An Israeli Angel

Hello!

Yes! I was immediately inspired when I saw Jewish paper cutting and I knew I would attempt an angel in that art form. I tried finding a particular artist, but I decided to look at this art form as a whole and choose elements that I liked from the two particular styles and artists.

So… I liked the idea of working on parchment paper, but in the end I decide on a non animal like material called ‘Dura-lar’ a very sturdy polyester film material. For my theme I used the First Jewish Temple: The Temple of Solomon, as the background. This temple was so beautiful!

I found a simplified clip art like version:

I also looked for ideas on cut out angels and like this one:

I decided to place the angel at the door, and I really loved the blue color behind it. I decided to add two blue stripes on opposite ends of the piece, making it look like the praying shawls religious Jews wear (tallit) and the two stripes on their flag.

Here is the process…

I had originally thought to include the animals but decided against it as I did not want any distractions from the angel…

There was a lot of measuring involved… and I decided to include the Hamsa (The 5 fingered hand):

I decided to draw one side and then draw it reflected using tracing paper:

Then came the most painful part. I knew by experience that if you push hard on parchment paper you get a nice 3D relief feel. Well with the plastic version you don’t get it as strong, you don’t get the white line, but I still liked it. So I laid the paper on a kitche towel and using a crochet needle I re-drew the entire image. It was hard… my thumb and finger tips were in absolute agony.