Helen Hiebert's Blog, page 27

Get the Vote Out!

The Sunday Paper #325

August 16, 2020

Introducing…!

Andrew Huot, Karen Hardy, and Linda Marshall are launching Book | Paper | Thread  — a source for online workshops in the book and paper arts. The three instructors, who have been teaching in-person across the country at arts centers, universities, and in their own studios, have moved their workshops to an online format so participants can learn at home or in their own studio. Their first courses include an Introduction to Bookbinding,  Transforming Japanese Paper with Konnyaku,  Ready, Set, Fold, and  Preservation Enclosures.

Course content will be presented as video demonstrations with accompanying PDF instructions for each of the projects, accessible online anytime during the course. Participants have access to a discussion forum to ask questions about processes and to share successes. Some classes will include live office hours webinars on the course website. Participants have the opportunity to purchase a kit of materials for each project or find their own from the supplied materials and tools list.

Join the Book | Paper | Thread mailing list  (reference the Sunday Paper in the Questions/Comments section) by next Sunday (8/23) when they will select one new subscriber to receive a paper pack from each of the three instructors.

Papermaker of the Week: Jackie Radford

This is a new column. If you’re a papermaker and would like to be featured in the coming weeks and months, please fill out this form. I’d love to hear from you!

© Jackie Radford “Exposed” 8.5×11 cotton rag paper, watermark. Watermarks are unseen until exposed to the light. This body of work responds to current country-wide unrest, as civil rights issues are exposed to the light.

The first papers that Jackie Radford fell in love with had botanical inclusions in them. Each sheet of paper had a speckling of natural mementos from someone’s garden. Every little bit of leaf, stalk, and petal told a story about a patch of dirt. Those papers ignited her relationship with papermaking. Today, she makes paper in her North Carolina studio tucked in the back of her own patch of dirt, and bits of leaf, stalk, and petal tell her story. Radford is in constant conversation with her medium. She pushes it until it protests and then they chat about what they can do in that tension. She’s working with cotton rag now. “What happens when I under-beat? Over-beat? Use cheap fabric? Mix blends of flimsy and robust fabric?” Try it and see what happens” is a guiding principle in her practice.

In the Studio: A Sheet of Abaca Comes to Life

Remember that online paper sale? THANK YOU to those of you who placed orders! I am busy making those abaca sheets. I’m pretty fast, but this is slow papermaking – if you’ve worked with abaca, you know that it drains slowly. I made a short video that shows the creation of a sheet of abaca, from fiber to finished sheet. Guess how thick a stack of 44 sheets of super thin abaca is? You’ll find out at the end of the video! And for those of you who placed an order, they are shipping out as I finish them, and everything will ship by the end of August.

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Check out this cool Notes for Votes Kit a mother/daughter team in North Carolina has put together to help you get involved in the 2020 election while staying socially distanced. Their goal is to get out the vote, support small artists and businesses, support/save the post office and share their love of getting something fun in the mail. That sounds to me like a win-win-win-win! They are donating their profits to Fair Fight 2020. Hop on over to Etsy and purchase a kit for yourself or to give as a gift. Each kit includes:

-10 Postcards with 5 designs that can be reprinted to make more

-3 Handmade Art greeting cards

-2 Cool stickers (the Truth Matters, Go Fact Yourself is my favorite)!

-3 Postcard stamps

-3 Pens in different colors

-1 Granola bar for snacking while you write

-1 Information sheet full of ideas to use your postcards and encouragement

-1 Surprise Gift

Karla Funderburk started making cranes three months ago, hanging them in her art gallery. She soon realized that she wasn’t going to be able to keep up with her goal – to exhibit a crane for each of those who have died in the U.S. of COVID-19 – by making 10 cranes each night. On May 14th, the number of deaths ticked to 88,000 and she realized it would take her 24 years to complete them and she asked for help. Now volunteers drop off scores of the elegantly made paper cranes every day.

A Tribute to Tradition, a touring exhibition on contemporary paper art, is currently on view in Beijing. More than 120 contemporary Chinese paper artworks, spanning from paper-cutting and installation to sculpture and relief, are on display at the Shandong Art Museum in Ji’nan before they travel to Shenyang, Xi’an, and Wuhan.

Artist Wang Weiwei’s paper statue Expect, made from a blend of pulp and ink, is on show at the Today Art Museum in Beijing on July 25, 2020. [Photo by Yang Xiaoyu/chinadaily.com.cn]

Spencer Little’s nestled sculptures are on view through September 20 at MOAH: CEDAR in Lancaster, CA. Illumination Devices is comprised of the artist’s bent portraits and totems of merging faces, in addition to a series of irradiated kinetic sculptures. Each lamp is formed from a welded metal body that is covered with a thin paper “skin.”

