the.com/decoupage
Gluing paper onto stuff and calling it art — French for getting away with it.
means The craft of decorating a surface by gluing on cut-out paper images and then sealing the whole thing under layers of varnish or lacquer until it looks deliberate.
from Straight from the French découpage, "the act of cutting out," from découper, "to cut up" — de- plus couper, "to cut" (the same couper behind "coupon," a little something snipped off). The technique itself is far older than its French name: it flourished in 17th- and 18th-century Europe as a cheap imitation of expensive lacquered Asian furniture, with workshops cutting and pasting prints to mimic painted scenes.
- french origin
- From decouper, meaning to cut out
- venetian craze
- 18th-century Venetians faked lacquer with paper cutouts
- royal habit
- Marie Antoinette reportedly decoupaged to pass time
- layer count
- Fine work can demand 30-plus coats of varnish
- the cheat
- Cheaper than imitating costly Asian lacquerware by hand
versailles palace interiors — marie antoinette decorated her private chambers using decoupage in 18th century france
victorian scrap screens — british upper-class women created elaborate decoupage folding screens from colorful printed scraps, peak 1850s-1890s
italian lacca povera — venetian craftsmen used decoupage technique to imitate expensive asian lacquerware on furniture, 17th-18th centuries