Book art - regeneration

Back in 2001 libraries became involved in the altered book genre after San Francisco Public library staff found loads of vandalised books hidden and shoved under shelves.  Fortunately an idea was born and there followed an exhibition of 200 original works of art created from the damaged books, with people from all over the world wanting to participate.

Then in 2007 the University of West of England and their library curated an altered book exhibition.  If you look on the website www.bookarts.uwe.ac.uk/regen there is a wealth of material listed under the individual artist's name, showing the artists' statements and samples of their work.  It's quite a list, so you'll need some time to browse if you want to view the whole lot, although if you are interested in book art it's a wonderful collection. 

Dressmaking book and tiny dresses

A few more pages from the book art book on dressmaking

It's taking a while to complete as there are so many pages I want to work on.

Started using some of my hand-marbled paper to make these tiny paper dresses and put them in the book.

Then decided to make a few cards too .... same idea ...

Five Deans Magazine April

Very pleased to be featured in the 'Artist of the Month' page in the Five Deans Magazine for April.  There is a short article and some photos of my work.  The magazine covers the five deans area and goes to most households during the month it's published.

Creation of my Memories Book

For a few years I have been working with a group which meets once a month to put together a collection of memories.  We are writing our life stories and illustrating them along the way.  We do some creative writing and alternate months we make some art work to bring our stories to life.  We have done quite a lot of paper folding and this is useful for 'containers' which can be included in our books and which will hold small items for our readers to find.  Here are samples of some of the pages from my own Memories Book.  Last month I showed the group how to make a pop-up 'house', and you can see my own version below.

This last image shows a fold-out of some family photographs.  This is a really good way of displaying a lot of photos in a small space because the page folds back up and the book can be closed flat again.

Altered Book

Have started another altered book.  I always seem to have several things on the go, and when I found this book I decided it couldn't wait, I had to start on it.  Found loads of things to put in, and here is a sample of some of the pages already done.  There are lots of diagrams in the book and I've been altering them as well into little drawings.

This is the book cover, and the book dates from around 1970.

This is a fold-out box made from a dressmaking paper pattern pack.

If you've ever done any dressmaking, you'll recognise this as a paper pattern for a collar.