© Spencer Little, “Large Orange Lamp” (2020), steel, paper, glue, red heartwood, gears, electric motors, sprockets, bicycle chain link, 40 × 80 × 40 inches. As seen on Colossal. 

I enjoyed this article with the premise of books still having lots to offer as libraries go digital.

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Try It, Woven Paper Lantern online class (self study), The Papermaker’s Package, Water Paper Time & The Papermaker’s Companion.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Paper Bears Spiritual Weight

The Sunday Paper #324

August 9, 2020

Papermaker of the Week: Maria Amalia Wood

This is a new column. If you’re a papermaker and would like to be featured in the coming weeks and months, please fill out this form. I’d love to hear from you!

© Maria Amalia Wood. The Metamorphisms artist book was pushed around on a movable pedestal to engage participants in writing down their prejudices, biases and “isms” (racism, sexism, ableism, ageism, etc.). The written reflections were beaten into a slurry that was then made into new sheets of paper and were printed with social justice quotes by famous activists.

Maria Amalia Wood is an artist, designer and maker working with textiles, papermaking and community-focused storytelling. As an immigrant from Honduras, her work delves into the complexities of a life lived between cultures. Working intuitively, she draws upon material culture and the natural environment to create beautiful marks that refer to specific memories of lived experiences. With an individual and socially engaged art practice, she is interested in using art and design as a tool for social justice.

In the Studio: Final Day to Place Your Order!

Last Sunday, I woke up to lots of sales in my online shop, and I sold almost all of the paper I had in my online handmade paper sale that day. THANK YOU to those of you who placed orders!

What’s left? I have a (very) small number of the colorful packages you see above.  And there is one paper that I make to order – the translucent abaca. This is a favorite of many customers, and you can place an order for 5 or 10 sheets (today please). I’ll be making this paper next week and shipping shortly thereafter.

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Papery Tidbits

Have you listened to my interview with Cathleen Baker on Paper Talk?

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Retiring University of Iowa Center for the Book director, MacArthur Fellow, and renowned papermaker Tim Barrett reflects on his storied, 34-year career at Iowa. Watch this video to the end to see how you can help Tim raise $2.5 million for the UI Center for the Book. Tim was one of my first guests on Paper Talk.

Here’s a fun project to do with the kids (of any age). Construct this simple paper helicopter that spins to the ground, and read about the helicopter that is on its way to Mars. The real helicopter has to be super lightweight to fly on Mars, and it needs large blades that can rotate really fast so it can generate enough lift to overcome the gravity of the Red Planet and lift off the ground.

Check out these intricate paper cuts by Badhrieaswari Rajagopal. She created her own 100 day challenge to perfect her paper cutting technique.

This is a great story about a young and resourceful artist who incorporates handmade paper into her practice. CalArts student Jennie E. Park was recently one of 10 out of 1100 applicants to win a Future Art Award from Mozaik Philanthropy, a competition that invited artists to share work that reimagines the pandemic and alternative futures.

In Jewish tradition, paper bears spiritual weight. Be it notes placed in the Western Wall or the strict laws regarding disposal of sacred texts, paper is treated as a sacred material. Carmel Ilan came upon pile after pile of books placed sheepishly beside trash cans. She took them to her studio.

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Translucent abaca (made to order), The Papermaker’s Package, Star Watermark Package, Playing With Pop-UPs.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Handmade Paper For Sale!

The Sunday Paper #323

August 2, 2020

In the Studio: Online Paper Starts NOW! 

Here… we… go! Shop for handmade papers you won’t find anywhere else in the world. Click through to watch a video of me handling and describing the papers. Supplies are limited, so don’t delay. Thanks for supporting Helen Hiebert Studio!

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Papermaker of the Week: Cathleen Baker

This is a new column. If you’re a papermaker and would like to be featured in the coming weeks and months, please fill out this form. I’d love to hear from you!

I had the pleasure of interviewing Cathleen Baker on Paper Talk recently. We talk about how she moved to the U.K in 1968 where she eventually became the paper conservator for the Courtauld Institute Galleries in London, and how handling the old papers in the documents she was preserving sparked an interest in paper. Among many other interesting projects, Cathy wrote the biography of Dard Hunter, which involved moving into his home in Chillicothe, Ohio (which his grandson now owns). Cathy publishes her own work, along with award-winning books about the history and technologies of papermaking, printing, and bookbinding by others under her imprint, The Legacy Press. Enjoy our conversation!

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Papery Tidbits

Participants in my Paper + Light online class are doing some amazing things with… paper + light (take a peek over on Instagram). If you’re interested in signing up for Session 2, we start on tomorrow!
Did you catch the virtual studio tour I gave a few weeks back through the Creative Arts Workshop?

