I love combining words with artwork, which is why I continue to make my own books and art journals. The books become a good way to contain work done during a workshop and a way to practice new techniques and tools. They also can showcase a theme, poem, or story as in this book I made as my senior project ages ago, which I called What the Sun Said.
Before Covid hit us, I tried to go to at least one big art conference each year. Now I miss the challenge of being with other creative people. Zoom, Facebook classes, and online classes work well, but they're not quite the same, are they? If you have a chance to attend a conference, GO. You will come away full of brilliant ideas, enthusiasm, and new ways of looking at the world.
This book that I created while in a workshop incorporates images of birds along with feathers, ribbons, threads, and buttons, with muslin and canvas sewn to the pages to connect the individual pages together.
Circles and time are two of my most used themes. Circles hold ideas and are complete in themselves. Time represents change and memories.
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| Our cat is always curious |
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| Exhibited at the online annual exhibit of Collage Artists of America this summer |
Looking back at conferences, I remember Focus on Book Arts' fourteenth conference in 2019. The organizers asked attendees to arrive with a book based on the engaging idea to incorporate fourteen words that reference the number 14. The group presented a list of 14 ideas to work from and asked each person to select 5. I hope you will create your own 14-page book of creativity!
Here are their instructions for the challenge:
"We are counteracting the Chinese notion that 14 is an unlucky number by celebrating our good fortune with a fourteen-theme book arts challenge. The list below contains fourteen themes, objects, color, and more that somehow relate to the number fourteen. Your mission is to take at least 5 (1 + 4, get it?) concepts from the list and incorporate them into a book arts piece. You may interpret your choices any way you see fit."
Citizenship -- 14th Amendment
Fingers -- sign language?
Forgetfulness -- # for forgetfulness
Fortnight -- 14 days
Gold -- 14 carat
Ivory -- traditional anniversary gift
Jewelry --modern anniversary gift
St. Valentine -- Feb. 14
Silicon -- atomic number
Sonnet -- 14-line poem
Stone -- British unit of weight equal to 14 pounds
Temperance -- Tarot cards: card of temperance
Transformation
Vermont -- 14th state of US
I've added some more 14 ideas:
Makar Sankranti -- celebrates January 14 as the sun moves from one zodiac zone to another
Moon -- 14 days waxing/14 days waning
Cuboctahedron -- 14-sided
Bastille Day -- July 14, 1789
Lunar Landing -- Apollo 14
To explore book arts, click here:
FOCUS ON BOOK ARTS CONFERENCE
To see a video of a one-sheet book, check out
https://m.wikihow.com/Make-a-Paper-Book
Another superb conference:
WriteOnTheEdge 2022 International Calligraphy Conference to be held at Mills College in Oakland, CA The committee is busy working on the conference and will have a website soon. Take a look at what was offered at the 2019 conference in Quebec.
From Mary by email: I loved seeing all your books, so beautiful. I was struck by your circle and time themes. I had never really thought of the fact that a circle is complete and time is ever changing. Thank you for sharing.
ReplyDeleteThank you, Mary. Now here's a challenge: something 14 in a quilt!
DeleteThank you for the inspiration and for the link to the very helpful videos. I am doing a memoir class through Olli at the moment - ideas generated 14 will make good prompts
ReplyDeleteI'm glad the prompts will inspire you to write! Now you will have some interesting memoir pieces when you are done with the Olli class. Who is the instructor?
DeleteBeautiful post, words, art and books. I sure miss creating with friends. It feels lonely and not as satisfying. Keep up the great work
ReplyDeleteThank you, Christine. It would be fun to be in a class with you sometime! Take care and you too keep up the great work.
ReplyDeleteBeautiful work, as always, Martha. I especially love your Book of Possibilities. I need to keep one of those close at hand right now!
ReplyDeleteThank you, Teresa, for your kind comments. I hope you are continuing to write. The Book of Possibilities could be an inspiration.
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