bookmaking

This week my contemporary bookmaking workshops started, I really love books in all their forms but especially handmade books and artists books and altered books and.............well I had better stop as I said I love books! The image below is of a concertina style book, this type of book was  part of the first workshop session, however this one is very old. It is a palm leaf concertina, consisting of woven palm leaves which are then woven into a concertina  structure, beautiful isn't it!

The concertina book is a simple form which lends itself to experimentation, because of its simple construction it gives the maker opportunity to 'mess around' with it and play creatively, to experiment with the structure and stretch the imagination, in short, to engage with a bit of 'what ifing'. So, with that in mind I thought I would post some images of this book form and show the ways that a few artists have approached it.

Dianne Longley's 'Curious and Fantastic Creatures'.

'Quantified Asthetic' Angela Davies.http://www.angeladaviesartist.co.uk/

A beautiful piece made from a double concertina format.

Ed Hutchings 'Book of Stars'. 

Wendy Shortland's 'Bling Book'.

I hope that these wonderful books have inspired you to have a go for yourself. All of the images show books that are standing upright, bend the form back on itself and it forms a star, lay one end  flat and the other upright and you have a different form but that's another story! Have fun and see what you can come up with?

A book must be an ice axe to break

the seas frozen inside our souls.

Franz Kafka.