Pictures one

I decided to have a nice week working my way methodically through the house finding pictures for each room.  I began with the apartment sitting room.  

I decided it needed a large slim landscape picture above the sideboard.  The left wall is too busy to need pictures.  The right hand wall could have a group of pictures or a long slim landscape mirror above the sofa.  I think lots of pictures in a small room is a bit overpowering and you feel as if you are in a gallery so I settled on a mirror for this space...... a future make.

These are the ones I had culled over time and I liked them all equally.

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

A word about copyright before we continue.  As a rough guide you should try to contact the owner of a piece and ask their permission to use it.  At the very least it is good manners to acknowledge the source.  In cases like this where ownership is not known and not findable the use of the image (or text etc) falls under the 'fair dealing' section.  The morass of copyright laws is a legal minefield but, commonsensically, if you are using things as we do in our projects and sharing with a few friends and without any monetary gain or mass production you will be safe.   Clearly there could be occasions when the artist might  challenge your use of their work if they see it and, equally clearly, you should remove it and apologise.  😊  Sadly in mini world there is a lot of 'commercial' copying of artisans work and we don't want to feel we are adding to that.

‘Fair dealing’ is a legal term used to establish whether a use of copyright material is lawful or whether it infringes copyright. There is no statutory definition of fair dealing - it will always be a matter of fact, degree and impression in each case. The question to be asked is: how would a fair-minded and honest person have dealt with the work?

Factors that have been identified by the courts as relevant in determining whether a particular dealing with a work is fair include:

• does using the work affect the market for the original work? If a use of a work acts as a substitute for it, causing the owner to lose revenue, then it is not likely to be fair
• is the amount of the work taken reasonable and appropriate? Was it necessary to use the amount that was taken? Usually only part of a work may be used

The relative importance of any one factor will vary according to the case in hand and the type of dealing in question.

From:  Exceptions to copyright Gov.uk  (https://www.gov.uk/guidance/exceptions-to-copyright)

This is UK copyright law.  I have no idea how 'international' it is.

Back to the picture.  I pretty much knew that the least interesting one, number 2, was going to be the one as its proportions were correct - shame; however I decided to  print and try all the others in situ just in case they looked OK and then discovered I was actually left with a choice of two; neither of which was number 2. Much fiddling about with numbers five and six ensued to find the optimum size.  The final (well for now) choice was made.

Next, the choices for hanging it were an Ikea click frame, an Ikea white wood frame or made to look like those stretched mounted canvas prints you can buy.  As it would be three feet by three feet in real world the answer was obvious.....

It was printed on some good quality copy paper and cut out with a generous allowance for wrapping over the wooden frame.  I cut and glued the wooden frame the same size as the print.  This was made from the wretched window frame wood that I am struggling with - you nearly escaped a mention of the windows this week. 😁

The print was then glued to the frame, trimming it to fit neatly.

frame being made, print ready to go

put together, showing the reverse with four tiny blobs of tacky wax for hanging it

I had experimented on a practice piece by coating it with some matt Mod Podge to give it some sort of 'surface' glaze and texture, but it muddied the colours a little and took the sharpness out of the detail.  Being a fusspot I decided to leave it unglazed (for now).

Et Voila - a picture in room number one.  After all my finger wagging last week about hanging pictures properly I think this needs dropping a little to pull the sideboard group together better.

Waiting for some more bits of dressing, a mirror and a human.

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PS:  Yes I did manage to knock over the candle/buddha tray.... sand and stones everywhere.  Thank heavens for the  first reference photo it saved me looking for more joss sticks which I set off doing because I was convinced there was more than three.

I intended to have all the pictures done this week but between a vendor faffing about (I was trying to match two frames I already have) and a lot of time spent with the family mini (my grandson) this has become an ongoing saga.  Look out for next Saturday's epistle.