- Ashley Kalagian Blunt: a candle – bird? – in the wind
- Blue “sparrow” for Zana Fraillon
- Arigato to Danie Ware
- Dumplings bring oceans of joy: thanks to Wai Chim
- Gumboots and a bottle pouring an ocean: thank you Tabitha Bird
- A monster of a job earns a monster thank you to Cass Moriarty
- ‘The Wave’ inspired Imbi Neeme’s book cover, which inspired this card
- Koala saves trees: thanks to Sophie Cunningham
- Gabrielle Tozer: thank you from DMZ
- Anna Whateley: such a normal selfie (card)
- Rob McDonald lives with rainbows
- Kelly Van Nelson lives in Graffiti Lane 😉
- An experimental card for Kelly Morton
- Simon Cleary confronted with a four-legged war artist: “Who’s (not) a good boy then?”
- Favel Parrett: Past the Shallows
- I had a whale of a time interviewing Elizabeth Knox
- Carly Findlay: a thank you party! early January 2020
- Samuel Maguire: wizard and Authors for Fireys contributor
If you’ve never heard about Zana Fraillon, you clearly haven’t been visiting Dark Matter Zine enough. I’ve read and reviewed all Zana’s books over the past few years and I’ve loved every one! Here are all DMZ reviews of Zana’s books and interviews with Zana. And here is my 2016 interview of Zana around the time of release of her award winning novel Bone Sparrow.
Zana Fraillon contributed to the Authors For Fireys fundraiser in January 2020. Emily Gale and Nova Wheetman organized this mammoth undertaking. They raised $513,149 to support firefighters and to help Australia’s bushfire survivors.
The entire list of original Authors For Fireys series of interviews and guest blogs are here. The ‘thank you’ posts, each of which include my cardmaking efforts, are here.
Meet Zana Fraillon
When Zana isn’t reading or writing, she likes to explore the museums and hidden passageways scattered across Melbourne. They provide the same excitement as that moment before opening a new book – preparing to step into the unknown where a whole world of possibilities awaits.
To bid on Zana Fraillon’s auction items, see her twitter feed.
Dark Matter Zine says thank you
I am a novice card maker but I made the pictured card. This is a thank you to Zana Fraillon for appearing as a guest on Dark Matter Zine and for supporting Australia’s firefighters.
About the card
This card is fairly simple in design but it still took a while to execute. I stamped a Tim Holtz crazy bird and colored it using a watercolor marker. After die cutting, I ran a black Memento marker around the edges of the bird so it looks neater and better cut than it actually is. Plus I put Glossy Accents on the eyes to make them googly.
The background is distress oxide inks: I sprayed water on ink marks on my glass media mat then picked up the wet ink with some Neena solar white card (the paper). I die cut some brown card to make the branch then added some copic marker coloring and white gel pen for dimension. ‘Thanks’ is stamped with versamagic clear ink, sprinkled with embossing powder and heat-set. The “authors for fireys” sentiment I printed out.
Trying yet again
The first card I made for Zana Fraillon I threw out because I thought it looked too much like a bird in a fire (light brown/orange background with black dots). Later I was upset that I’d thrown it out because my next card, in my opinion, wasn’t as good. This is about the third I made in this series. I persevered despite myself because I love making things, I love doing art and craft. And I’m learning that people enjoy getting cards in the mail, hand-made cards showing that someone is thinking of them.
This card arrived at Zana’s place some time ago – I forget if I mailed it in February or March now – so now it’s even more important to do nice things for one another. Making and sending cards might be your thing; if so, I encourage you to do it! You might prefer helping elderly people get essential supplies or maybe putting a bear in your window for the Great Bear Hunt is more your speed. Some people move their bears regularly, making their front window and/or front yard more of a socially distant treasure hunt. Others put up rainbows as a sign of hope to color our world.
Whatever is your jam, do it!
Stay safe,
Nalini