Creative Moments: Altered Game Boards

With proper supervision, this project is good for both children and adults. It all depends on how elaborate or complicated you'd like to get with the piece. This project requires advanced planning if you don't have a wide variety of materials on hand. Gathering a wide variety of ephemera will add interest and keep your creative wheels turning. Let's look at what the definition of ephemera is before we continue:

"Ephemera refers to written and printed matter published with a short intended lifetime. In the world of collectors common types of ephemera include letters, advertising trade cards, cigarette cards, airsickness bags, posters, postcards, bookmarks, baseball cards, tickets, greeting cards, stock certificates, photographs and zines. Decks of the most-wanted Iraqi playing cards are recent example of ephemera because they will probably lose their original purpose and interest in a relatively short time. The word derives from the Greek meaning of things lasting no more than a day.

In the field of library and information science the term ephemera is also used to describe the class of published single-sheet or single page documents which are meant to be thrown away after one use. This classification then excludes simple letters and photographs with no printing on them, which are considered as manuscripts or typescripts. It includes: postcards, event-oriented posters, transportation and show tickets, baggage stickers, stock certificates, motor vehicle licensing forms, business cards, printed wedding invitations, trade cards, and other similar printed materials.

An academic or a national library often has a rare book department tasked, in part, with the acquisition and organization of such ephemera, in order to preserve them as witnesses of local or national history. In some places museums are given this responsibility, or decide to assume it. Libraries must carefully develop criteria to decide what ephemera to acquire and save." - wikipedia.com

In addition to the ephemera, gather the following: