Passages Through Time by Linda Edkins Wyatt

Hello.

Time travel has fascinated me for years. I wonder about past lives, wonder if I have lived before, and if so, who I was. I have sometimes had the experience of being in a new place, yet feeling like I know it, like I have lived there or been there before. I often watch films and television shows about time travel, and one of my very favorite books is Time and Again, by Jack Finney.

This feeling overcame me when I moved to New York City 40 years ago and was exploring different neighborhoods. On the Lower East Side, I saw a park and a row of old houses that I felt I knew. I hadn't seen a photo of it, or read a book about it. But I did feel like there were memories of the park and houses inside me waiting to be discovered. I had the same feeling in Paris, when I visited Montmartre. It seemed so familiar, and I wondered if I had lived there and been part of an art scene from yesteryear. I felt that odd familiarity with a new place driving through an old tenement area, which was under renovation, near Albany, NY. Most recently, that "I know this place" feeling hit me when working in Harlem.

So to illustrate the StencilGirl® travel/passages theme, I thought, "Time Travel!" and decided to create a little old-fashioned city-scape to illustrate the idea.

Here's a video which shows my process:

The woodblocks and matchboxes were painted with a few coats of white or black gesso.

I have been collecting cardboard boxes that hold wooden matchsticks. Paired with some house-shaped wooden blocks that I snapped up for $1 each at a discount store, I had a good foundation for the project. I painted one of the blocks white, and the other black, and did the same with the matchboxes.

Next, I used the December 2018 StencilClub set, Fancy Houses, designed by Valerie Sjodin, to create the buildings. I stamped a Versamark pad through the stencil, then sprinkled the white shapes with black embossing powder, and the black shapes with white powder, then zapped it with a heat gun. On the back of the blocks, I got a little more experimental, using gold embossing powder on one, and on another, adding color with Derwent Watercolor Blocks.

Areas from the Fancy Houses StencilClub set were used to decorate the blocks and boxes.

I had to be verrrry careful with the matchboxes...there was a fine line between melting the embossing powder thoroughly and burning the box! I also had a little trouble getting a crisp image on the box, especially on the sides where there was a textured strip for striking the matches. Since I was using mostly black and white, I touched up any unwanted blobs and speckles with a black sharpie or a little bit of paint on a small brush.

My stencils were larger than the boxes and blocks, so I selected strategic areas of the stencil, like using just the light post on the edge of one of the blocks. On the other sides of the boxes and blocks, I used the windows or doorway areas, and also a key stamp to add interest. On the back of the blocks, I got a little more experimental, using gold embossing powder on one, and on another, adding color with Derwent Watercolor Blocks.

The sides of the boxes and blocks were also painted and embossed.

The cabaret paper doll fits inside the matchbox. Here, she dances atop the backside rooftops.

I couldn't resist making a little cabaret-inspired black and white paper doll to live in--and dance on top of--my time-travel village.

The old-fashioned doll was made with a Rubber Moon stamp and a Graphics Fairy vintage hat image.

A subtle detail was flipping the clock image before printing to give the idea that time was going in a different direction. I used a vintage image from The Graphics Fairy.

While I may never actually time travel, my little village makes me think about the possibility, and definitely makes me want to read my old favorite book again.

Linda