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I love meeting other artists in my online classes! David Friedman is an eclectic artist who has been specializing in papercutting for the past 9 years. His work uses colored papers behind black paper to create striking colored shadows behind his elegant and complex designs. Be sure to click through to see his papercut typeface + more of his wonderful work.

© David Friedman, “Thick and Thin”, red, blue and black Canson Mi Tientes papers and basswood stilts, 20 x 20 inches.

My beloved the world is making to fight the coronavirus. I am going to have to try to make a trip to The Philippines one day!



This ‘rice paper’ from Vietnam made it into my news feed, although it is not truly paper, but an edible rice paper. I had to laugh because there is a misnomer that Asian papers are made from rice (you can make paper from rice straw, but the rice we eat does not have enough cellulose to make paper). From what I know, there is a paper made from the rice pith plant, but it is a shaved paper, more similar to payprus or amate. Anyways, I thought I’d throw these in here, because they are so beautiful! And if anyone was with me in 2014 after the opening of my installation of The Wish, I think we ate these at dinner afterwards!



This is a mesmerizing video about the paper marbling of Garip Ay, and I love how the work is described as painting on water.

The work of Garip Ay, as seen on This Is Colossal.

Someone over in my facebook group (The Paper Studio) mentioned this cool community engagement project: The Rubin Museum Invites the Public to Participate in The Lotus Effect, a Community-Built Installation.

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class; Try It! my online handmade paper sale; and Playing With Paper.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Home in the Cottonwood

The Sunday Paper #322

July 26, 2020

Papermaker of the Week: Helen Frederick

This is a new column. If you’re a papermaker and would like to be featured in the coming weeks and months, please fill out this form. I’d love to hear from you!

Helen Frederick is known mainly for hand-driven media such as custom-formed paper installations, artist books, paintings, drawings, and prints that often incorporate the use of language. She also adapts electronic media and sculpture in her installations. Throughout her life, Frederick’s passion for diverse cultures and histories has led her to travel to observe the material cultures of many societies, their skills, and ideas and to make connections among disparate cultural traditions. Her private Reading Road Studio in Silver Spring, Maryland, provides collaborative opportunities for artists interested in works in and on paper, constructions, artist books, and critical conversations about social justice, cultural and visual literacy. She is recognized as a distinguished artist, curator, educator, coordinator of international projects, and as founder of Pyramid Atlantic, a center for contemporary printmaking, hand papermaking and the art of the book. Frederick is a Professor Emeritus in the School of Art at George Mason University.

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In the Studio: Online Paper Starts Next Week! 

I’m getting ready for an online paper sale which begins August 2nd – make sure you read the blog next Sunday because supplies are limited! Purchase papers that you won’t find anywhere else in the world: watermarks, abaca leather, stenciled designs, rainbow abaca, collage packs, and translucent abaca (made to order).

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Papery Tidbits

Participants in my Paper + Light online class are doing some amazing things with… paper + light (take a peek over on Instagram). If you’re interested in signing up for Session 2, we start on August 6th!
I attended OrigamiTalk last Saturday and really enjoyed it! Ali Bahmani interviews a prominent origami artist every Saturday. Last week it was fun to hear about the work of Ekaterina Lukasheva, who is contributing a project in my upcoming book. You can attend for a small fee.

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I met Dolan Geiman recently at Art on the Rockies, a casual yet upscale art fair that takes place within walking distance from my home. Everyone wore masks and hand sanitizer was abundant (a sign of the times for anyone reading this post in the hopefully near-distant future). We had a lovely conversation, and of course I was drawn to his collage work. Geiman produces large-scale paper collage portraits of American icons and Animalia entirely from hand-cut vintage paper elements. He likes to spend time reminiscing on the past while flipping through the pages of decades forgotten magazines, intently searching for the perfect shape, color, or texture within a periodical’s pages to add to his archive of collage elements. He’s become increasingly precise and intricate over the years; his latest large-scale paper collages feature thousands of individually hand-cut pieces.

© Dolan Geiman, Oriole with Nest Original Paper Collage

These lights caught my eye. Yuko Nishikawa makes each lamp by mixing paper fibre with wet clay and turning them into bulbous, hollow shells using a coiling technique. Click through to see her interacting with the objects.

I find this piece by David Joo so intriguing. The sculpture, created with handmade paper, is part of an exhibition titled “Cracked,” and like nearly all current gallery openings, it’s online due to the social distancing requirements necessary to control the spread of coronavirus.

© David Joo, Imaginary Landscape lll

This is a lovely story about Soo Wai Yan, an entrepreneur whose passion for paper flowers has led to paper flower walls for event decorations and boutique visual merchandising, 3D paper animals such as birds, butterflies, bears, koi fish, and even fashionable flower headpieces from paper for beauty shoots. She’s currently working on incorporating seed paper into her flowers to make them plantable!


