Byopia Press Advent Calendar 2022: Day One and A Small Ornament

This Advent all the projects will all be based on circles, or circular things like spirals and spheres. To start things off, here’s a simple ornament.

Last Post Before Advent 2022

As you may have already guessed, I spent most of the week working on projects and posts for the Byopia Press Advent Calendar 2022. Here’s a glimpse of the final version of the asterisk garland.

Friday Night Flicks: Sarah Bodman

One of my favourite altered books was made by Sarah Bodman. She overprinted an inkjet print of Constable’s The Haywain on the centre spread of a British Department of Agriculture pamphlet on how farmers should deal with with nuclear fallout.

Today’s flick is about her artist’s book Read With Me. From the text on the YouTube page:

It is the final part of a 4-year project made in collaboration with a psychometric reader and the public. This last edition concludes the tributes to Susan Hiller’s collaborative telepathy experiment ‘Draw Together’, and the Fox sisters who launched their careers as spirit mediums with a public performance on 14th November 1849, at the Corinthian Hall in Rochester, New York state, USA. The artist’s book is the result of a performative drawing event, readings by the psychometric reader, collages made during lockdown and words assembled from the dissected readings. Produced via a remote residency at the London Centre for Book Arts, UK, 2022.

 

 

As well as being a book artist, Bodman is Senior Research Fellow for Artists’ Books & Programme Leader for MA Multidisciplinary Printmaking at the Centre for Fine Print Research, UWE Bristol. By going to this page you could watch another video this weekend (23 minutes) of Bodman discussing the artists’ books in the Bristol archives.

Following a Train of Thought to a (Possibly Illogical) Conclusion

Showing you sneak peeks of the projects coming in December has begun to feel a bit mean, so I have an actual project for you this week. It began as a bit of paper play and led to something completely different.

Friday Night Flicks: Julie Chen’s World Without End

Julie Chen’s work has been on Friday Night Flicks before, but the last time we saw World Without End it was in a speeded-up video along with two other books. Tonight’s flick from the Jaffe Center for Book Arts gives a slower, closer look.

 

 

For an even slower look at Chen’s work, take some time this weekend to look over her full portfolio.

Using The Geometry Skills I Learned In High School

I spent a significant part of the past week calculating angles for Advent projects. Some were more obvious than others.

Friday Night Flicks: Body Chronology

Tonight’s flick is from the Bainbridge Island Museum series Artists’ Books Unshelved, and explores two works from the Cynthia Sears Artist’s Books Collection. The books shown are About Pearl by Robbin Ami Silverberg and Hair by Sun Young Kang.

 

 

I highly recommend that you spend a little time this weekend checking out Silverberg’s website, or looking at more work by Kang here, or both.

All Circles, All The Time

I finished the photo processing (David took the pictures) and the layout for the annual Beeston Calendar on Monday, and started printing but didn’t finish because my Lovely Assistant Kemuri spent a lot of time sleeping on the printer. Most of my time was spent playing with circles on the computer in preparation for this year’s online Advent Calendar. There was a bit of studio time as well.

Friday Night Flicks: Artists’ Books at MIT

In tonight’s pair of very short flicks Anna Boutin-Cooper introduces two artists’ books: The City Within by Natalie Draz, and The Actual Accordion Book by Peter and Donna Thomas.

 

 

 

You might wish to spend a little time this weekend checking out Natalie Draz’s website here (pop-ups!) or looking at Instagram images from Peter and Donna Thomas here. (You can see their gypsy caravan and images from some of their workshops.) You can also read one of my posts from last year’s Advent calendar on Nested Accordions, a structure invented by Peter and Donna Thomas.

How To Make A Bi-fold Case (and Something To Put In It)

Today’s post is really about making a two-compartment paper case, but it does come with a Hallowe’en version of Bingo so you have something to keep in your model.