The Virgin of Guadalupe meets an Altoid Tin and some Pencil Stubs

I had been saving pencil stubs for several years -- wanting to use them on one of my 2-D mixed media collages as the rays emanating from the Virgin of Guadalupe.

As you might guess, this becomes another story of "art takes a detour."  

Those darned pencil stubs just didn't want to lie flat on a 2-D canvas -- they wanted to express themselves in 3-D fashion.

Thus begins the saga of The Virgin of Guadalupe meeting an Altoid Tin and some pencil stubs.

I first deconstructed an Altoid tin -- removed the lid from the base, gessoed both pieces, then painted them gold.

I used one of my favorite images of the Virgin of Guadalupe in a blue robe -- 

trimmed her and Mod Podged her, and mounted her in the bottom portion of the tin into which I had glued lots of gold beads.  The sides of the shrine are embellished with beads and flat-back rhinestones.  A molded gold angel and separate gold paper foil wings are mounted in front of the Virgin.  And I gave her a Jolee's Boutique gold crown

The Altoid tin lid forms the base of the shrine -- which is embellished with gold studs and rose-shaped buttons that I painted red.  

The pencil stubs are glued to the back of the shrine and a rather nice large junk jewelry clip-style earring (with the clip removed) covers the area where the pencil stubs don't quite converge (there just isn't room for all those eraser ends).

I've already made five more Altoid tin shrines.  I'll get them photographed and added to my blog.  And there are two more in progress on my work table.  I guess I've started yet another series!