23 Sandy turns a page! 23 Sandy was founded in Portland, Oregon by book artist and photographer Laura Russell in 2007. For 10 years it was a brick-and-mortar gallery space exhibiting a wide range of unique & edition artist books and paper art. 23 Sandy closed its physical doors in 2017, becoming an online gallery. In July 2020, the gallery is relaunching under the ownership of book artist Erin Mickelson, 23 Sandy’s long-time gallery assistant until her relocation to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class; Try It! Panel Shade online workshop; Ruffle, a drawing in paper; and Playing With Paper.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Papermaker of the Week

The Sunday Paper #321

July 19, 2020

Papermaker of the Week: Nancy Cohen

This is a new column. If you’re a papermaker and would like to be featured in the coming weeks and months, please fill out this form. I’d love to hear from you!

© 2020, Nancy Cohen, Migration Drawing, 67 x 55 inches, abaca, cotton and linen pulp on pigmented abaca paper

Nancy Cohen makes drawings, sculptures and installations in a variety of materials, including handmade paper. For the last five years a major focus has been on a series of large-scale drawings, many of which are based on waterways and all which are constructed sculpturally. Nancy doesn’t have the facilities for making large sheets in her own studio, so she begins by making pigmented papers (primarily abaca and sometimes cotton) in space she rents at Dieu Donné Papermill in NYC. She transports the sheets back to her studio in Jersey City, pressed but still wet, then assembles them, in a quilt-like fashion. Later, she draws on these constructed surfaces with various densities and varieties of paper pulp. The wet pulp on the dried sheets causes a buckling on the surface that appears very much like stitching. The finished works speak to the physicality of the body and simultaneously evoke an intimate sense of touch, in a way akin to being in nature experiencing both vastness and quiet moments of focus. You can listen to my conversation with Nancy on Paper Talk.

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In the Studio: Online Paper Sale Coming Soon! 

I’m getting ready for an online paper sale during the first week of August. I’m bringing back my bubble paper in a variety of colors (I made a few black & white sheets yesterday, which you see here). Save your pennies so that you can collect some fine papers that you won’t find anywhere else in the world! I will have translucent abaca, other watermarks & more.

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Papery Tidbits

If you teach online, Alyson Stanfield is offering The Sales Page Blueprint for Artists  who teach and want to write compelling sales pages that encourage more students to register for their classes and workshops. I signed up! Class is this Thursday and Friday, one hour each day, on the pay what it’s worth model. (Please note that this is an affiliate link; I’ll earn a small commission if you sign up).
Participants in my Paper + Light online class are doing some amazing things with… paper + light! I’ll share some of them with you eventually, but in the meantime, if you’re interested in signing up for Session 2, we start on August 6th!
Did you have a chance to listen to my podcast interview with Pam Paulsrud?

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I love these drawings by Kay Lee with white pencil on black paper.

© Kay Lee, as seen on My Modern Met

Fold a circular fan with Paul Jackson. The British Origami Society had him on a Facebook Live recently.

Watch Molly Margaret of Newfoundland make a paper cut piece about seasonal affective disorder and hope. This is part of a series called Paper Cuts.

The Paper Bag Project at The Montgomery Center for the Arts looks like a lot of fun, with participants from around the globe. An online exhibition opens tomorrow.

A cat-take on the paper bag mask. Credit: Montgomery Center for the Arts.

Speaking of paper bags, Ashleigh Perrie made the best of her covid19 quarantine after being on a cruise ship using paper bags! She created what she calls PAPER BAG ELEGANZA. All of the outfits were created from 100% from recycled paper bags, napkins, bio degradable containers and disposable cutlery that were delivered to her hotel room.

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Puppy update. The pups are 4 weeks old, and we’ll get ours in 4 weeks… click through to see them in action. Katalyst Kennels has already posted another cute video on their page… rabbit hole warning! My heart is melting.

 

Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class; Try It! Panel Shade online workshop; Ruffle, a drawing in paper; and Playing With Paper.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Treewhispers

The Sunday Paper #320

 

July 12, 2020
Papermaker of the Week: Pamela Paulsrud


I had the recent pleasure of talking with Pamela Paulsrud on Paper Talk. Pam is a Chicago artist who began papermaking to examine and exploring the creative process from inception to completion. From the formation of sheets, to working with fibers in its various degrees, she was led to create spontaneous marks within the pulp, and the medium became an art unto itself and now offers her a multidisciplinary approach. We talk about the Treewhispers project that Pam and Marilyn Sward started in the year 2000 after Pam conceived of it on a bike ride (her daily practice) and where the project is today (it is still going strong). More than 7,000 paper rounds created by people from around the world feature stories, poems and imagery about trees. These disks are strung into tree-like forms for exhibition, and Pam tells me about the time Greenpeace contacted her, and how Treewhispers became an influential part of one of their activist campaigns to save a forest. Enjoy our conversation!

