Forever Blowing Bubbles (2022)
Recently I finished up work on a new collage, just in time for Father’s Day, here in the UK. As I’m giving handmade gifts this year, it felt right to create a lifelong Hammer - my Dad - a West Ham United football club themed present.
Sticking to the colours on the club’s badge, I first painted three pieces of paper; one blue, another claret and final piece, half yellow and half gold. Whilst they were drying, I mocked up and printed a document boasting three words from I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles. The anthem which has become synonymous with the team, after supporters adopted it many years ago, and continue to sing it with pride before, during and after games… Depending on the result!
Once the painted paper was ready, I got to ripping it up into various sizes and glueing the shreds around the text. I chose to predominantly use the claret and blue, and mix in flecks of yellow and gold. This was to both guide eyes around the piece, and match how frequently the colours appear on WHUFC’s branding, the emblem and their kits. Unsurprisingly, I decided to leave the trickiest part - filling in the spaces in-between and inside the individual letters - until last.
Whilst I could easily use the edges of the painted paper for the borders, as well as along letters with straight sides, trying to cut and rip paper into shapes to fit snuggly around the intricate elements was incredibly fiddly. It took a lot of trial and error (and tiny bits of discarded paper) to get everything to fit just right, Goldilocks-style. In the end, to #GetItDone, I resorted to tracing the counter’s of the letters ‘B’ and ‘O’ to create the perfect puzzle pieces. As you can imagine, this is undeniably the most time-consuming piece I’ve worked on so far.
I would say the piece took approximately 6 hours to complete, and then an additional 3 hours to frame… When you consider the 30 minutes to drive to the shop, select and purchase a surround, then the 2+ hours to get home after your car breaks down in a Dunelm car park, and needs a jump-start to get going again. If you’re planning on making your own collage, I’d probably recommend skipping out on that last part if you have the choice.
Regardless, I’m really pleased with the slick end result - especially as I found that I could reframe the piece to be backlit, as the light would illuminate the letters, which is perhaps something I’ll try once I’ve recovered from my previous framing escapade - and I’m glad to report that the gift was warmly received.
All in all, a job well done!
❤ S