Another Artist Book is almost done

One of the things about making artist books is that you can use them to house a lot of stray art which has not yet found a home, and it's a good way to let people browse through.  

So this latest book is a group of stitchings on handmade paper, together with other handmade paper pieces, some molded, and it uses second cut cotton linters fiber, abaca (that's banana tree) fiber, and daylily paper.  The whitest looking, crisp paper is the cotton, the softer, more ivory color is the abaca, and the daylily paper is a rich golden brown.  I made all the paper, and will soon be making more, but I need to be more outdoors to do it without flooding the studio.  These pages have been exhibited, but are home now.

Here are the fronts and backs of the pages, both adhered to a piece of foamcore for stability. You'll see stencils and stampings.  I handcarved the stamps, from giant erasers, great fun, and the stencils were given to me years ago. One paper is black, mulberry paper, I didn't make that one! not having access to mulberry raw materials.

 I'll be explaining all the techniques that went into this one the week I bring it in, since a lot of them are very accessible to anyone once you realize it's possible.  Such as molding the paper, which gives great results, and is easier than you might think.

Then, so that people can see both sides, and protect the art at the same time, I put the pages into page protectors.

And I improved (!) a three ring binder to hold them and to work with them in concept.

When all the decorations are dry on the cover, I'll install the pages.  If you look at the cover you'll see a great effect. That lacy stuff is in fact the glue holding the paper on the other side, organized to be another art element. It will dry clear, but will still look interesting.

I'm hoping that, aside from enjoying the art, participants will get new ideas they can try at home, without years of training! The week I talk about handmade paper, I'll bring in enough equipment for people to see what it consists of, and raw sheet fiber, which they can send away for if they get excited about this process.  We can't make paper at the residency session, but I can explain the process.

I'll try to alert you here about what's coming up which week, in case you're local and there's something you really want to see. But I hope you'll show up anyway!