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Inside the Studio: Paper + Light, Oh My!


If you follow me on Instagram, check out the single sheet lanterns that participants in my summer online class, Paper + Light have been working on this week. I’m working a bit ahead of the class, writing instructions and shooting videos for Week 5, when we’ll be applying konnyaku, crumpling paper and stitching illuminated paper forms. You can join us for Session 2 – it begins on August 3rd and runs for 4 weeks.

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Papery Tidbits

Speaking of Paper + Light, Kyoko Ibe has worked wonders with both for many years. Don’t miss “Between Eye and Light,” a special online Zoom event on July 15 to celebrate the publication of the Paper in Performance (Summer 2020) issue of Hand Papermaking magazine.

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In 2019, Melanie Mowinski used ‘obstructions’, or constraints from family and friends who know her work well, to create something that reframed the divisive events occurring in our country at that moment. With The Obstruction Project, the resulting creations range from traditional letterpress prints to handmade paper, outdoor sculptures, wall drawings, sculptural objects and more. Some of the artworks were impossible to edition. For those months, Melanie created companion pieces that complement and extend the experience of the original works, sometimes using letterpress, other times creating stickers, and digital prints on rag paper. One month she even printed on paper made from her 50 year old baby diapers (pictured below).

100% of the profits from Obstruction Project sales is being donated towards anti-racist efforts including Multicultural Bridge, Campaign Zero, Black Lives Matter, Equal Justice Initiative, Southern Poverty Law Center, National Museum of African American History and Culture, Civil Rights Museum, Black Women in Visual Art, The Sentencing Project, and Black Women in Politics.

Hand Papermaking Magazine is having a really cool fundraiser called The Handmade Paper Wheel of Fortune. Sixty contemporary papermakers and paper artists (including yours truly – those are my papers pictured below) have donated bundles of 10-12 sheets of medium-sized handmade and/or hand-decorated paper. YOU can receive a surprise bundle by making a contribution of $100. Everyone who “spins” wins a bundle of handmade paper!




I’m seeing illuminated paper everywhere! These cool objects were shared over in The Paper Studio, my facebook group. Kell Black created the shadow puppet theater for dinner table entertainment, and Elliot Fan made the sculptural light box. You have to answer three easy questions to join The Paper Studio (this keeps trolls away) – please join us!



Check out this work by Tai Hwa Goh that recently debuted (virtually) at the Torpedo Factory Art Center’s Target Gallery. Goh created these flowers, with the intention of making us understand the relationship between organic growth and human desire, using printed and cut wax paper.



Need a crash course in basic papermaking? I wrote this article for beginners a couple of years ago.
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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class, Water Paper Time, Sound Blocks: Make your own set of paper vowels, and Playing With Paper.











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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

 

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

The Woman Who Printed the Declaration of Indepence

The Sunday Paper #319

July 5, 2020

Papermaker of the Week: Ray Tomasso

Ray Tomasso at the Hong Kong Open Printshop in 2018. Photo by Wong Lik-wan / Courtesy of Diane Wray Tomasso

It is with great sadness that I share the news that Ray Tomasso passed away on June 25th. Ray was papermaker and artist who welcomed me into his Denver, CO studio a few times. It was always stuffed to the gills with projects, an amazing library, his artwork, tools and materials, and Ray was always happy to show me around and talk about papermaking, techniques and projects. Among other things, Ray devised unique methods for creating his monumental sculptural wall pieces, and he was instrumental in bringing the Davis Hodges beater to life (20-30 were produced, I owned one for many years, and I hear about them often). RIP Ray. Here’s a lovely obituary by Denver arts writer Michael Paglia. I also had Ray on Paper Talk in 2017.

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Inside the Studio: The Trip to Red Cliff

I have always wanted to make a video of the last bit of my drive to my studio in Red Cliff, Colorado, but I’m always driving! I took this video on a recent trip when I was a passenger. We drove into town on the high road and then out of town under the Green Bridge. We did not go by the studio and I should have been filming horizontally, but oh well! Enjoy the views. If you’ve come to Red Cliff, look for the Green Bridge Inn and Mangos.

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Papery Tidbits

Like many organizations, the North American Hand Papermakers Conference is going online (October 15-17, 2020). There are several calls for entries to present and exhibit at the conference.
My summer online class, Paper + Light begins this Wednesday (July 6th). Sign up for 4 weeks ($145) or 8 weeks ($260). It’s not too late to join us!
Arnold Grummer’s is having a 15% off flash sale through July 7th on papermaking supplies and their beautiful presses. Use promo code FIREWORKS.
Hand Papermaking Magazine is having a really cool fundraiser! 60 contemporary papermakers and paper artists (including yours truly) have donated bundles of 10-12 sheets of medium-sized handmade and/or hand-decorated paper. YOU can receive a surprise bundle by making a contribution of $100. Everyone who “spins” wins a bundle of handmade paper!

