Click anywhere on the descriptions or pictures for more detailed informationYouth Workshops 1. Boxmaking: Do you like boxes? The skills students need to be able to construct a box are folding, cutting with an exacto knife and patience. Once you know the basics of making a box, you can modify it to any size to hold a book, collectibles or allow it to stand alone as it’s own piece of art. We will learn how to cut bookboard with a straight edge and exacto knife, glue the pieces together, choose your favorite Japanese paper and wrap the box in it. If there’s time, we’ll even make an additional box, one that’s made just through folding. Bring your own exacto knife and self-healing mat if you have them. Students may also bring their own bookcloth or Japanese paper if they wish. All experience levels are welcome in this workshop. 2. Hand Bookbinding: Students will produce at least one finished book during the class. We will learn how to fold signatures, use an awl to punch holes and stitch together our pages. Students will choose paper for the end pages and glue them onto the front and back of the signatures. After gluing the binding we will cut the page edges cleanly. Paper backed cloth will be glued onto cardboard for the covers, the signatures will be correctly placed inside and glued in. Voila! Your own book! Students may bring a front and cover sheet of their own: a drawing or computer print 6” x 8” maximum will work. 3. Three Dimensional Bookbinding: Do you like to fold and cut paper? Those are the basic skills students need to be able to construct accordion, tunnel, business card, and carousel books. Think of a book as a stage; we can look through and into these books for three-dimensional effects. Students can learn four sculptural book designs that will promote and encourage their writing skills as they write stories to fill the pages of these books. Students will develop their science skills through the study of kinesthetics and engineering that dictate how their books open and move. Students will also advance their math skills through the necessary measurements to make books that are well built. There are four books students can learn how to make in this workshop. These books include a Kaleidoscope book that opens like a fan or a DNA Helix. A second book is a Flag book that has a series of pages that interweave. Another book is a Tunnel book that opens like a diorama. The final book is a pop-up book that has parts that move with the action of turning the pages. 4. Altered Books: Have you ever wanted to take a pair of scissors to a book? Here’s your chance to destroy a perfectly good book while creating a new work of art. We start with a normal hard cover book that we cut, glue rip and otherwise desecrate with our artmaking. Students will learn the basics of pop up and kaleidoscope books for use within their pages. These books may look strange and funny, but they can pack a powerful message. Students may bring drawings, magazine images or computer prints up to 4” x 8”. Any found materials such as fabric, dried flowers, feathers, ribbons, etc. can be brought for embellishments. 5. Papermaking: Roll up your sleeves as you’re going to get wet. Make your own paper in various colors and thicknesses, adorned with flowers, ribbons, even insects. It’s amazing how simple it is. Rip up bits of existing paper, from newsprint to watercolor paper, put into a household blender with water and grind into pulp. Using the nifty frame you’ve built from wood, duct tape and window screen, the pulp is sloshed on top, forming a wet layer of paper mulch. We flip this onto a sheet of cloth and allow it to dry, forming a whole new sheet of paper from your torn bits. Add any sort of embellishments such as string, sparkles or butterfly wings to make it uniquely your own.Your new dry sheet of paper can be used for scrapbooking, bookmaking, drawing or any other artistic treatment. It may be so beautiful you’ll just want to display it as is. 6. Cottage Collage: How about designing a lovely collaged open box or screen? This workshop combines elements of collage with three dimensional bookmaking. You can enhance the collage and turn it into a book form by adding writing. We will start by sanding the edges of mat board that has been cut into house shapes. Choose lovely printed paper to cover four pieces and attach them together with linen tape. You may connect them together to create an open box or leave the two ends unattached to make a screen. Finally, glue images, writings and embellishments to finish your Cottage Collage. 7. Fun Sculpture: Roll up your sleeves and stick your hands into the bucket of plaster! We need to mix out the air bubbles before we pour it into a milk carton to set. Later we’ll use knives and nutpicks to carve. Bendable wire can be twisted into figural shapes, pieces of wood can be glued together and painted. How about using plaster-coated strips to make a cast of your foot or hand. There are all kinds of ways to make three dimensional art objects. We’re going to explore several in this sometimes messy hands on workshop. 8. Monoprints: Make single prints with paint, ink, paper, and glass. Participants will use tempera paint or ink to create an image on sheets of glass. By applying a sheet of paper to the wet surface and rubbing, the image is transferred to the paper. Interestingly shaped objects such as flowers and lace may also be coated with pigment and pressed onto paper. This may be the final image or the artist may continue to refine the paper surface with various media such as markers and pencils. Each print is unique and original.9. Photographic Transfers: Join us for an artistic workshop we’ve never seen offered elsewhere. Have you ever wanted to print images onto a surface other than sterile photo paper? We’ll discover how. Finished transfers have a colored pencil quality to them, and indeed, you can color on top with any material. There are many ways to make photographic transfers; we’ll investigate four. Recent magazines and catalogs (approximately two months old is the limit) can be cut apart for material; leave a margin around the image. Tape it face down to good quality receiving paper with drafting tape, spread a small amount of adhesive remover onto the back, and by rubbing with a blunt instrument such as a pencil, the ink is transferred. Those same magazine images can be used for a gloss lift. By coating as many as ten coats to the front of the paper with acrylic gel medium and rubbing in water, the paper will dissolve, leaving the ink imbedded in a transparent skin. Iron magazine pictures onto mending fabric and flip and iron again to transfer the image onto receiving cloth. Want to use your own precious photographs, drawings, and paintings? Use heat transfer paper in a color copier and make copies of your images. With a simple iron, you can transfer your images onto your cloth. From this jumping off point, you can continue to collage additional images, work the print with pencils and paints, or enjoy as is. Come try something completely different! 10. Cyanotype Photography: Magic Happens! Transform plain white paper into a rich blue photograph. No matter what your artistic interests are, here’s an opportunity to free yourself from conventional restraints. This alternative photographic process is accessible, exciting, and applicable to other mediums. No photo background is necessary to master this process. We’ll take something old and something blue and give it a new interpretation. These blue prints are made with the help of the sun so bring your sunglasses. You will produce blue photographic prints on paper or cloth using Cyanotype, one of the earliest and most beautiful non-silver processes in photography. This workshop, while photographic in nature, requires no darkroom or extensive equipment. You will first coat paper or cloth with a light sensitive solution. You will make a negative by drawing on a transparency using a permanent marker, cutting out and attaching pieces of old black and white negatives, or using the copy machine to transfer a previously created image to a transparent sheet. You expose the negative in contact with the coated paper to the sun and develop with running water. 11. Van Dyke Photography: Make photographs without a camera! The possibilities are endless and well within the grasp of the beginner, while challenging for those with experience in photography. This is a great workshop with materials that are totally transportable. We will be working with Van Dyke, which produces a brown and white photograph on paper or cloth. Bring old black and white negatives and interestingly shaped objects to class.You will first coat paper or cloth with Van Dyke’s special mixture of a light sensitive solution. You will make a negative by drawing on a transparency using a permanent marker, cutting out and attaching pieces of old black and white negatives, or using the copy machine to transfer a previously created image to a transparent sheet. This solution is extremely light sensitive so you’ll see the exposure begin as soon as you take it out to the sunlight. After exposure, simply develop with running water. 12. Painting: Grab your brush, dip it into some paint and let’s go. We’re going to make a quick pencil sketch of a scene on our watercolor paper and use acrylic and warercolor paints to bring it to life. We’ll experiment with a variety of brushes and sponges to achieve a lively painting. Your masterpiece will be bright, bold and ready to take home at the end of this workshop. Adult Workshops Youth Workshops Workshop History Calendar Artist Bio
