book art & Utopias

My facebook friends are always sharing inspiration with me, and I wanted to pass this one on to all of you as the work is so wonderful. I am feeling inspired to start a guerrilla book art project of my own!!

On the home front or should I say studio front I am still wrestling with the installation of the new utopia work at the Week’s Gallery. It is close but not quite there. I have another sneak peak to share with you, but I can’t wait to get a real photographer in there to take a good picture to share once it is completely installed and beautifully lit!!

Lastly, this is day late but Seth over at the altered page put out a call for images of our paper stacks, so here is a stack of cast paper from the installation waiting to be sewn into walls in my studio. I am using the fact that my hard drive crashed on my desktop and left me computer-less for a few days as my excuse (not a good excuse but…)

PS. Check out LaWendula’s post about the One Tribe One He(art) bags which are still hanging in there in their tree in Germany! How amazing is that!! Check out her post here

:: Life without utopia is suffocating, for the multitude at least: threatened otherwise with petrifaction, the world must have a new madness:: E.M. CIORAN, History and Utopia

not much to report

Still struggling with the daily grind until the end of the month, and that spurt of enthusiasm born of my decision to quit has long since flickered out. So I have just been puttering in the studio, willing the door to my creativity shut, or at least only ajar until the end of the month. There is a little news to share however…

First the local library procured a copy of a book I have been dying to read

Scrapbooks: An American History

by  Ms. Jessica Helfand

I was hoping that reading it would cure me of my desire to own it… no such luck!! I guess it will just have to stay on my amazon wish list after all. If you haven’t seen it, it is absolutely worth a look, especially for all you ephemera collectors out there. I used to keep scrapbooks as a kid, I spent hour cutting and pasting, I still have a few of them, my favorite is from a trip I took to Southern Ireland to attend an international scout jamboree when I was 14 or 15. Maybe I’ll scan a few pages next time there’s no news from the studio!

This seems a good moment to plug Seth over at the Altered page who will be hosting a sort of online book guild for art lovers every sunday on his blog. In his words “The Book Guild will meet every Sunday, rain or shine. So stop by to be introduced to a whole new library of art-related books. The Guild will be more than just a list however. There will be links, book reviews, giveaways, and interviews with many of your favorite authors. And I promise you that there will be some major events that are guaranteed to knock your handmade socks off!!” I’ll be there for sure, hope to see many of you there too!

Then Lawendula over at Woven Letters posted an update on the one he(art) one tribe tree, you can see it here, all the bags are still hanging in there (excuse the pun!!). Also today I got the news that the collage box is finally on its way to me, so Seth, if you are reading this, I’m dying here!!

Lastly, a local plug, for a small press book fair that I am dragging my poor hubby to this Saturday. I’ll report in on what I see and no doubt purchase! Hope anyone living close enough will take a trip to check it out. While I’m in Buffalo I’ll also be stopping by the WNY Book Arts Center to try and not buy paper!!!

Now I’m off to teach perspective drawing to my evening class, wish me luck

one tribe one he(art) update

LaWendula over at Woven Letters has posted a new picture of the project here so go and see how it looks!

Seth over at The Altered Page is busy (as always) with a new edition of The Pulse, because about 200 artists, me included, are participating he has decided to do a series of online reveals, the first of these, Secret Sunday will take place soon – Sunday November 22nd, so be sure to head on over and see what is revealed… if you want to play to, there’s still time head over to find out how to join in!

I am heading out to buy turkey, so have a great Saturday, I have lots to post tomorrow about things that are going into the snail mail post, so come back then!!

still here… just about

my amazing hubby pretty much pushed me out the door to attend the opening for the faculty show, I am tired, I didn’t really want to play nice tonight, but he insisted so I went. I am glad I did, I really needed to see all the great people I ran into tonight, and to hear a few compliments didn’t hurt my current state of mind (burnout) either. I am not exactly feeling refreshed, but I am at least toying with the idea of getting back to some “real” work in the studio. I would especially like to thank Steve from Chautauqua Word, who barely knows me but really does seem to like my work, for taking the time to introduce himself and for listening politely to what was pretty incoherent babble about my life right now! He also wrote something really sweet about my work in this weeks edition in his  preview of tonight’s event.

LaWendula over at Woven Letters has been posting more about her one he(art) one tribe project, my contribution finally arrived after being lost in the mail for weeks, I am happy that it is at last hanging there in her tree! I am looking forward to taking part in her paper swap later in the month, I am constantly amazed at the energy of all you bloggers!!

While I’m in this more pleasant frame of mind I also want to thank Lumi for offering me a fabulous gift this week, I am really looking forward to recieving it, I am hoping it will be the spark I need to really get back to work! I am working right now on a little something to send her back in return. More about that later perhaps!

Lastly thanks to all of you who encourage me to keep on going when all I want to do is lie down and let the waves wash over my head, who keep showing up here, even when I have nothing to say!!

more DisCo and other collaborations

A busy weekend, a birthday sleepover for the baby, and two openings, one at Fredonia state, their faculty show and another of a local artist I went to school with, Casey at the arts council here in Jamestown.

Meanwhile in the studio… Through the ingenious Seth’s DisCo project I met a fabulous artist from Germany and got to take part in her one tribe one he(art) collaboration. Here’s my contribution, I hope I am not letting the cat out of the bag by posting a picture here…

My DisCo book has gone off to the faculty show very much unfinished, I have found that I really need a lot of time with the book each time I work on it to really begin and I think because it is already bound I am very afraid of making a misstep. Here are some images of some pages I have started to work on. It is almost a relief to have it out of the studio, it has certainly been occupying a lot of psychic space there. I am looking forward to just fooling around with some new binding experiments, getting ready for Bonagany later this month and the little berlin book fair in October. Well I have an exam to write, so I’ll just leave you with the pictures…

Oh and a big thanks to Jen for sending me this link, these books are fabulous!