My most recent artist book, “The Edge” has been selected for inclusion in the show “Between Word and Image” at the University of Arizona Poetry Center, 1508 East Helen Street.  The show opened June 1 and will continue until August.  If you are free tonight, June 4, do come to the reception.

When “edges” was selected as this year’s theme for our PaperWorks mixed media study group,  I started exploring many different meanings and graphic approaches to edges – alone, with the group and with others.  I decided to feature a favorite quote by Patrick Overton for my submission to this show.

For me the quote conjures up a vastness which I represented with a layered landscape.  Pastels added atmosphere and I took advantage of  the pages to contribute depth. I chose Stonehenge paper which I toned with pastels to create the landscape backgrounds.

Next I broke the quote down into five parts and wrote them on the upper edges of the folios.  Next I cut along the edges of  the individual letters.  I like the way the Neuland calligraphy cast shadows on the layers of background.

I wanted the work to have an element of surprise – something I’ve been doing in recent pieces.  Placing wings on the cover did the trick.  Whichever way you start viewing the book, the other side provides an unexpected visual.

My photography skills do not do the book justice.  It is 14” tall.  When the individual pages are set up nesting inside of each other to enable the shadows to be cast, it is about 16” wide.  I hope you will be able to experience it while it is on display at Poetry Center.  The show will be open through August 12 this year.

When it comes to drawing I usually use a sketchbook or a good piece of art paper. After I’ve finished the drawing I may add color or I may leave it alone. I’ve never given much thought to the particular surface that I draw on.

This past week at a two-day class titled “ Exploring the Surface: Mixed Media Drawing on Paper”, I tried a whole new approach! The instructor was Catherine Nash, well-known papermaker and encaustic artist who has a personal passion for drawing.

Our first day began with handling an assortment of papers and making marks on them with a variety of tools to see how each paper responded. We treated some surfaces with sizing, wax-based resists such as crayon and then applied colored washes to create interesting backgrounds and drawing surfaces. We purposefully flooded ink and watercolor on to some areas of asian and hand-made papers so that the color would bleed through to the other side. After they dried we turned them over and worked on the back of the page, using the pattern that had bled through as inspiration for the drawing.

On “Day Two” we used a many kinds of drawing materials: pens, stick dipped in ink, crayons, chalk, pastels, oil pastel, graphite sticks and assorted brands of colored pencils to draw on the surfaces we had created the day before.

Our focus was on experimentation and discovery and layering media to develop richness in our drawings. The surfaces we worked on ranged from “Yupo”, a plastic sheet watercolor artists are working with to soft print-making surfaces and papers made from cotton, kozo and abaca fibers.

Here are some quick photos of things I played with.

These ink drawings were done as tests to see how papers responded to sumi ink and Noodles drawing ink in fountain pens. I collaged them together with a glue stick and some stitches.

This kozo paper with bark chips in it was further distressed with methyl cellulose painted on it in a few areas (hard to detect) and then watercolor pencil and light wash added in a few areas. Now it’s all ready for a drawing!

Yupo and watercolor and a few pen marks make for interesting effects. I think I need a whole class on working with Yupo and I seem to remember that someone at the Drawing Studio is teaching one this spring.

Walnut ink laid gently on to damp sized kozo created the perfect background for a quick sketch of a pistachio branch. I drew it on dried paper with a sick of charcoal and a gentle hand. Next I added the watercolor. After it had dried again, I rubbed off the charcoal and was left with this.

I drew this quickly with a graphite stick on paper that had been toned first with washes and then, when dried, rubbed with some soft pastel (yellow-orange).

Now, as you can probably guess, I’m having a lot of fun making a variety of backgrounds so that I’ll have some ready to draw on.

New beginnings.
Here I am several weeks into the new year. My “to do” list has had “Write and post on Wild Sage Art” on it for at least the past ten weeks but somehow I don’t get to it! Maybe this year I’ll do better, but maybe this is the “every-once-in-a-while” blog.

I love beginnings – the new year, summer, the school year, my birthday, the first day of every quarter, the equinox, the solstice, the start of something (project, diet, friendship, workshop). For me each one is cause for celebration for at least a day or two. And that has been true this January too – with an extra special bonus. I had been plagued by an h.pylori infection that was recently diagnosed. After treatment, I am feeling so much better – better than words can describe! I feel like I got my life back – another new beginning to celebrate.

