PAPER DISTRESSING & PSBA MEMBERS' EXHIBITION

Many thanks to Carolyn Jones for a very interesting workshop on aging and distressing paper. It was soon clear that Carolyn had done a lot of research and experimentation on the subject and she had many examples to share with us. While we don't have any examples to show here, I'm sure our members will soon be using some of these techniques in their work and hopefully will share photos with us.

PSBA 2025 Members' Exhibition

Puget Sound Book Artists (PSBA) are celebrating their 14th Members' Exhibition at Collins Memorial Library on the campus of the University of Puget Sound in Tacoma, WA. This will continue through August 3rd before moving to Daniel J. Evans Library at Evergreen State College in Olympia WA to run September 29-December 12. The theme this year is Field Work. According to the Exhibit Curatorial Statement, 

"Field Work could mean the conventional sense of work performed not in the office or studio--but it could also mean the artist's area of interest or expertise and how that interest is expressed in the work...You can even consider field work through an agricultural lens or a spiritual one. Your field of vision is wide open!"

Here is a sample of some of the books in the exhibition.

Under Our Feet by Judy Cook

Trabajar Los Campos (to work the fields)
by LeeAnne Campos

Boundaries by Dorothy McQuistion

Strange Birds by Gina Pisello

Family Roots by Bonnie Julien

Caps by Christie Houston

Nature's Grey-ccordion Book by Donna Letterese

Meet Me in the Meadow by Jan Ward

Field Notes by Fran McReynolds

Bird is a Verb by Abbie Birmingham & Judith Roan

Songs of Kaua'i by Laurel Moorhead

AGING & DISTRESSING TECHNIQUES

Our June workshop will be a paper play day. Carolyn Jones will show us a bunch of ways to add subtle color and texture to paper and card to give them an aged effect. She will show a bunch of examples of her experiments, demonstrate several quick techniques that we will be able to try right away, and suggest others that take a bit more time.

The biggest variable is the paper. The weight, fiber composition, color and texture all have an impact. Carolyn asks that we try to collect at least three different papers or cards that we like to use (light colors, different weights, different surfaces) and have multiple pieces of each so we can compare different techniques on the same paper. Small pieces are fine. We will be experimenting!!

Materials:

• Paper and/or card stock, a couple of kinds, about 10 pieces of each

• Texturing tools - sandpaper, steel wool, files, scoring tools, textured surfaces

• Natural colorants - used tea bags, coffee grounds in their filter, dry ground spices (turmeric and paprika work well, but grab a couple of others if you have them)

• Other colorants - ink pads (neutral colors), shoe polish

• Water - in a jar and in a spray bottle

• Applicators - brushes, sponges, toothbrushes

• Wax paper

• Flat working surface - such as a glass plate or cookie sheet

When:     Saturday, June 14 at 10 a.m. PDT

Where:    On your computer, tablet or smartphone via Zoom

RSVP:      Dolores Guffey by June 9

Workshop Questions:  Carolyn Jones cjweaver@fastmail.com

Zoom Questions:  Bobbie Hayes

Contact information is in the newsletter

Member News

Nature, Paper, Fiber, Found is the title of a wonderful exhibit that just opened at the Newport, Oregon Visual Arts Center. Our NORBAG member, Cheri Aldrich, is the artist who created these amazing pieces of art. The show will be open through July 27 in the upstairs gallery. 

  

CALENDARS

 Instead of a workshop, our February NORBAG meeting will be a show-and-tell featuring handmade calendars. Carolyn Jones will share some of her favorite calendars made by herself and fellow artists Dorothy Swendeman, Terri Tinkham, and Vikki Young. We invite you to pour a beverage of choice and sit back and watch as Carolyn takes you on a tour of handmade calendars that showcase various themes, bindings, structures, surface design and other paper arts techniques.

left to right: Terri Tinkham, Vikki Young, Carolyn Jones, Dorothy Swendeman

In 1994, three handweavers (Carolyn, Dorothy & Terri) got together and used scraps and samples of their handwoven fabrics as the focus of an edition of 35 calendars on a textile arts theme. It was a hit so they did it again the next year. In 1997, Vikki joined the group and they worked together to explore new themes and structures. Vikki wrote stories and text to illuminate the themes as they added new paper art techniques along with their weavings.

Editions ran to 150 copies at their peak. Themes included ethnic textiles, fashion, food, travel, theatre, botany, a coloring book, color, words, and patterns etc. Each calendar is an exercise in marrying structure with content, and an extensive collaboration between four fertile, but very different, artistic minds. Since the deaths of Dorothy and Vikki (Dorothy was a founding member of NORBAG and Vikki edited the newsletter for many years), Terri and Carolyn have continued to explore. The collection now includes 27 handcrafted, themed, limited edition calendars and four limited edition books.

