Sarah’s three collaging tips for beginners

With a good few years of collaging professionally under my belt, I wanted to share some of my tried and tested methods to help out emerging artists, so I've ripped out a few tips from my collaging rule book and glued them together to create three tips I wished I'd known when starting out.

Newbie to the collaging scene? I'd recommend keeping these in mind …  

1. Stock up with the good stuff

This doesn’t mean only diving into wafer-thin, glossy-Heat-mag 80gsm style paper with your scissors – no siree. Fork out the extra for a variety of good quality papers to use which aren’t going to ripple once glued.

When you’re flicking through the array of paper, magazines or journals (or whichever printed medium you’ve selected), look for colours, textures and movement over subject matter. Every snippet you select for your artwork should be for a reason.

2. Cut above the rest

Firstly, pick a sturdy pair of scissors which cut through the paper neatly and with precision, you don’t want to be spending extra time fussing because your scissors aren’t up to scratch. With a good pair in hand, start to think of your scissors as a paintbrush. Avoid cutting straight lines and keep in mind that the direction of the cuts your making will make a huge difference to how the piece flows.

3. Finish with a flourish

Remember, layering is key. Adding more carefully cut trimmings to the medium will build textures and a good depth. To make this easier, simplify the image you’re creating into shapes and go from there. One last piece of advice? Be prepared to cut small as the finishing details are everything.

Find out more about my artistic journey so far here.