Tissue Paper Experiments in Art

Add Tissue Paper to your Art Supplies! Try this out!

Today I had some fun doing experiments using white tissue paper. Tissue paper is so cool in an art journal, because if there is something on it, like markings, and you glue it down to your project, the tissue paper becomes nearly invisible!

What sort of experiments have you been up to lately? Art or otherwise, Tell me about them!

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I started using my watercolor paper towel refuse (paper towel I used to wipe off my brushes, so it was colorful), separated, as tissue paper, then glued on, during Sketchbook Revival*. Instead of using tissue paper, because I didn’t have tissue paper.

This made me get some tissue paper because I wanted to try the method “better” with real tissue paper.

Yesterday, I was inspired by seeing some “Fodder School**” posts on Instagram that showed some really fun patterns on paper. I decided to try some fun patterns on my tissue paper because it’s just been on my mind for ages.

First, I used marker, and shared. People asked if the marker was going to bleed?? I didn’t know, but I didn’t think it was going to!

So, I -had- to test it out in my Studio Journal***. It is the best place to try out some experiments! Especially sticky ones. Haha.

So here’s how I started out!

I was using these really neat markers, and drawing on the tissue paper. Having a grand ol’ time without even thinking about the possibility of their bleeding! So, here we go.

My tests were to see the possibility of bleeding, and transparency visibility.

In #1, I put glue down (matte medium) first, then added the tissue paper. That looked pretty ok, with some slight bleeding in some areas, but nothing super glaring. I was impressed. So then I thought I would add some watercolor, because, I want to be able to layer my collage things. And obviously that was a mistake.

#2, to test transparency, I added watercolor first, let that dry. Then I put the glue down, and the tissue paper. That looked good.

#3, This is where things got hairy. lol. I was like, ooooh, I should use the markers and test the transparency. I drew some hearts, and then used the glue, and the marker got all spread around from the glue. HA. Okay, roll on! Put down the tissue paper, then added glue. The marker bled and spread like crazy. Oh crud. Haha. And I had told people I didn’t think it was going to bleed! Whoops! And… the transparency wasn’t very good. What…. :(

#4, Marker heart first. Painted the glue on very quickly, and the heart didn’t bleed that much. Okay, going well. Next, I put the tissue paper down, but, upside down, as in the image side was facing the paper (does that make sense?). Then added glue. The ink didn’t bleed as much, but still bled, even through the back of the tissue paper! Oye!

Okay, so the marker pretty much failed, at least in the way I plan to or expected to use the tissue paper. It was time to try something else. I thought my colored pencils would work!

I wont go into all the detail this time, because I wrote it down on the paper, and I think you can understand it. But I found out that even my colored pencils would bleed under matte medium if I worked the area too much! *insert brain explosion emoji* okay. Maybe that is because they are so pigmented. I did find out though, that if I went quick, it would be ok!

During this experiment with colored pencil, I never really thought about it before, but my watercolor resisted over colored pencil. How neat! Can’t wait to play with that a little bit more!

I needed to further experiment, because when I tried using my fountain pen ink, drawing directly on the tissue paper and found that it bled really badly (and I only have black), so I wanted to find SOMETHING else that would work because this tissue paper stuff is just so cool to me.

Alright, moving on to the next photo!

I wanted to try with some watercolor. My brain said “well why would this work? Watercolor is water soluble too…” but, I played with it a little elsewhere, but really wanted to do this test with it to see.

I noticed that my tissue paper has a shiny side, and a dull side. I put the same sort of marks with watercolor on each side to test this out. Does it matter if I put it on the shiny or the dull side as to how much this may or may not bleed?

As you can see, the watercolor preformed extremely well! Wow. I know that on the previous experiment I did I had a little bleeding where I did not water down the paint very much. But, I did some decent watering down with this and definitely waited for it to dry before using the matte medium to glue the watercolor decorated tissue paper down.

I realize that I deliberately used the dull side of the tissue paper when I drew on the tissue paper with the marker and colored pencil. My thinking was that on the dull side, the ink or colored pencil would have “more” to hold on to (tooth) compared to the shiny side, because I assumed the shiny side was “slippery”. So, I needed to repeat the previous experiments using the shiny side. I picked some different colors to see if color made a difference.

Interestingly enough, it seems as though the shiny side preforms better! Wow, who would have thought?! Okay, then I needed to repeat (very bottom right, in red box labeled “repeat”) on the shiny side, with the original colors to see if the bleeding was color dependent. It looks to be a possibility that color was a factor for bleeding, however, I do see that there is more ink with the raindrops, and that could be why the ink bled SO much. In the experiment using blue marker lines on the tissue paper it did bleed a little bit, but not as much as the rain drops. And the red colored pencil bled a little when overworked, but not as much as the blue colored pencil.

I am glad that I did this experiment in my Studio Journal, and not on like, a “real” piece. Haha. I would have been so upset to find that the ink bled so much!

I hope this helped you in your art somehow, and that you decide to play with something new too! Tell me about it!

Any questions? Be sure to comment! <3

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Referenced:
* Sketchbook Revival
** Fodder School
*** Studio Journal (video)