Postcards From France

"Dear Mom,

   France is beautiful."

   Those are the words on the front panel of the tunnel book, Postcards From France, my book of the week for week .. um 34.  Next month I start teaching a 6-week class on tunnel books and carousel books at the local art center in Cary, NC, so wanted to make a book to introduce the class. And I miss Paris! and the Loire valley! and Chateau du Pin!... and pate!... and the fresh fruits and vegetables of harvest season in France! Here is the front of the book...

The cover is a map of the Loire Valley, France on which is glued a velum pocket with an antique french postcard. Inside the velum envelope are three more postcards bought at an antique shop in France.

The "story" is written on the postcards... an imaginary journey... real impressions...and a sort of poetry.

Open the book to see the tunnel inside. There are seven panels that make up the scene of acrylic paint and pen and ink drawings. There's a castle... an orchard and fields...a vineyard... a village... mountains... two floating balloons and a brilliant yellow sunrise... or is it a sunset?

Looking down, the accordion sides and seven panels are clearly seen... and the front panels open like a window in an old french chateau.

I love the idea of a place that symbolizes the phenomenon of journey... that starting point and that anchor. My tunnel book with the postcards reinforces the transformation that occurs on a journey...  the part that's grounded in place and the part that moves from one point to another.
What would your tunnel book be about?
Kathy

Dilemma

Think of your favorite philosophical question... not the one that you're absolutely sure about.. but the kind that you can see either side as a possibility... having merit or not... or just impossible to decide... too much grey and not black and white. It's pretty confusing just reading about it, huh? That is what you call a dilemma.

   What's an example of a dilemma? There's always the question what is art? There are lots of answers to that one. And at Penland School of Crafts, where I sometimes live and work, when someone brings it up, you hear a low groan throughout the room. Nobody wants to get into a discussion about it, because there's just no agreement on the answer. So what's another example of a dilemma? How about the question: do you leave old books to be ignored then rot and molder away, or do you cut them into tiny pieces and sew and glue them into newly made books? The dumpster or the scissors and paste-pot? That's what I've done in making this week's Book of the Week. It's called Dilemma and I chose the scissors and paste-pot.

   I dismantled an old book titled The Readers Encyclopedia, copyright 1965... I found it like this, headed for the trash bin at the local library...

When the urge to do surgery gets too strong the book begins to look like this...

Pages come out and are showcased in a way that they are seen and enjoyed just for themselves.

This illustration is a copy of the original title page of Don Quixote, 1605. How beautiful is that?! Then it all becomes a new book for writing notes, journaling, daily living, collecting the snippets of a life lived and windmills tilted. Among the blank pages are some earthy colograph prints and the excised pages from The Readers Encyclopedia.

And like Richard Minsky, you begin the process of altering the text from The Readers Encyclopedia pages to become a story of your own by circling the words you like and marking through the ones you don't.

 "...survives...after...studying..and traveling...into the magic lore...of..knowledge... and ...the...story. The Poem...divine...poem." And so on.

So that's my Dilemma... a change in the status quo to write my own story. What's yours?
Kathy
p.s. I'm still not sure that altering the book was the right thing to do...

Midnight Blues

   What is it about the color blue that is so appealing? I've heard that 90% of all people prefer the color blue. When I'm dying textiles with indigo or processing cyanotype prints, I'm struck by the lovely shades of navy and turquoise blue produced and I understand the sentiment. The book of the week, Midnight Blues, a tribute to those shades of blue.

Midnight Blues

The painted canvas cover is a miniature version of the Nag Hammadi Book of Lists I made several weeks ago. This tiny soft cover book will fit into the palm of a hand. An antique shell button and satin ribbon wrap and loop to form the closure.

Turquoise and navy and powder puff blue

   The pages are cyanotypes on handmade Arches and Rives BFK paper.  A cyanotype is a photographic printing process that gives a cyan-blue print. The process was first discovered in the 1840’s by Sir John Herschel. By the 1870's the process was used for making blueprints. Blueprints are still made by this technique today. Toward the end of the 19th century and to the present, cyanotype printing became popular among amateur photographers because of its simplicity and low cost.

   To make a cyanotype print, the paper is first treated with a sensitizer solution containing a mixture of ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. After drying the paper, images in the form of cut-outs, stencils, negatives, or actual objects are placed on top of the paper and  exposed to ultraviolet light (sunlight works great!), which produces a blue shadow. After sufficient exposure, the paper is washed in water to remove the soluble unexposed salts. Upon drying, the image darkens as a result of slow oxidation in air. This blue pigment, known as Prussian Blue, has been used for printing ink, paint pigment, typewriter ribbon, and carbon paper. Treatment with oxidants, such as hydrogen peroxide or potassium dichromate, produces a darker blue (almost black) image.

