Lake Paper

Not too long ago a photo of someone making paper in the ocean inspired me to create large deckle boxes. Using cheap wood, polyurethane, hardware cloth, and screening, I made a series of boxes-- the largest of which is 2'x4'. I plan to use them in Center Hill Lake, a short hike from my cabin at the Craft Center. I tested out one 2'x2' deckle box at Liberty Paper Mill yesterday. I lined a wooden frame with plastic and filled it with water until it the deckle floated inside, I pulled a sheet of paper, and I let it dry in the sun. Claudia told me that it should be completely dry before I took it off the screen so that it would restraint dry as much as possible. When it was dry, I peeled it off and had a beautiful large sheet of paper. The deckle box materials cost less than 50$ total at Lowe's. I can't wait to try it out in the lake this summer.

Sparkle and Fade

Claudia has been teaching me how to pigment pulp using a Whiz Mixer. I have learned about how to add Retention Aid, Sizing, and Pigments. I made pulp in tan and terracotta- which I now know press and dry much much lighter than they appear when wet. I also have been adding Supersparkle from Carriage House, testing out what happens when the powdered mica (which is Supersparkle) is added to the vat or sprayed onto pressed wet sheets. It is very pretty and really seductive.


















In addition to learning about pigments and other additives, I've been experimenting with beating cotton rag- specifically denim found in the "free box" (where students donate/ recycle old clothing here at the Appalachian Center for Craft).





I was warned by Claudia that we have so much soap in our clothes that I didn't need to "wash" the denim, I could simply rinse it a lot before beating it. I was lucky and the suds didn't get too out-of-control. The color is BEAUTIFUL. I still have a ways to go in beating it, so i had to put it on hold for a while.









[Cotton rag shredded on the left and halfway beaten on the right.]

The Secret Of Kells

Beverly Plummer, Joyce Seivers, Claudia Lee and I saw the Secret of Kells at Nashville's Belcourt theater. It was fantastic! The hand-drawn animation contained imagery based on the Book of Kells. We all loved it- it was the perfect movie for a group where we have combined experience in bookbinding, papermaking, calligraphy, and printing (as well as other media). The movie was really touching, we were all inspired, and I think we all want to see it again after we research more on the Book of Kells.

Japanese paper

So. Japanese papermaking. Yeah.
In my experience with many aspects of fiber art, I usually get a grasp of many hand processes fairly quickly. Japanese papermaking was not one of those things.



Just looking at the difference in Claudia's demo sheet and my sheet, you can see the fibers are supposed to line up and distribute very evenly.



[My poor first attempt at Japanese papermaking]















[Claudia's demo-- note the difference.]

I made about twenty sheets of kozo paper (at least they looked like ok sheets to me) using a sugeta and then switched to western papermaking using the Thai kozo in the vat. I still have plenty of kozo (in my freezer) ready to make more sheets and I am determined to get a handle on this using the sugeta.














[Both kozo pages, on the left is japanese papermaking, right is made with a western mould and deckle.]

Experiments

These photos are of experiments with abaca. I use a lot of cartographic imagery in my work, and as I have mentioned before, I digitally print on handmade paper using a desktop printer. Recently, Claudia has taught me her method of including string when pulling a sheet of paper as well as laminating string and other things between two layers of overbeaten pulp to create interesting effects.

[My influences here are my map collection- specifically a map of the ocean, and stick maps of the Marshall Islands]


























[This is another experiment with abaca. Sewing thread and spun lokta paper have been laminated between two sheets. The dark color of the lokta paper bled into the abaca- but I love the effect.]














[These are some "recycled" pieces.]

Beater Tests

"Paper is designed in the beater." Claudia has emphasized that the beating of pulp is the largest part of designing paper. In order understand how to use the beater to help create a specific paper, it is common practice to do beater testing. This way, one can see how a pulp is affected by the length of time a pulp is beaten and by other variables like the level/number at which the beater is set and how hard it is beating.



[Claudia and Cheryl look at Tallu Schuyler's beater and fiber testing at the Appalachian center for craft. Her BFA research on handmade paper is a wonderful resource for seeing how many different fibers -including plants from the Craft Center- are made into paper.]

Claudia and I started the beater and waited for the pulp to be broken up a bit.

To do our beater test, we used a mould and deckle box and poured the same amount of pulp from the beater into the box and made a sheet of paper at 20, 40, 60, 80 and 100 min as the beater continued to beat the pulp.

Papers were pressed and then restraint-dried on windows, or air-dried on plastic grids. This shows us how the paper behaves in the process -how it shrinks and cockles.

We beat abaca and bamboo separately, making a set of tests for each fiber. The amount of pulp created a thick paper, and I noticed that abaca shrank quite a lot- where the bamboo remained nearly the same in size. Bamboo, which I had not experimented with before, kept an oatmeal texture even after 100 min.

Artist Visit: J. Smith

Joyce, Claudia, and I visited John Smith, who lives in a beautiful home between Smithville and Sparta. He does everything: paints, designs, makes his own tools, collects many things (from fine art to antique microscopes), builds model ships (that are incredible years-long endeavors where he plies his own thread to make miniature rope for the rigging). He was a trained artist, he worked for many years as industry executive because of his problem-solving ability, and he has incredible creativity. The astonishing thing about John aside from the number of different things he attempts, is that he does everything well. Getting a tour of his collections and interests is like seeing the hobbies of several people combined. However, the main reason for our visit was to see his book collection (comprised of many first editions and extremely rare books), and his own skillful rebinding of books.

John has collected rare books for decades, but became interested in protecting his books and rebinding those that had wear. He has learned a lot about what makes a book gain or lose value --sometimes rebinding is not the best option-- and books can be protected in many different ways. He knows what materials are appropriate for a project and how to do a new leather binding on a century-old book and preserve the original look by integrating well-chosen materials. Looking at his rebound books and clamshell boxes, both are very precise and well-crafted in addition to being archival.

[One of John's beautiful clamshell cases for a book. The navy blue portfolio on the top (that slides perfectly underneath the book), contains loose pages of prints. The navy book cloth on the portfolio matches the navy book cloth on the original book- an example of his attention to detail.]




[Some of John's rare books: Japanese block prints, 150+ years old; Aubrey Beardsley's first published illustrations from the late 19th century; Don Quixote combined 1st and 2nd ed. from 1675.]



John has artistic talent as well as a problem-solving scientific mind and real ingenuity. He made his own press for complex binding processes. It has movable pieces that create the indention on either side of the spine, and the entire press lifts off to become horizontally positioned so that it is easier to work on the spine. In seeing his book collection and how books are reconstructed, I learned so much from John about the structure of books: how marbled paper was attached, how leather is flattened to be folded around a cover-- all things I had never thought of when looking at a book.


[John's press that he built himself.]