SINGLE PAGE POCKET BOOK & MORE

 Our August workshop, taught by Emmy Nelson, was great fun. Not only was this a quick and easy structure to make, but we discovered multiple ways to personalize it. Here's one variation of the structure (see the previous post for the originals).

Bonnie Julien added decorative paper 

behind some pages with a pamphlet stitch

to keep the pages aligned.

She also added a single stitch to keep the pockets closed.

Thank you Emmy for an excellent workshop.

This month's featured artist in the kiosk at the Humboldt County Library is Lynne Gurnee.  If you're in Eureka, be sure to check out this great display.

Thank you Kenzie Mullen for arranging this display.

Notes from the Art Lab 

by Bonnie Halfpenny

The Treasure Chest

In a recent NORBAG newsletter, there was a mention of public domain sites listed by Bel Mills at Scrap Paper Circus. Maybe you are very familiar with these websites, but I was not. Now that I've peeked into them, I realize I was missing a real treasure chest! Some of the great sites mentioned include Old Book Illustrations at https://www.oldbookillustrations.com which covers everything from plants to individual illustrators. Next head to Vintage Ephemera when you need that look at https://vintageephemera.blogspot.com.This site has an extensive subject listing, so you don't have to look through so many things to find something useful.

Over the years, the Smithsonian has been collecting everything they deem important; now they are busy removing copyright restrictions from their digital images. Smithsonian Open Access lets you in at https://www.si.edu/openaccess.

The Biodiversity Heritage Library has over 100,000 images available to download at https://www.flickr.com/photos/biodivlibrary/sets/.

While I have received emails promoting The Public Domain Review, I had never taken a serious look at this site. Browsing there is well worth your time, at

https://publicdomainreview.org/

I'd like to thank Bel Mills at https://www.scrappapercircus.com/ for making this information available. For these and all public domain websites, please take note of any caveats they may list. And if you have a favorite public domain site to share, please let us know through the blog. Happy browsing!

Newport Paper & Book Arts Festival - 2016

NORBAG was widely represented (as usual) at this year's Newport Paper & Book Arts Festival (NPBAF) on April 22-24. What fun we had cutting, dyeing, embellishing, folding, stenciling, stitching, tearing, wrapping, and who knows what else, but if it involved paper we probably tried it. There were 21 different workshops with 108 participants and at least 15 were NORBAG members including four instructors (Dolores Guffey, Margo Klass, Randi Parkhurst, and Jackie Wygant).

The festival, sponsored by the Oregon Coast Council for the Arts, celebrated its 21st year and continues to grow as the largest annual event of its kind on the West Coast. The workshops range in levels of expertise from beginner to advanced so there is usually something to suit everyone. There were a few multiple day classes, but most were only one day. Pictured below is a sampling of photos from the weekend.

Randi demonstrated her box/book sculpture, Patience, at the Instructors show reception.

The instructors were invited to show some of their work in the gallery...some pieces were for sale.

Jackie Wygant, artist and instructor

Two books by Alaskan instructors Margo Klass (top), and Connie Stricks (bottom)

Margo Klass

Tall books by Judilee Fitzhugh and smaller books by our own Dolores Guffey

Randi Parkhurst's piece titled "The Windmill" - it is two books and two boxes that fit together in several ways

Margo's two-day Pocket Book class had many components so our tables got a little messy 

Michele had a little help from Wes stitching her book together - he was really concentrating on the project

Pocket Books - same structure but they became very unique books

The stitching could be done with one or two different colors of thread

The Pocket Book class minus a couple of members...all but three participants were NORBAG members, including our instructor and our mascot, Wes

Instructor Heather Fortner helps to unveil a scarf dyed by a participant in the Eco-Dye class

We each had one silk scarf plus 18 sheets of paper to use. Here Heather demonstrates how to roll the paper & leaf pages onto a dowel

This roll of paper & leaves is tied up tight and ready for a hot bath

Some of the leaves were fresh and some dry

Here is an example of what the paper could look like after the bath and the leaves removed

Two of the vats for boiling the rolls of paper & leaves or scarves and leaves

Two more boiling stations...each had water, vinegar, rust items, and various plant materials such as black walnuts, avocado pits, eucalyptus leaves etc.

Papers drying outside...it wasn't a very warm day so most papers did not dry completely

Heather demonstrated one way to bind the pages into a book, but since our papers did not dry completely we had to wait to do this at home.

If you would like to join in the fun next year put April 21, 22, & 23, 2017 on your calendar now and make sure you are on the mailing list for the festival. To receive a brochure next year email npaf@coastarts.org.