A cyanotype painting

   I always imagine this will be a great "craft activity" to take to the beach... just coat the paper, lay it in the sand beside some sea oats, and watch the events of the day cause the shadows of blue hues... So that is on my TO Do list. For now, I just chase the 10 minutes of sunlight all around my tree-filled yard until I get enough UV rays to create the blues. And that reminds me of music... which John Lee Hooker said so well... "The blues tells a story. Every line of the blues has a meaning."

Kathy

The Bowl and the Book

   This week's book is titled The Bowl and the Book.  I wrote this little story when I was trying to decide whether to continue being a potter or become a book maker. But it's really a discussion between a bowl and a book about which is better... and that brings me to the word competition. This book is really about competition between two equally wonderful things. This week, with the Olympics occurring in London, the word competition is a really big deal!

   If you've been reading this blog, you know I'm taking a 2 ½ week woodblock printing class with Belgian print artist Goedele Peeters at Penland School of Crafts. Goedele is an amazingly talented artist and a wonderful (and tireless!) instructor.  She has led us into a process of creating complexly layered woodblock prints which is just a jumping off point for years of playing in this medium. Now that the class is almost over, we can look around the classroom and see many different approaches to what we have been taught, and a room of beautiful prints.

   So, I started planning the design of The Bowl and the Book last week. I drew the images and planned that the woodblock prints would be in black ink with the text set and printed on the letterpress. I was influenced by an antique Japanese storybook I had from the late 1800's ...and thought to make something similar in size with a black line border around each illustration. I knew I was in a competition against time. I had seven days to finish it. I set my goal to carve a block a day. I did that! ...wood chips a-flyin'! Then I set the type to letterpress print the story. Yesterday I printed it all! Woodblock illustrations on the pressure press and text on the letterpress. Fourteen hours later I was done with everything but the cover. I let the ink dry a bit then I printed the cover paper and bound the book today. It's still a little sticky, but here is the story.

A woodblock print covers the small flat spine book

And the story goes like this...

There once was a bowl 

and a book. The bowl led

 a very busy life. He told 

the book, "I am so important,

 people reach for me every day! 

I feed the world. Without me 

man would starve!

"I feed the world. Without me man would starve!"

Into me people put their rice

and their beans, their soup and

their strew, their ICE CREAM!

I am most important. I feed the world

 everyday!"

"...their rice and their beans, their soup and their stew, their ICE CREAM!"

The book stood quietly on the

shelf. "It is true. Sometimes

I stand for months on this shelf, and 

no one even touches me.

I stand for months on this shelf...

But sometimes they do take me down

 from this shelf, carry me to a quiet

place and read my words.

...carry me to a quiet place and read my words.

Into me people put their thoughts and 

their theories, their histories and 

their prophesies... their whispers from GOD!

 I also feed man, but instead of food, 

I feed him ETERNITY!"

... their whispers from GOD!

And the bowl said, "Oh, you're

so dramatic!"

The End

I wish your team the best of luck, but just being in the competition is good enough for me!

Kathy

Highway

   We never really know where the journey will take us. That's the archetypical hero story. Like most folks I'm fascinated with this story, which is why I've titled this week's Book of the Week Highway. 

The original highway... taken at Penland School of Crafts

   I'm taking a wood block printing class at a crafts school in the North Carolina mountains and used this image taken in 2005 (at the same location) as inspiration for my first wood block carving exercise. Seven days later and the image is carved and printed, the text is written and printed on the letterpress, and the accordion-style book is assembled and posed in it's natural setting.

The afternoon sun shines like gold...

This is the story...

Two-lane highway

winding through

iron mountains

Stretches out straight

at the place

where

Gold grows

and the world

whispers.

A pastepaper cover on Highway

   Who knows where the highway leads or what is met along the way. When coming to this golden place I always know I'll be challenged and surprised.

The real thing and the book Highway

Kathy

Soul's Kitchen

   What is it about storytelling that mesmerizes us and also spins us into a vortex of imagination? Paulus Berensohn is a potter, a journal maker, a dancer, and an extraordinary man. This weekend I attended a workshop on a mountain in North Carolina where Paulus led an equally extraordinary assembly of book artists, writers, and visionaries in creating handmade journals and telling our stories.

Paulus, author of Finding One's Way With Clay

   A film crew from Australia came from the other side of the world to make a documentary of our friend and mentor... who recently won an award from the Smithsonian Institute as a phenomenal teacher... as he lead one of his workshops on making and keeping handmade journals.  In addition to leading us in making pastepaper,  covering book board,  assembling our folded papers and sewing the coptic bound books.... he had each of us spend time in front of the camera (and our fellow workshop participants) telling our stories of (what we considered) our significant life's work. Yet, we all had to include how this one man changed our perception of the world... and most importantly of ourselves. There were plenty of tears.. as well as laughter and love, dancing and accordion music, delicious food, and communion of spirit.

