Pop-Up Circus

I am learning pop-up design. It's exciting with lots of challenges. As an artist I've learned how can I turn my vision into a picture. I am confident with the composition, the shapes, the colors.

The pop-up design is a brand new field to me. I can learn it via books and tutorials. The biggest challenge to using my knowledge adequately, that the surface pops up on the right spot. Especially if I want to  keep the original composition. I decided to make pop-up cards using great art works. Good exercise! I have to follow the composition and have to find the right pop-up mechanism. Here is the first one. 

I've chosen a painting of Vilmos Aba-Novak. He is a great Hungarian artist from the age of avant-garde. The title is "In the Circus" and it's painted in 1935. 

I began with designing the space division. It's the classical triad. The foreground is a group of artists, the middle space is the band on the stage and the background is the circus ring. We cannot see the show properly, because we are in the backstage. This is an important thing. We are watching the scene from the view of the performers, we are with them. I wanted to follow this guide on my pop-up.

I have created 3 layers. I've used V-folds for the closer ones and an M-fold for the background. I printed out the picture. I cut off the shapes and mounted on the folds. I've completed the collage with painting, because the picture didn't cover the whole surface. Then I stuck them together. 

It's a simple pop-up but I am happy with it. I think I've been successful at changing a two dimensional painting into a three dimensional pop-up. I've kept the composition but I lifted the shapes up.

More information about ABA-NOVÁK, VILMOS (1894 - 1941)