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I’m promoting artists here on the blog to help them replace some of their income during the pandemic. Please reach out if you have a paper product to sell that you think my readers will enjoy.

Imre van Buuren creates handmade books in boxes in her studio in The Hague, the Netherlands. These unique books serve as guest books, remembrance books and more. Imre works with many types of paper – Italian, French, Japanese, wallpaper and silk paper – and creates book pages with them by folding, sewing, embroidering, painting or stamping with Indonesian textile stamps. The boxes that encase each book have  “collaged” covers, featuring small objects found in nature, folded bundles of silk, embroidered French poems, calligraphed fragments on paper and origami animals. (Click on How to Buy on her site if you’d like to make a purchase).

© 2020 Imre van Buuren, Reception Book #6

Wowza! Ed Fairburn repurposes old maps by transforming them into beautiful, highly-detailed portraits.

As seen on My Modern Met

The Jaffe Center for Book Arts is featuring book artists on their youtube channel every week. I enjoyed this one featuring Shawn Sheehy, a paper engineer based in Chicago who has contributed to several of my how-to books. Shawn creates a pop-up as he talks!



I recently discovered Design&Paper, an online magazine filled with interesting content about paper. In a recent issue, they featured Europapier, a company that is adding coffee and grass into their commercial paper.



As we celebrate our country this weekend, here is a fascinating story from the Declarations Research Project at Harvard (shared on the book arts listserv) about the only “official” version of the Declaration of Independence to be printed by a woman, Mary Katharine Goddard. Goddard also served as the first female US Postmaster, but after the ratification of the constitution, she was removed. The reasons were likely political, but were interpreted by Goddard and the public as patronizing and sexist (the only reason given was that the position would require more travel and time on the road than a woman would presumably be able to handle). Backed by over 200 prominent citizens of Baltimore, Goddard took her complaint to President George Washington. Though unsuccessful, her petition is preserved in the National Archives as a testament to her tenacity and devotion to the city of Baltimore (and of course, it was hand written on paper).
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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class, The Papermaker’s Package, Water Paper Time, Tangential, an artist’s book, and Playing With Paper.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

 

* My Amazon Shop is possible thru their affiliate program & I am an affiliate for the Craft Industry Alliance, so to be completely transparent, I want you to know I’ll be making a few cents on your purchases.

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

Virtual Studio Tour

The Sunday Paper #318

June 28, 2020

Paper of the Week: Translucent Papers

I recently stumbled across these paper samples I put together for my book Paper Illuminated 20 years ago. They show a range of ways to make paper translucent: punching, tie dyeing, embedding, piercing, layering, printing, applying beeswax, using the old cut & pierce technique, and more. My book, now out of print, is getting harder to find, but I did find a copy on Amazon (it’s not cheap). You’ll find it here, along with a list of books about paper in my Amazon* shop.

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Inside the Studio, Literally!

I gave a one-hour virtual studio tour through the Creative Arts Workshop on June 19th. Thank you to those of you who attended! Here’s the replay… sit back and relax and enjoy an overview of my studio, a papermaking demo, and a peek inside of a few of my artist’s books.

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Papery Tidbits

Have you had a chance to listen to my interview with Pam Thorne on Paper Talk?
I am a member of the Craft Industry Alliance, an invaluable network of craft business owners. They have just launched a scholarship program and will award four craft business owners a one-year membership free of charge. As part of their commitment to creating a culture of diversity, equity, and inclusion within our organization and the crafts industry as a whole, they highly encourage individuals with Black, Latinx, Asian, or Native American ancestry to apply. I have gained so much from my membership in this group. You can also join and pay for a membership* here.
My summer online class, Paper + Light begins July 6th. Sign up for 4 weeks ($145) or 8 weeks ($260).
I wrote last week about the bojagi piece that Steph Rue has donated to a fundraiser in support of the black lives matter movement. You can enter your name in the hat by going to the Japanese Americans for Justice instagram page now. Good luck!

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Kirigami (a type of origami that adds cutting to folding) principles show up in so many places! This show coating looks cool, but won’t be seen much. It serves a practical purpose though: gripping ice and other slick surfaces.

MIT researchers drew on kirigami, a variation of origami that involves cutting paper as well as folding it, to create a friction-boosting material that could be used to coat the bottom of your shoes, giving them a stronger grip on ice and other slippery surfaces. Credit: Diemut Strebe

Makiko Kato Brookes is recycling her old newspapers by making them into boxes, household bins, small and large baskets, bags, and folders to use while she has been working from home. The reporter calls this origami, but I see paper weaving.