   If you are interested in reading more about Paulus, read his book Finding One's Way With Clay or one of the many articles written about him. Also, there will be an "online Journal" of the filming quite soon and eventually the documentary will be available. As soon as I have information, I'll post it on this blog so you can see more.

   Paulus initially called our workshop "Soul's Kitchen" and that is what I have named my book of the week for week 29. Soul's Kitchen is the book I made in this incredible 3-day workshop.

Pastepaper and a photograph of orchids for the cover....

All the journals of Soul's Kitchen

Holding Zan's doodle "Everything is Indeed Reaching Out to Everything Else"

   One of our workshop participants shared her 30-foot piece that started as a doodle and became a poem, a symbol of transformation and an incredibly beautiful piece of artwork. Her own journals were equally beautiful. She taught us all how to make a string ink painting. I made a string ink painting in my own Soul's Kitchen. It's easy to do.. just dip a 6-inch length of string into a cup of ink, then hold it over the paper and let its end lay in a curl over the paper.. then drag it across the paper. But be sure to relax! and let go of your need to control the string.. just pull it ...maybe dance a bit as you do!

So fragile when we begin to grow...

On the last day we gathered in a sewing circle and sewed up our books. Paulus calls the needle the "silver sword."

Joy, Paulus, and Debra in the sewing circle...

Our classmate Joy led us in singing the song, "When I Was Young." I wrote the words on the very first page of Soul's Kitchen. 

When I was young

I was the sun-

shone through the trees

onto the ground.

When I was young

I was the mountain-

knew all the birds

had my own vision.

When I was young

I was the river-

flowed through the mountain

down to the sea.

When I was young

I was the ocean-

held all my friends

throughout the end.

I am I am. I am I am. I am I am. I am I am...

   So over a lifetime, our small group has come to know the importance of keeping a beautiful journal, our Soul's Kitchen, and living a poetic life with all the dreams, poems, blessings and challenges recorded there. And thanks to Paulus, each of us has felt compelled to share this with others, as I am with you.

Pastepaper page of Soul's Kitchen

Kathy

Week 28, Wild

The book of the week for week 28 is titled Wild. It's a Platform Panel book structure which was taught by fellow book artist Ann Clark at our Triangle Book Arts Guild a month or so ago.

Two wild kittens on the cover of Wild

The Triangle Book Arts Guild is a very low profile and eclectic group of book makers, printers and book artists who meet every third Monday of the month to share information, ideas, and the love of book arts. For the May meeting we learned about printing using an old retrofitted pull-type "knuckle-buster" credit card machine. Sixteen of us carved a 2 x 3-inch linoleum plate each, and printed 16 prints of our carved plate to share. Then we cut the accordion-folded card stock strip to create the swivel panel accordion book on which to paste the prints.

Swivel Panels of Prints

It took awhile, but I finally got all the pieces put together, the covers glued on, and the book finished this week. I spread it out in the backyard and noticed many of the prints had the theme of something wild.. I put my own print on the front cover as the title piece and also on the last panel of the book. I named the book Wild because my carved panels are pictures of my two kittens, Charlemagne and Louis, and the carved word "WILD."

Prints of flowers, leaves, a dog, trees and kittens... make up the book Wild

   My husband calls the kittens "monsters" but they're really pretty cute. Like most kittens, they're full of energy; they jump and climb and play a lot. I caught Charlie climbing the brick wall in our laundry room last week.. He was as high as my shoulder.. hanging off a vertical brick wall. Louie is fascinated with a certain paper ball and chases it all over the house growling as as he carries it in his mouth. He sounds really intense when he has his paper ball, but most of the time Louie is very sweet and gentle.

Wild Louie Lamour

He loves to be petted and purrs like a little motor boat. He's the big brother... at 4 months old.

Wild Charlie

Charlemagne comes when you call him Charlie. He's two weeks younger than Louie and half his size. He has very funny looking fur and tufts that grow out of his rather large ears. He loves to wrestle with Louie and he copies everything Louie does. He has a squeaky little meow that's more like a mew.

Kittens turn on and off rather quickly. Like the swivel panels of the book, the kittens can be full of wild energy one minute and fast asleep the next.

Louie asleep on the rug

Charlie.. trying to stay awake....

That's how it is in nature... a cycle of ups and downs.. and like wild kittens, everything has it's time.

Wild!

Have a good week and stay cool!

Kathy