materials between two pieces of tissue paper and seal with polymer medium. This is a good way to create beautiful collage papers to use in your art.

Step 1

Put a plastic bag on top of your work surface. Lay a piece of tissue paper down on the plastic and gently paint the tissue paper with polymer medium that has been slightly diluted with water.

Step 2

Immediately place your fibers or plant materials onto the tissue and arrange as desired. Glue the items down with a little more of the polymer medium mixture if necessary.

Step 3

While the tissue paper and fibers are wet, place another piece of tissue paper on top, like a sandwich, and apply more diluted polymer medium.

Step 4

Let the paper and medium dry completely. Once it’s dry, you can pull your embedded fibers off the plastic.

Step 5

Cut into pieces or use as is.

GRASSES

Sandra Duran Wilson