Stitches and Sewings for Bookbinding Structures by Betsy Palmer Eldridge provides a quick reference to a range of sewing patterns and techniques. It is available as a PDF at Guild of Book Workers' website.



I printed it out doubled-sided in the pamphlet form, together with a folio of tracing paper as the cover sheets, then sewed it up onto a cover with a pamphlet stitching. A great workbench reference protected.

My books are going to be busy for the next few months. Lucky for them, they will be hanging out in air-conditioned galleries.

Starting next Friday at Denver's Abecedarian Gallery, Rapunzel #2 will participate in Artists' Book Corncupia III from April 20 to June 2. The "Cornucopia" is an international juried exhibition of artists' books.

Abecedarian Gallery is one of the only three commercial galleries in the US that specialize in book and paper arts, so I am sure she will be in great company with other book artists' work.

Then in May, Hokusai's Ghost will participate in Crafts National 2012 at Kansas's Mulvane Art Museum in Topeka. This juried show by Gail M. Brown will feature works in in clay, fiber, glass, metal, wood, beads, basketry, handmade paper & mixed media. The exhibition will run from May 5 to August 19. It will undoubtedly be hot and humid during those months in Kansas but the Ghost will be chilling in the cool gallery at Mulvane waiting for Dorothy to come back...


San Diego Book Arts is one of the few book arts venue for classes and exhibitions. I am proud that Rapunzel has been accepted to its Fourth National Juried Show this year. The show, juried by Carolee Campbell, will begin on May 26 at the Geisel Library at University of California, San Diego. This show will close on July 8.

Correction (May 2, 2012): Hokusai No Yūrei (Hokusai's Ghost) (2010) is showing at Abecedarian Gallery and Rapunzel #2 (2010) is showing at Mulvane Art Museum. I had them reversed.

(Continued from part one and two)

Happy New Year! Okay, now where was I? It's about time to wrap up this series of posts. Last time, I talked about using custom jigs and securing the pages onto the cords. There is still a small piece of quick tip that I'd like to share.

Little signatures
It so happened that I was in the process of making a batch of little signatures, and apparently they were perfect to prop up the pages as well. When these little signatures are packed together, they allow me to quickly insert and pull out photos to check and see if they align right. They also have a spring-like flexibility so that they don't stress out the photographs.

This piece relies on a slight offset of each of the images and it's important to double check if they are in the right order before gluing.

(Continued from part one)

Using the jigs
Before all the "pages" are securely attached to the four cords, they need to be propped up. The jigs keep each of the pages in place, while they also provide a relatively sturdy structure when the cords are pulled taut.

Securing pages onto cords
Once the cotton cords were pulled taut through the pages, I applied a tiny drop of PVA glue onto each of the joints. A squeeze bottle with a tiny tip worked great for this.

When dried, the PVA prevents the pages from shifting on the cords, so as to maintain even spacings between them. Supports at the front and back of the train worked with the jigs to keep the structure upright. Once the PVA dried, the structure became pretty sturdy and can now stand on itself.

By the way, that's my trusted HP-22S scientific calculator in the second picture. I had it since high school, it's been 20+ years and it's still working great.

(To be continued.)

Pages took me about a little bit over a month to create. It was quite a cautiously-made piece: for every step, I had to be extra diligent and careful, as mistakes couldn't be covered up easily.

Pages is constructed from images of eight of my earlier volumes, which are held onto 4 cord cords with PVA glue.

Model
Before working with the photographs, I made a model to see if PVA would be strong enough to keep the card stock on the cotton cords (I had a lot of old name cards to spare.) I also wanted to see if I could avoid using grommets, which would add unnecessary bulk. I wanted the piece to be as minimalistic as possible, so extra hardware just doesn't sound like a good idea.

Arranging the photos
The photos were then printed and trimmed, stacked and ordered. Each photo in a group offsets slightly to create a staggering effect. By looking at the edges, I double checked to make sure the order was correct. I placed a card stock in front of the first photo to protect the print surface from accidental scratches and finger prints.

Spacers/jigs
After piercing each of the photos, they were ready to be threaded with cotton cords, a few photos at a time. The challenge then was to keep them at equidistant from each other, while the cords are pulled taut when I applied PVA at the joints.

I made eight jigs of equal thickness from scrap boards. The center of the jigs is hollow to reduce waste and for the ease of handling. I could move the jigs around without touching the photos on each side of the jigs.

(To be continued.)

It certainly feels like summer just flew right by me. Despite my occasional tweets and Facebook posts, I've been really quiet.

There is always something in our lives that we said we'd want to do, but either we procrastinate or just avoid it, until it's too late. Since I had my boy cat Yogi in 2008, I've been wanting to make a book about him. Well, he passed at the end of June. He was only a little more than 4 years old and it was really devastating. This experience pretty much clouded my whole summer. Most days were gloomy since.

Then again, it might be a good idea to make a book about him to help myself grieve. Maybe. Perhaps. That's not something I could force myself too hard into doing.

That pretty much summed up my summer, which explains why it felt like it just flew right by. The equinox is only 10 more days away.

I can only hope that fall will be better. Afterall, fall is my favorite season of the year. This fall, both of my Rapunzels are away on display. One at Towson University and the other at NOPX in Turin. Things are happening again.

And I shall write again.

First of all, click on the image on the right to see a larger version!

Earlier in March I have posted an image of the photographic elements of this new piece that I've been working. It's been completed, and I am sticking with my initial working title, Pages.

Pages is constructed from images of eight of my earlier volumes. The images capture each book's unique structure and composition. Each image repeats eight times, offset slightly to create a shifting motion. Each level is both a page and an image of a page, and collectively they create a changing visual pattern as the viewer moves around the piece.

Traditional book forms have a fluid structure that changes as readers turn or flip through their pages. In this piece, the fluid structures of the original books, now frozen within a single fixed external form, are collectively transformed into a new visual structure, one made fluid by the changing perspectives of the readers who must circle the piece to gain its entirety.

Soon I will be posting images of the process. I have come up with a few techniques which I thought could be pretty useful for other projects as well.

The piece will participate in Center for Book Arts' Artist Members Annual Exhibition entitled "The Photograph Unframed" from July 6, 2011 - September 10, 2011.