I love these unique mixed media works by Claudia Hershman, who uses materials such as tar paper as canvas or PVC pipes for a collage base. Click through to see more of her work.

This is three views of “Tribe 2” is a sculpture built on a large cardboard mailing tube by Claudia Hershman, on virtual display at Anton Art Center. (Courtesy Claudia Hershman)

If you’ve ever seen a Le Klint light fixture (or even if you haven’t), you’ll be mesmerized by this video that shows how to paper-like material is pleated, punched, and manipulated to create modern lamps. Make sure you scroll down at the link to watch the video!

More trash to treasures: check out these unique paper vessels made from junk and learn how to make your own. As seen in the New York Times.

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Join me on Tuesday, June 30th at 1pm EST (12noon CST, 11am MST, 10am PST) for a one-hour online workshop via Zoom. We’ll work together in real time to create a paper weaving as we cut two complimentary papers into strips and weave them back together like a puzzle to create a work of art. Here’s a link to the facebook event page, where you can find all of the details and register. If you are not on facebook, you can register via Zoom here. This is a pay-as-you-wish event, and a link for payment will be provided during the event.

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class, The Papermaker’s Package, Interluceo, an artist’s book, Playing With Pop-UPs.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

 

* My Amazon Shop is possible thru their affiliate program & I am an affiliate for the Craft Industry Alliance, so to be completely transparent, I want you to know I’ll be making a few cents on your purchases.

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A New Ceiling Lamp

The Sunday Paper #317

June 14, 2020

Paper of the Week: Mulberry Paper & More

I love discovering new papers and paper combinations, and it is fun to pare papers (kind of like paring wine) for paper weavings. I’m using these two papers for a Woven Window Hanging lesson in my upcoming online class, Paper + Light. It features a smooth mulberry and a batik vein paper from Mulberry Paper + More. It isn’t too late to register for the class, which begins July 6th. 

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In the Studio: The Ceiling Lamp!

I’m so excited to have installed my new ceiling lamp above our dining room table. It was a process: 1. Create 10 sheets of abaca with embedded copper wire 2. Stitch all 10 sheets together into the round 3. Use the wires sticking out of the ends of the sheets of paper to attach to top and bottom rings 4. Connect top ring to existing light fixture with a series of strings.

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Papery Tidbits

I just stumbled across these lovely and poignant Data Visualizations of Black Life for the World’s Fair of 1900 that were spearheaded by W.E.B. Dubois in a trailblazing effort “to give, in as systematic and compact a form as possible, the history and present condition of a large group of human beings.” As seen on Brainpickings.
Maria Popova is the mastermind behind Brainpickings. This is not paper-related, but she has just released some really cool face masks. “Because of the mask’s particular folding pattern, some of the artwork came alive in a wholly new and unexpected way.”

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Steph Rue is contributing a bojagi paper curtain project for my upcoming book. Bojagi is a Korean patchwork technique. I can’t wait to share the actual project with you, but in the meantime, Steph is donating this piece to a fundraiser in support of the black lives matter movement. The fundraiser starts June 27 9am pst and ends June 28 9pm pst and will be a random drawing. Enter your name in the hat by going to the Japanese Americans for Justice instagram page on June 27th.

© Steph Rue, Untitled No. 5. A patchwork collage of hanji (Korean mulberry paper) dyed with persimmon juice and mounted onto hanji. Paper made and dyed by Steph at her home studio in Sacramento, California, during spring of 2020. 10×14″

I had a lovely conversation with Pam Thorne from Burnie, Tasmania on Paper Talk. Pam has been actively painting, sculpting, exhibiting and co-ordinating exhibitions, conducting workshops, teaching art in schools, and participating in community arts projects in Tasmania for the past 35 years. She is best known for creating, with her artistic partner Ruth Rees, a series of life size papier-mache sculptures which are displayed in numerous locations around Tasmania. Enjoy our conversation!

Doug Beube is one of the first book artists I ever met, way back in the early 1990’s, when I lived in Brooklyn and a friend of mine was his housemate. Doug makes amazing, thought provoking artist’s books, sculpture and installation work. Here’s a video tour he created featuring some of the pieces that are part of the Seager/Gray Gallery virtual Art of the Book Exhibition this month.

Kids + paper makes my heart swell! Look at this cutie, and he’s already teaching at age 5. Shahan Naderpour has developed a big passion for making origami, especially paper airplanes, and he recently hosted a virtual party for his fifth birthday to show people how to make them.

Speaking of kids + paper, Paper For Water is a favorite non-profit of mine, and I’ve written about them before. I read in their May newsletter how they are helping to provide 275 gallon water tanks to families impacted by Covid-19 on the Navajo Nation. These families do not have water in their homes – can you imagine not having water during this time? A $250 donation will provide a tank to a family. You can join me in helping (I’ve made a donation) by making a one-time donation here or by joining the well-of-the-month club).

