Nancy Moore Bess
Enrollment limited to twelve.
This workshop is full. if you'd like to be added to the waiting list. (Please be sure to include the name of the workshop.)
#1, upper left, Hannah Rose: Hannah is my favorite young relative. When I visited her family a year ago at their farm in Maine, Hannah couldnʼt wait to introduce her favorite chickens (all named) and tell me about their different personalities. She dashed in and out of the newly constructed coops and described the second building that was awaiting the goats and horse expected the following week. When I taught her how to make these folded, pyramid-like packages, she sent me a thank you note with drawings of the new goats. The package is filled with farm animals — leaning heavily on chickens, goats, and horses. (The photograph is copied on a sheet of transparency and folded, punched with holes, and stitched with ribbon.)
#2, upper right, Temple Notes: This open-hexagonal weave basket is covered in handmade papers and old Japanese book pages. I often purchase old books at temple flea markets. Inside the basket are omikuji (divining papers) which I also purchase there. (If you donʼt like the prophecy, tie the paper on a nearby shrub or simple fence.) These memory baskets can hold a wide range of items that relate to the outside skin of the basket. (The basket is woven of dyed cane in the open-hex plaiting pattern that holds the paper skin exceptionally well. Methyl cellulose or acrylic medium is used over this weave pattern to secure the paper.)
#3, lower right, Imagine Peace: The image is from a card I keep in my studio — Gandhi reading, and his quote, “An eye for an eye will make the whole world blind.” Scrabble pieces inside spell, “Imagine Peace” and “Yoko Ono”. Yoko placed a full page ad in the NY Times with this message. I love the idea of their ideas coming together with the same message, PEACE. (The Gandhi card was printed on a transparency, then folded, punched and stitched.)
#4, lower left, Scrolls in Bamboo: Long pages taken from old business record logs in Japan are rolled alternately with my writings about tea ceremony. The resulting scroll is put inside a round piece of bamboo charcoal used to purify water in Japan. (Using the rounds of bamboo to hold the scroll, rather than a traditional tie, is especially appropriate since these particular pieces of bamboo charcoal were marketed specifically to those who do chabana [floral arrangements for tea ceremony]. Plain pieces of bamboo would be more appropriate for other topics.)
rtist book makers continually search for structures to contain information, ways of organizing material that enhance and support content.
GAS is pleased to present a new teacher, Nancy Moore Bess, to our students—although she is not new to teaching. The structures Nancy will teach have direct application to the artist book world as you will see in the following description of the class.
Please be sure to visit Nancy’s website, www.nancymoorebess.com. She is an accomplished artist and her site will provide you with the opportunity to learn about her and to view her work.
Examining the foundations of Japanese packaging is an exciting way to expand your book arts vocabulary. The exposure to familiar and unfamiliar materials and techniques offers a rich variety of innovative formats to tell a story and develop a narrative.
Traditionally, the Japanese used indigenous materials to wrap and protect small items—rice straw to bundle five eggs; bamboo woven to hold chickens or heads of garlic; folded paper to wrap small, irregular items.
When giving gifts in Japan, packaging is all about presentation! Baskets are stage sets and paper vessels conceal and reveal.
Building on these traditions, you will use cane, bamboo, and paper in unique ways with some unusual, additional materials such as screening and acetate.
For example, single pyramid-like paper packages can hold multiple items that present a possible story, a hint of which is written on the surface; multiples of six using the same format can be stitched together to offer completely different options.
Multiple name cards or pricing tags slipped into a handmade pocket can be rearranged into a variety of changing story lines.
Handmade paper can be applied to the surface of a woven basket creating a skin that can be painted and written upon. Visual access to the basket’s interior allows for a more complex conversation between the two—surface and interior—part of the narrative accessible, some only intimated.
The possibilities go on and on with each project leading to multiple variations and hours of experimentation.
Nancy’s vast collection of Japanese packaging, plus books on the subject and a Japanese video will illustrate the potential of these unfamiliar forms.
There are no prerequisites for this workshop.
About one month before the workshop, registrants will receive a tool list, directions to the studio, and any other pertinent logistical information via email. Workshop hours are usually from 9:30 until about 5:00. Please do not buy an airplane ticket or make any other non-refundable payment before checking with us to be sure the workshop for which you have registered has sufficient enrollment.