Hi everybody, my name is Sheridan, I work
at the Long Beach Public Library, and I'm
here today to show you how to make a
found object picture frame using
supplies that you probably already have
at home.
Pretty cool. Before we get started though,
if you haven't signed up for summer
reading be sure to do so by going to
longbeach.beanstack.org, and if
you've already signed up, enter the code
"pirate" into the activities tab of your
challenge to get a point for watching
this video today. Cool? Okay, so before we
get started I want to talk a tiny bit
about what found object art is. In 1917 a
French artist by the name of Marcel
Duchamp signed a name and put the date
on a urinal that he found.  He took this
urinal and he took it to a gallery where
there was an art competition happening,
and he said that it was art. And it was
really controversial, because up until
that point, art and sculpture was
something that somebody put in a ton of
time for, trained for years to do, and
oftentimes had an insane amount of
talent to be able to actually produce
something that was called art. Duchamp
completely obliterated that when he took
this urinal and he called it art. He took
this urinal and he recontextualized it.
He took its original purpose which is to
serve as a bathroom, and he called it art,
and it became art. And so this is what
Duchamp would call an objet trouvé, which
means a found object. And it became art!
And it changed the course and landscape
of art forever.  This had really really
influential consequences. For example in
1936, Meret Oppenheim took a saucer, a
teacup, and a spoon, covered it in fur, and
called it art, called it sculpture. This
is a little bit more surrealist and bent,
but the point is that he didn't make
the cup of the saucer or the spoon, and
he didn't make the fur, he just assembled
the art from objects that he had found
in the landscape around. Really abstract,
really controversial, and also really
really cool what's possible with what's
just lying around you to turn it into
art. So now I'm gonna show you how to
take some stuff that's just around your
house, and turn it into your very own art,
okay? So to make this found object
picture frame, what you're gonna need is
some cardboard or cardstock.
I'm using some cereal boxes which I'm
sure you have at home. Cocoa pebbles is
one of my favorites, so I chowed down on
the cereal and now I have the box to use
in art.  Also I've got some pipe cleaners,
some feathers, these little puffy billy
bops, some markers, glue stick, a little
bit of glitter glue, some washing tape,
scissors, a pencil, a ruler, some little
gems in case you want to make it, you know,
and then I have these stickers
laying around too so I decided to use
those as well.  You can also, you can use
glue or you can use tacky glue to attach
this stuff. If you have a parent who's
helping you, you can also use a hot glue
gun, but be very careful with these
because they get very very hot. Leave
that to the grown-ups, okay? And so we'll
get started.
In here you can see that I've got a
picture of myself and my grandmother. I'm
reading her a letter when I was visiting
her one day that her sister wrote her
from Mexico City. My grandma can't read,
so I just, you know, took the opportunity
to read her the letter aloud, and my mom
snapped a photo and now it's one of my
favorite photos of me and my grandma. So
I framed that in this one, and the one
that I'm gonna show you how to make in
the video, I'm gonna frame a picture of
myself and one of my really best friends
Sarah. And so I'll show you what to do. So
earlier, before the video, I cut up a
cereal box. As you can see it was Fruity
Pebbles, another one of my favorite
cereals. And I took the two panels, the
two biggest panels the front and the back,
to be able to form the frame. So you
probably want to do this in pencil, but
I'm gonna do it with marker just so that
you can see the lines.
As you can see, the panel is a little bit
bigger than my photo. This is a 5"x7" photo,
but you can do a smaller one if you like,
or even a bigger one if you like, if you
have a big cardboard box or something
like that. So what I want to do is I want
to measure, using my ruler, about how if I
put this about in the middle, how wide
that is.  So it looks like it's about an
inch. I'm not sure if you can see that,
But it hits about the one. So from the
bottom of the photo, I'm going to measure
another inch and I'm going to draw a
little dot. From one side, a little dot
there, and on the other side, a little dot
there. And then using the ruler, I'm gonna
connect those two dots with a line and
this line is gonna be then an inch all
around the photo. And using some scissors,
I'm just gonna cut off the excess cardboard. Cool, so this is going to be the
back of our frame. What we need to do
with this other panel is do the same
thing. Now that you've already got one
that's the correct size you can just lay
it on top and cut it out, or if you
really feel like it you can also trace
the line onto it and then cut it that
way. I'm just gonna cut it out like this.
Alright, perfect. So now I've got two panels that
are gonna serve as my picture frame, okay.
What I'm gonna do next is I'm going to
try to cut out a rectangle in the middle
of this panel to be able to actually see
the photo that's in the frame. I'm gonna
lay this photo on top, and very carefully
so I don't actually mark the photo, I'm
going to mark the four points that are
on the end of the four corners of the
photo. I'm not sure if you can tell, but as
you can see I've marked four little dots.