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On a totally unrelated note, one of these 11 pups will be ours in about 8 weeks. Ruh roh! Don’t tell Halo (our 8-year old pup).

Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class, The Papermaker’s Package, Interluceo, an artist’s book, Playing With Pop-UPs.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!

I Can’t Understand It

The Sunday Paper #315

June 14, 2020

Paper of the Week: Words on Paper

© Emily Duong, Stand, 2020, 8.5×11″, paper and stamps.

This piece by Emily Duong moved me when I saw it on Instagram this week, so I wrote to her for permission to share. This text accompanied her post: “As we reflect on all the voices we hear from our families, friends, neighbors, and communities across the globe, we are seeing a shift. There is a  collective evolution of perception becoming action. The whole world is talking, standing up. A wave of change is coming. And we truly believe the ripples start with every individual and every action, no matter how small or overwhelming”. Check out Emily’s other word work here.

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In the Studio: Intensio/Tendere/Tension, an Artist’s Book in Progress

My next artist’s book continues to take shape. Take a peek at this video of the mock up. I am currently working on the text (title page, my reflections about the work, colophon) which will be letterpress printed. I am also pondering the title (see my thoughts in the  heading above). Next steps: make paper, print, stitch, bind, box.

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Papery Tidbits

If you’re near Sydney (Australia) check out Primrose Paper Arts, a membership group with a well equipped papermaking studio, a printing press and bookbinding equipment. I taught a workshop there back in 2009, and they were sweet enough to write about my Paper + Light online class on their blog this week.
I’m giving a Virtual Studio Tour through the Creative Arts Workshop this coming Friday, June 19th from 3-4pm EST. Join me from anywhere in the world!

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I’m promoting artists here on the blog to help them replace some of their income during the pandemic. Please reach out if you have a paper product to sell that you think my readers will enjoy.

Speaking of Australia, I love seeing how things are made, and this video about the quilled paper jewelry that Wendy Ashcroft  makes at Westendpieces in Brisbane is a beauty. Wendy likes to use recycled or specially selected paper from old books or paper collected from her travels and enjoys all parts of the process. From selecting her paper pieces and individually cutting each strip, to twirling and pinching and piecing together, she never knows what the result will be until it’s finished. Find Wendy’s work on Etsy and  instagram.

I love these mixed media pieces by Cree Scudder. Cree purchased a collage pack (of commercial papers) from me a few weeks back and has been incorporating them into her work. It is so fun to my scraps turned into works of art!

© Cree Scudder, “Due South of the Chateau”, mixed media on canvas, 24” x 36”

Need a project for the kids (or heck, for yourself)? Look what this 12-year old accomplished during lockdown. She folded 1000 paper cranes.

Umeno Newland, 12, has made 1,000 colourful cranes during lockdown, inspired by a Japanese legend, where if you make 1,000 cranes you will be granted a wish of world peace and world health Picture: Charlotte Bond.

When I was in Japan last fall, I visited the Igarashi Masami workshop! It was so fun to discover this article about the proprietor we met there, and to learn about the papers she is making with food waste (her son had the idea).

I had no idea that sewists were using projectors to transfer patterns to fabric (what a great idea). This trend might make those lovely (but perhaps impractical) paper sewing patterns obsolete.

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Earlybird pricing for my online class Paper + Light ends tomorrow (June 15th) at midnight. Sign up for 4 weeks ($145) or 8 weeks ($260). Session one begins July 6th, and I’m happy to send you a supply list to look over before you sign up.

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The News from Here:

I got my hair cut this week. I go to a salon where it is usually just me and the hairdresser, so the only difference was that we both wore masks. My husband says he could have done it with the clippers, but that made me a bit nervous!

My artist friend Anne Mavor has a timely and important installation up at The Arts Center in Corvallis, Oregon right now (you can schedule a visit). I Am My White Ancestors: Claiming the Legacy of Oppression is available to travel should you know of a venue that might be interested. This work was created as a first step for White people in particular, to be inspired to participate in the end of racism. Click through to read, listen and learn more. This is powerful work that we should all be doing.

Be kind, stay well, promote peace and make art my friends!

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Featured this week in my Studio shop:

Paper + Light Online Class, The Papermaker’s Package, Try It! Shadow Ornament Class, 50 Revolutions, an artist’s book.

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If you read this blog regularly, would you consider making a donation to support the research, writing, design and delivery of The Sunday Paper? Click on the paper button at the left to learn how. Or, perhaps you’re interested in promoting your business in The Sunday Paper.

Thanks to everyone who has already pledged your support!

SHARE THIS blog post with your paper-loving friends!