MAKING A SIMPLE GRIMOURE

Making a simplistic grimoure could not be easier. To begin with the face I was going to use under the front cover of the skin of the grimoure was to be removed which gave me two choices as to what to do with it.

1] Keep it as it was made for the grimoures cover.

2] Use it to make a new project from.

Once I made 3 grimoures I chose the second option but more on that in a moment or two.

STEP 1:

Creating the face to make the grimoure cover from. To do this I created a simple face using some tissue paper pulp. Once dried fully I laid this on a piece of thick cardboard the matched the size of the hard backed book I planned to use.

STEP 2:

Next I covered the whole thing in foil. To give the effect of the face forcing it’s way up through the books skin I formed the foil into stretched creases. For the heavier creases I placed some cardboard triangles under the foil. This was then paper mached stripped over with around 6 layers of paper strips.

As shown below.

The ‘same’ face can be used over & over again. By simply changing the cardboard & foil creased shapes beneath the foil can alter the appearance of the finished project. A simple time saving effect that works every time.

STEP 3:

Once the strips were dry I then coated this in tanned skin coloured dragon skin (see my HOW TO VIDEO: MAKING DRAGON SKIN LISTED AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE) to give the effect of ancient fried skin trapping the poor deranged sole within the grimoure.

STEP 1:

The face I used for the grimoures I then went on the make into an entirely NEW project a simple wall mounted screaming face. To do this it was a simple case of adding using paper strips & paper tissue pulp the face features, eyes, eye lids, eye brows, lips. I formed the tongue from a cut & shaped piece of cardboard which I used tissue to cover for texture.

STEP 2:

Painting was a simple case of using a strong coloured pre-mixed water colour paint of copper colour. Once fully dried I then gave this a ‘black wash’ of the same kind of paint but extremely watered down. Just before this black wash fully dried I simply wiped the heaviest of it back off with a damp to the touch cloth. This gave it the appearance of a very ancient bronze or copper face – screaming.