Right, and then what I'm gonna do, you
don't want to actually put any lines on
this photo just yet, because what you're
gonna be doing is you're actually be
cutting a rectangle that's smaller than
the photo, just by just a tiny bit. Next
up what I'm gonna do is I'm going to
measure a quarter of an inch into
diagonally from the dot. So this seems
confusing right, but I've got the dot
here, and because I want this rectangle
to be smaller, a little bit smaller than
my photo, I'm just going to measure a
quarter of an inch into the rectangle. So
I'm gonna do that for all four, okay, on a
diagonal. And then that way the photo
doesn't slip out of the front of the
frame when you've got it in there. We're
just gonna do that real quick for all four points.
So as you can see now I've got four
points on my rectangle where I'm gonna
start drawing lines to cut it out. These
four points are actually smaller than my
photo by a tiny bit. My photo covers them
up right? So now I'm gonna draw lines and
cut it out.
Perfect, so as you can see now I've
got a frame right, the front of the frame,
and I've got the back of the frame. I'm
gonna test it out real quick by putting
my picture in the middle, and putting
this on top, and as you can see it covers
the white part of the photo. And then
that way I'm sure that my photo will not
fall out of the frame. So we're about
halfway done.  What I'm gonna do next is
I'm gonna take my glue stick, and I'm
going to apply glue to three sides of
the frame. Unless you want this photo to
be in this frame forever, you really only
want to do three sides of the frame so
you can slide the photo in and out
easily. So I'm gonna do the bottom, and
I'll show you guys what I'm doing just a
sec, the side, and the top. Be careful not
to put any glue stick onto your actual
photo, because you don't want to damage
it or get it all sticky. But as you can
see I put glue stick onto all these
three sides of the frame, and then that
way I can slide this photo out by this
side. And then take your the top of your
frame and measure it so it's nice and flush,
and press down on that glue to make it dry.
So now you're pretty much done with the
frame construction part of this. And
now what's left is to turn this found
object that we cut up a little bit, and
with other found objects, decorate it to
make it into a piece of art for yourself
and your family. So what I'm gonna do
here is I'm going to take some of these
markers, I think I'll do orange, and I'm
just going to color the front.  You can
choose whatever color you'd like though.
You can do more than one color, you can
do, you can draw designs on it,
it's your art, you can do whatever you'd
like, right?  You can see my frame is
orange, and now I'm gonna start kind of
you know gluing stuff to it. Maybe I'll
put a little bit, a swirl of glitter
glue in one of the corners, or
four of the corners who knows. Maybe you
know get a little crazy, here the idea
here is to get as creative as you want.
And maybe I'm going to stick a couple of
these little billy bops on there with
the hot glue, If you're using hot glue be
very very careful or have your parent do
it so that that way you don't burn
yourself.  It can be really really painful
to burn yourself with hot glue, trust me,
I've been there.
So now I've got some glitter glue, I've
got some of these little doohickeys on here.
Maybe I think I'm gonna add some
feathers. This is the open side of my
frame so just remember where that is but
I think I'm add some feathers to the top
here. Put a little bit of hot glue there. You can also use tacky
glue or even just like white glue if you
have that.
And it doesn't have to be perfect, it's your art. And it's art because you say it's art.
That's why it's art. You can see I've got some puff balls, some glitter glue, some feathers...
I think maybe I'm also gonna add a couple
of gems here to the other side. I'll take my
hot glue and very carefully lay down
some hot glue here. Be sure to have extra
hot glue sticks on hand because
otherwise it makes it really difficult.
This craft is a great way to use up any
you know like little extra craft
supplies that you have from other
projects. Or you know, little pieces of
yarn if you want to get it super, you
know more of a textile kind of feel. It's
just a great way to use up extra craft
supplies and anything else you have, you
know, around the house. So I think now I'm
done with the decoration portion of my
frame. I've got some glitter on it, I've
got some feathers, these little billy
bops, some gems, and now I think I'm ready
to put in the photo. Before you put in
your photo be sure that all the objects
and stuff are dry, so that that way it
doesn't damage the photo in case you
want to use it in another frame later.
But I'm just gonna go ahead and put it
in so that you can see how it works.
Because I left this side unglued, what I
can easily do is just very carefully
slide the photo into the frame. Sometimes
it takes a little bit of doing, and as
you can see, the photo went in.
If you put too much glue on one of the
sides, it's very possible that the photo
may not go all the way to the end, and
that's okay.
But I think this photo is pretty well
centered. So as you can see now I've got
my photo in there, it's me and my friend
Sarah. And we've got a little frame that
I made out of found objects, and it is
art. And it's a great way to memorialize
our friendship and the many years that
we've known each other. Over here I've
got my grandma in another found object
frame, and I can put this on the fridge
or in my room or you know wherever I
want to. Thank you so much for joining me
today! Hopefully you had a great time and
you can make your own found object
frames. If you do decide to make the
frames, feel free to share them with us
on Twitter Instagram or Facebook. We'd
love to share them with the rest of the
Long Beach community. Okay, take care, have a great summer. Bye
