Haystack Part Three

There is entirely too much to show but I'm going to try to share a fraction of what my students were up to. Michele got really into cyanotype on her handmade paper, as well as dyeing already developed prints. That cutout is from the Fab Lab's laser cutter.

Michele trained early on as a seamstress and I loved that she pulled out a sewing machine and had no fears sewing paper (hanji here).

She also flattened tons of bottle caps and trapped them between sheets that she heavily worked, whether through wax, dye, or other surface design.

Katie has a grad certificate from the Iowa Center for the Book, and I was worried at first that she would correct all of my mistakes, but instead she turned out to be so helpful and funny, with so many insights about a million different topics. We bonded early when she stayed late at night with my Lisa (my TA) and me while we cooked a bunch of kozo. She was determined to learn to cord and twine, and I was really pleased that she did.

Katie also had a lot of fun with the dyes we made and used, with lovely subtle effects (like avocado on the big base sheet of hanji, with the coffee mug 'stains' made by painting persimmon juice on the bottom of the actual mug).

I came in one morning late in the session and Katie had clearly been very busy using suminagashi techniques on her lovely kozo circles.

Lauren came with a plaster mold from which she tested lots of different paper fibers to make these wonderful birds.

Her tablemate Shelly was wonderfully methodical about practicing each technique, with lots of dye samples and thread and bark lace. I especially liked that she didn't think she'd be into the latter, but then really took to it.

Lauren reminded everyone else how fun suminagashi can be, and spent many nights in the studio doing things like punching tiny holes out of hanji and using joomchi to fuse them to other sheets (this would have made me totally insane but I was impressed by her dedication to soldier on).

Another mix of Shelly's (background, including the cast bark lace dyed with hand ground sumi ink) and Lauren's (foreground) work

Peggy was also great at trying each technique, and got very far with the basketry. I showed her how to start the finish but for the show and tell she liked keeping the ends visible, which she had dyed with red onion skins (the greenish color) and brazilwood (magenta color). She experimented endlessly with new materials as well as what she brought with her and was generous sharing things like wasp nest pieces.

Susan was also busy making lots of sheets, and made some lovely weavings with paper thread that she made and dyed. She was one of the few who attempted to bridle a book together and I enjoyed using one of her hardware store tools to do small scale papermaking at home.

Jona and Mary Ellen shared a table so this is a mashup!

I'm too tired to reorient these images, but they're supposed to be portrait style. Mary Ellen knew immediately that she wanted to work with maps, and went early on to the Fab Lab to come up with this shopbot-cut foam in the shape of Deer Isle's topography.

She first tried to cast it with kozo paper she had made on the deck, but we hadn't had a particularly aggressive or long beat, so there were too many long fibers that distracted from the map.

Then she switched to using hanji that was much finer, made by a great Korean papermaker. She added watercolor to test.

Finally, she got a nice balance of color and relief. I so admired her commitment to seeing each test through, and taking the risks (because it meant tearing up all of her paper).

Jona also used the Fab Lab to laser cut the fun foam that I provided for everyone to make a stencil in the shape of Iceland (again, this is NOT the orientation it should be!). She used dogbane fiber to make the island shape.

Jona also GOT the cording and paper yarn/thread making immediately, and then made a bunch of knitted, crocheted, and woven samples.

Here is Jona's wasp nest (courtesy of Peggy) paper, using pigmented abaca.

Lisa was very busy making sure that everything ran smoothly in the studio (which, for those of you who know about the labor and heavy lifting of keeping a paper studio clean, is significant), but managed to make and dye lots of paper.

Here's her brazilwood-dyed crab!

Here is the dry studio (the wet studio past that, and the deck after that) cleaned up for studio walk throughs on our final night. The best compliment was when a woman said she had walked through all of the studios and said that the energy in ours felt very good, warm, and positive.