Here is a sample of some of the wonderful calendars Carolyn will share with us.

Discarded medical record folders were transformed into a rainbow
 edged concertina, with pockets, to explore Transformations.

A dozen favorite quotations were illustrated with collage
in star book form for May We Quote You?

Individual miniature works of art illustrate 24 facets
of the plant world, with each page in this tyvek binding
unfolding to provide hints about what inspired us.

What if? takes a tour around France and explores
a different use of the Cricut machine each month,
chronicling our successes, failures and discoveries
along the way.

Not quite a word a day, Logophilia illustrates a word 
every 2-3 days with a handmade object or game
inspired by a specific date.

Though the majority of the calendars are spiral or comb bound, 
like these, they come in a variety of shapes, and incorporate
lots of interesting paper structures and techniques within.

Remember...there is NO workshop for our February meeting, but we will have a wonderful show-and-tell and of course our Valentine exchange cards.

When:   Saturday, February 11 at 10 a.m. PST

Where:  On your computer, tablet or smartphone via Zoom

RSVP:    Yes, to Dolores Guffey by Feb. 6 to receive the password

Zoom questions: Bobbie Hayes

Contact information is in the newsletter.

More Calendars

As long as we're featuring calendars this month, we have another NORBAG member who has made a lot of calendars through the years. Vivienne Bruce, our member (since 2001) from Victoria, B.C., Canada made the calendars featured in this month's kiosk display at the Humboldt County Library in Eureka, CA. For several years Vivienne participated in our holiday card exchange with a calendar using a unique design and technique every year. Each calendar is printed in both French and English and she often included information from the Chinese Lunar Calendar into her designs.

August, 2015 Workshop - Surface Design

On Saturday, August 8, Carolyn Jones invited us into her home for a Surface Design play day presented by Terri Tinkham, Vikki Young, and herself. We were told to bring aprons and gloves, but you would be surprised at how many of us were so excited to start that we left our gloves and aprons in our totes. 

Before starting, we had a quick tour through the stations. We received a handout that gave us the general instructions and what materials were used. After that, our goal was to play with all of the surface design options.

• String Printing – a string was saturated with paint, put between two pieces of paper, weight applied and then the string was pulled out quickly to leave behind trails of paint.

• Wax Paper Prints – acrylic paints were applied directly to waxed paper and a monoprint was made.

Miriam H. displays both string and waxed paper prints.

• Smoke Printing – a lit candle was used to deposit smoke on paper. A fixative was then applied to set the smoke.

•  Bubble Printing – a water bath with dye and a bit of detergent was agitated with a straw and then paper was laid on the bubbles for a print.

  

Michele K. is under the hat stirring up the bubbles.

• Suminagashi - Japanese inks are floated on water and printed to a paper laid directly on the surface.

 

Suminagashi print

  Crystalline Paper – Gel medium is applied to tissue papers either as a single layer or using multiple tissues making a collage.

 

Crystalline paper on the left just has gel medium on it.  When dry, the tissue paper is considerably stronger. On the right, gel medium is use to collage other papers to the base tissue paper.

•  Direct prints – apply acrylic paint to one side of an object, turn over, cover, and roll over with a brayer.

•  Rubbings – lay a piece of paper on a textured object and rub a crayon or colored pencil over the surface.

  

• Encaustic - melt 2 or more colors of crayon on an iron and then transfer to paper.

First we applied colored wax to the iron and then applied to paper.

•  Paste Paper – using a paste that has been colored with acrylics, coat paper and make designs using various tools.

Michele K. is at the paste paper table. The following photos show some of the paste papers drying.

•  Brayer Printing – wrap a brayer with textured items, apply inks or acrylics and roll on paper to print.

For the business part of the workshop there were twelve books for the exchange theme of "Book Game" (a book that's a game).

We also received a delightful gift of letters cut from discarded books which spelled NORBAG from Carol Stallard, her husband Butch, and Bonnie Julien.

It was Carol's idea that the letters be given to celebrate NORBAG's 20th anniversary. Her suggestion was for them to be used for exhibits etc. They started collecting various books almost a year ago.  Part of the fun was finding covers that reflected the letter in some way. It was a team effort. Bonnie traced the letters onto the books, Carol cut them on the band saw, Butch did the interior cuttings of the A, B, R, etc. with a scroll saw, and Bonnie did the finish sanding. Carol added the little tree (that was made during one of their play dates with Randi Parkhurst) in the middle of the O. Bonnie added a mini book made from old NORBAG newsletters to be placed inside the G. 

Don't forget to look at the exchange books on our Flickr page.  They will be up by the end of the month.