Great workshop.
Last week I took my first workshop of the year – a 12 hour class (over three days) with the extraordinary book artist, Laura Wait. She taught us a dimensional structure she developed several years ago. It utilizes a very wide spine which can support a hanger so that the book can be displayed on the wall. Signatures are spaced widely across the spine and stitched on to the spine with a traditional long-stitch. The hanger (cord or wire) is inserted into the spine through two of the stitching holes.

We started out writing with sumi ink on large sheets of BFK. Our natural handwriting became the foundation for paper embellishment. We experimented with a wide variety of tools from pens, colored pencils and chopsticks to wooden shingles and were encouraged to explore mark-making with anything that could transfer ink or paint on to paper. Over the course of the first two sessions most of us managed to get three layers of ink and/or color on to our papers which resulted in rich tapestries for book pages.

I especially appreciated the comfortable atmosphere that Laura created and would encourage you to take a class with her if you are so inclined. She will be teaching two classes at her Santa Fe studio and in San Diego and San Francisco this year. Check out her website for more details. She limits her teaching just a few weeks each year to make sure that she has plenty of studio time to do her own work. www.laurawait.com

Some of Laura’s favorites for making these painted books:
Paper that folds without cracking.
She likes BFK (heavy – 240 gm) for text pages because they have “bulk. She uses Velin Arches for covering book board and for pages.
Both papers fold without cracking and can handle water and layers of paint.

Watercolor and gouache for painting pages.
She appreciates the quality and extensive color choices of Daniel Smith watercolors. For gouache she often uses Winsor and Newton and Daler Rowney. Inks and liquid watercolor (Hydrus) are also fun to use for this project.

Watercolor pencils with creamy pigment.
When you spray drawn lines, they bleed in interesting ways and they are fun to use when writing on damp or wet paper. Derwent is one brand that is nice and soft.

Easy to handle cover boards.
We used 60 pt. archival case board which was a new product for me. It’s a fairly rigid board that is much denser than mat board. And it is easy to cut when compared to the Davey board most book artists rely on.

I worked on two books during the class and finished them up this past week. The first book, “Sanctuary”, was informed by writing about trees as I was working on large sheets of paper. I was thinking about how a tree can provide food and shelter for birds and other creatures. When it came time to choose a shape, the tallness of trees and the density of foliage where on my mind. After completing the structure I added the branch to the front cover and placed small copper clips to hold folios together – suggesting safe places found under the canopy and between the leaves.

The second book I’ve titled “Markings”. As I looked at the pages I had painted and began to assemble them into signatures, I was struck by the variety of marks and values I had created. Thus the title. When I went to size the book, I created pages that were two contrasting sizes and colors and widely spaced on the spine so there could be movement when the book was handled. This book also has a hanger on the back spine so it can (with a little help from museum wax) be displayed on the wall.

For the past three years I’ve made an “art” doll on my birthday. I got the idea from an article in “Art Doll Quarterly” which featured the work of fiber artist Karen Page who has, for many years, been making dolls to celebrate her birthdays.

This year I decided to make some hand-quilted fabric to use as the doll’s body. I quilted the fabric on a recent trip Ed and I too . We traveled to New York to visit Ground Zero and to Washington D.C. to spend some time with his daughter and her family. Ed returned to Tucson and I stayed on an extra four days to spend time with my Tri Delta sorority sisters at the Sanctuary Retreat Center in Bellsville, Maryland.

I had been collecting doll ideas on Pinterest in recent months but I didn’t have a specific concept for the doll other than to use the quilted fabric. On the morning of my birthday I open gifts from my sister, Barbara. She had used some delightful threads and yarns to tie the packages and I immediately realized they would become the doll’s hair.

After breakfast I sat with the yarns and fabric and consulted my “scrap” box. I pulled out the fabric bits that might fit as I built the doll. From that point on, she took shape quickly as I discovered a crazy quilt scrap to use for her boots and heart and a lovely golden toned gridded silk that became her arms and hands. Assembling her took more time than expected and I didn’t finish her until this morning.

While every birthday is special this one took an extra celebratory note as I brought my husband home after spending the night in the hospital. He had just completed a very successful surgery on his left carotid artery. This was his second carotid surgery, the other having taken place last spring. This aging process is certainly challenging but now we can rest a bit easier knowing that the “rivers” in his neck are flowing freely.