Introduction: SOFT ELECTRO-COLLAGE

By Paola Guimerans

Circuit material provided by: AgIC

  • Title: Electronic human-Collage
  • Size: A4
  • Technique: Art mixes media techniques (Combining Analog/Soft circuitry and Collage)

Collage, from the French word coller, which means “to stick,” is a visual art that is accomplished by gluing objects to a central backing. The term collage was coined by Georges Braque and Pablo Picasso in 1912. The two artists worked together during that time period and experimented with collage, using bits of glued paper added to charcoal drawings. The material used in this art form can be both original and borrowed, and the medium is limited only by the imagination of the artist. Typically, a collage incorporates mixed media. This mixed media art form that involves gluing pieces of paper, ribbon, or fabric onto canvas or other bases. This tutorial will show how to include a soft circuit on a collage adding electrically conductive materials and electronics. We will use copper tape and the AgIC’s circuit marker that contains silver, which makes the ink conductive, turning the collage into an electric circuit.

MATERIALS

  • Color blinking
  • LED
  • Copper tape
  • Lithium 3V Batteries Size
  • Agic Silver Ink
  • Marker
  • Alligator clips
  • Glossy Photo Inkjet
  • Papers Glue
  • Glue stick
  • Old Magazines
  • Color marker
  • Metal Clip

TOOLS

  • Scissors
  • Craft
  • Knife
  • Round
  • Nose
  • Pliers

Step 1:

Choose a style of collage . Look at other artist’s collage and get inspired. Example:

Merve Ozaslan
Natural act is composed by several collages based on the questions of the relation between nature and the humanity. It is basicly a critical presentation referring to the fact that each of us is part of the nature. it seeks the answer whether greed, urbanization, mechanization and detaching from the nature is favorable or coherent for human or not. In that sense natural act appears with its all colors when our emotions are paralysed in the vital points of the clishe and dull city life. . .

Rocio Montoya creates surreal collages that speak about the human body in close relation to nature. The female figure and a loss of identity are here conceptual basis. The resulting works are a mixture of graphic elements collected from magazines and vintage botanical illustrations with photographic portraits and old family postcards.

Step 2:

Combine different types of paper magazines for an interesting background. Fold, cut or tear the paper into different shapes. You can use scissors or a craft knife to make different shapes

Step 3:

Now that you have some materials together, you will learn how to make a collage with an integrated soft circuit.

It’s necessary to know what would be the collage composition like before starting adding light and electronics components to the paper.

In order to add properly the color LEDs, the first step is to do a circuit exercise on paper, with a battery and a single LED. Consider how you are going to attach these elements to your mixed media artwork. Take your time to understand the systems and remember to take into consideration the concepts about soft circuits.

Step 4:

When choosing the option of parallel circuit, the color LED positives (+) side needs to be attached to the (+) side of the battery and the(–) side needs to be attached to the( –) side of the battery for the LED to turn on. A parallel circuit is a circuit in which there are at least two independent paths in the circuit to get back to the source.

The electrical connection between LEDs will be drawn with Agic silver ink. Keep in mind that when you use conductive ink electricity becomes a medium of the visual arts. To secure the battery and create electrical connections between the ink and the 3V battery we will be using copper tape.

Step 5:

After the circuit is finished, you are now ready to complete your collage. To do so, you could use all sort of materials (gomets, glitter, color pencils …)And you’re done with your mixed media collage!