You probably had your first encounter with paper-cut art as a child, when you folded a piece of paper into fourths or eighths, snipped out pieces, and then reopened your paper to get a big, clumsy snowflake.

If you liked your childhood snowflake experience and you’re comfortable with using sharp little scissors, x-acto knives and glue guns, then you might want to try making some paper-cut designs. Of course, keep in mind that the detail and precision to that goes into creating paper-cut artwork is mind-boggling. 

A couple of weekends ago, when I was at the Brooklyn Museum of Art, I saw one of the paper-cut and mixed media installations by street artist Swoon. Seeing her work reminded me of the versatility that lies in paper-cut art. Instead of protecting her laboriously-crafted paper sculptures with frames and shadow boxes, Swoon places her work on walls, lamposts, street corners. The wear and tear of the elements becomes as much a part of her style as her intricately cut patterns and designs. By combining such a fragile artform with urban graffitti, she makes a marked change in how paper-cut is viewed in the art world (think: Henri Matisse). The image pictured on the left is one of Swoon’s pieces in Soho, New York.

If you’re up for the challenge, you can get started by following this simple tutorial on papercutting from the Guild of American Papercutters:

1) Get a pair of scissors. Fingernail, cuticle or any scissors will do. Begin by using what you have, and what you’re most comfortable with.

2) Get a piece of paper. Typing paper will do just fine, just so it’s not too heavy weight for the scissors. Paper is always a prime topic when papercutters get together. But leave the details until later. Use what you have.

3) If you have already thought of a subject, fine, but if you are undecided look out your window. What do you see? A swingset, a bird house, a car, a tree, a bird, anything will do. Imagine it’s dark and there is a light area behind the subject. There you have a silhouette. Reduce it to as few details as possible.

4) You can trace your outline on the paper, or you can be especially adventurous and just pick up the scissors and paper and start.

5) To make a design with a mirror image, fold the paper before you start to cut and sketch your design on the outside. Cut through the two papers at once. Don’t make it too detailed. Now, open the fold and look at what you have done. It’s probably not a masterpiece but its a start. Practice by working on larger designs and then as you get better, you can begin to add intricate patterns and shapes, and adjust the scale of your design accordingly.

To see what others have done, and to share your own paper-cut art, take a look at the flickr groups silouhette — paper cut and cut paper illustration.

You might also want to spend more time looking at resources, artists and books recommended by The Guild of American Papercutters and the links on Papercutters’ World.

Some of my favorite paper-cut artists include: Greenbeanbaby’s Ellia Ana Hill, who uses carefully cut and assembled pieces of colored and patterned papers to create whimsical illustrations (above, left); Turquoise Creative’s Misha Zadeh, who cuts shapes from colorful translucent vellum and layers the pieces onto smooth cardstock (above, center); and Saelee Oh, who uses paper-cut designs to decorate accessories, make stationery, and create larger pieces of framed paper-cut artwork (above, right).

July 11th, 2006