Colorful Butterfly Ephemera Sheets
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The butterflies on these free printable collage sheets are what were called relief scraps. Relief scraps from printers in the late 19th and early 20th century refer to small printed images or designs that were used for a variety of purposes, such as decorating printed materials like books, newspapers, and advertisements.
I’m no lepidopterist, so I couldn’t tell you if these are representations of any butterflies that exist in nature, but their bright colors sure are pretty and would be nice for adding to journal pages.
Scroll down, and you’ll find three different butterfly ephemera sheets that are free for you to download and add to your mixed-media journaling supplies. I have more free butterfly collage sheets in my collection if you are interested. You might also like these exotic butterflies and moths collage sheets, these British butterflies sheets, or these painted butterflies and insects sheets.
In relief printing, the image or design to be printed is raised above the surface of the printing block, while the surrounding areas are cut away, leaving only the image or design to be inked and printed. Relief scraps were produced by printing these raised designs onto a separate sheet of paper and then cutting them out, creating small printed images that could be easily added to other printed materials. You’ll notice there are little strips that connect the butterflies together.
Relief scraps were often used to decorate pages of children's books, scrapbooks, and other personal items. They were also used in the production of greeting cards, advertisements, and other printed materials to add visual interest and variety to the design. Today, relief scraps are considered collectible items and are sought after by collectors of antique and vintage printed materials.
Much as stickers and embellishments are used today in scrapbooking, relief scraps, with their colorful and intricate designs, were a popular way to add a decorative element to scrapbook pages in the 19th century. They were affordable and easily accessible. They were often cut out and pasted onto the pages alongside photographs, clippings from newspapers and magazines, and other mementos. They could be used to create decorative borders around the edges of the page, highlight important information or events, or simply add a touch of visual interest.
Print these collage sheets and add them to your supplies for art journaling, junk journaling, bullet journaling, collage, artist trading cards (ATCs), scrapbooking, and other mixed media artwork.
If you enjoy these free printables, be sure to follow me on Instagram and Pinterest, so you’ll see when I post new ones.
You may also enjoy these free collage sheets.
Terms of use:
Free to use for personal or commercial projects. You may print the collage sheets as many times as you wish for your personal crafts or in your projects to sell, including: art journals, scrapbooks, junk journals, collage art, etc. You may not redistribute or sell the collage sheets “as is" in either print or digital form.
If you wish to share the files on your own website, please do not make the files available for download directly from your site. Instead, include an image with a link back to this site.
To the best of my knowledge, these are all royalty free images that are in the Public Domain in the US. However, you should always do your own research if you plan to use them commercially.
