5 trees

A new book...

spine book

Thank you for all your lovely comments about the book in my last post. I love the challenge of a commission, pushing myself to come up with something that I wouldn't normally think to do, and making the effort to produce the best possible thing I can. It's sometimes hard wondering what expectations might be attached to the finished item, but I just keep telling myself to make something I am happy with, something I'm proud of and hope that is enough...

Anyway, I'm hoping to make some more books in this style (but with tree cut outs I think, or perhaps thin little concertina circles??) soon, when the working of evenings finishes in a few weeks for the summer. A whole 4 hours of day light every evening, luxury!


This is a book I made for the artists book fair a few months ago, and one of them has been sitting on my coffee table for weeks now. I keep picking it up and twiddling it about, curving it round, watching it spring back. I think it's inspiring me to get folding again...


You can get one of your own here if you like that kind of thing ;)

I've been...

Laying in the sunshine, under the trees, pretending I'm on holiday.


Walking in the rain.

Scrambling up Gordale Scar (and sliding back down again). Admiring the fields and walls and trees and stone from way above. Greens and yellows and greys. Wanting to make a patchwork quilt...


Folding concertina books


Waiting for summer...

dandelions

I've finally got round to taking some pictures of some of the books I made for the artist's book fair back in when was it, March. Thought you might like to see them. The book I am most pleased with is the one about dandelions...


The drawings were done on a lovely sunny day, whilst weeding and dreaming in my garden. At the moment it's an overgrown mess, but one day it will be a little paradise I hope.

Its screen printed in dark brown and white, I made the background by painting indian ink on tracing paper over the drawings. This can then be exposed directly to the screen which I think gives it a directness often lost on computer generated images (or perhaps its that I'm no good at computers, who knows) I think its the first screen print I have made that I'm actually pleased with...


After looking through the book the back cover opens to reveal behind the weeds a little plan of my garden, how it is now not how it will be when its done... and then the plan lifts up to show a careful drawing of the dirt that was left in the fold of my sketch book when I finally put the dandelions on the compost heap. You can see more pics here


The whole this can be opened completely to look at all the weeds at once. I've got one framed on my desk to remind me. Go out and do the weeding.

Wednesday

I can't wait for summer. Specifically some free time in summer to work on new prints and books. I think the light evenings are finally getting through to my brain, and I'm starting to try and spend time in my studio after work, starting to have free time at lunch times to make prints...

I seem to have spent the last few months starting things and never finishing them, not being able to motivate myself, not feeling like anything is worth it. I know this is just how it goes, but at the time that doesn't seem to help. But in the last few days I've looked at the piles of cover-less books and screen printing positives and notes scrawled on scraps on my shelves and felt not overwhelmed but perhaps a little bit inspired to make a start on them again...

Today I sewed a book, the finished thing feels good in my hands.


And I wonder what I could do if I felt motivated all the time?!

box...

skull problem

I've been having a bit of trouble with my skull prints... They're etchings, and to print etchings the paper must be soaked. But paper, when soaked tends to stretch and shrink, which, to my dismay, doesn't go well at all with the precise measurements associated with concertina books...


So after spending the morning printing 5 strips of eight plates I found the next day they were about 2cm shorter and the pages wouldn't line up at all. That's the way to learn I suppose, it seems to be the way I'm learning at the moment at least... So. Onto plan B.


Individual sewn pages?
On a concertina spine?
French folded?

I wish there were more hours in the day!

a moon book

Whilst I was playing around with my moon screen print I printed some of the final layer in white onto some recycled card that I had been saving for who knows what (like you do). It's a lovely soft brown colour with little flecks of colour through out; reminders of its colourful past I suppose.


Anyway, I decided to make the prints into book covers with the moon wrapping right around the book and across the spine...


I'm really pleased with this little book, the subtlety of the white on speckled brown is hard the photograph (these are the third attempt!) but it works well. The folded edges make it sturdy and durable. The moon appears in the light. It feels nice in my hand.

You can see more here...

Those little ladybird larvae from yesterday are making me feel all itchy. Turns out they're harlequin ladybirds, an invasive species that eats native ladybirds and other bugs. They also bite! If you see any in your house or garden you should tell the harlequin ladybird survey people as they're monitoring the spread across the UK...

Anyway, I made a new book. It's square and grey with a paper lable. Can you tell what my favourite bookcloth and paper combo is at the moment?! This book is one of my biggest rounded spines yet and making it was a challenge, it took a couple of remakes to get the spine fitting just right, but I'm pretty happy with it. There was a point where I nearly gave up, just couldn't work it out, but pushing myself to have one more go was definitely worth it. It opens like a dream. I think if no one buys it I might keep it for myself... do some sketching :)

secret belgium dinosaurs...

This morning I finished making the prints I was talking about a few days ago in to a dino book for my friends wedding present...


Above is the front and back, and here is what it looks like opened up...


Ahhh, dinosaurs in love :)


I'm getting to like this style of binding (the secret belgium style), even though each time I've sewn it I've done it a different way... This time I used a combination of methods involving sewing the cover around the pages but not attaching it, then sewing in the pages loosely, looping around every spine thread and then tightening them up at the end. The book feels fairly sturdy, it just took ages :)


Anyway, I'm going to be away for a week or so now as I've got two weddings in various parts of the country and a trip to Amsterdam to keep me occupied... So, have a good week, hope the sun shines where you are :)

book for beth

Rounded spine book with tracing paper dust cover and paper tree cut out...

It's the book from yesterday, with a little tree cut out to be used as a card and then stored away in the cover for safe keeping... and here are some gratuitous paper shots of the inside...

Tissue paper, tracing paper, watercolour paper, cartridge, newsprint, kraft paper, graph paper... (actually, I want to keep it)

I also tried a bit of an experiment with the covering of the book; I wanted a particular red colour and a softer texture which the buckram couldn't provide, so I used quilting cotton and ironed on some fusable interfacing to create a kind of book cloth... I've tried this before with bondaweb but it was a bit floppy so this time I bought the firmest interfacing I could find and it seems to have worked ok (apart from a few glue splodges, but we won't mention them). Its definitely something I think is worth having another go at :)