Hedi Kyle Workshop at SF Center for the Book

I spent a magical weekend in San Francisco at the Center for the Book making folded structures with Hedi Kyle, 15 students and 4 SFCB instructors who were Hedi's assistants. We created a dozen or so structures and added content to several. Hedi was engaging and patient; pacing the class so that everyone could successfully make each book, folder or flexagon. Here are some pictures of my pieces.

Enjoy,

Gina

Stenciled Flexagon

Belt fold around slat book and other books beneath.

Pink book was passed around class and everyone decorated a page.

Fishbone fold inside diagonal pocket folder. Blue book is a needle book. 

Sling Fold book open, with stenciled ovals and text.

Lots of letter folds and the needle case on the left.

Teaching in Tacoma

I was privileged to teach The Road to Spring to nine Puget Sound Book Artists last weekend in Tacoma, WA. We spent 3 hours together creating folded map books from Strathmore charcoal paper. I really enjoyed sharing this structure I invented from the Turkish map fold and the Hungarian map fold. Pictured below are the participants (with the exception of MalPina) and their work.

Enjoy,

Gina

Deb, Don, Kathy and Mary

Carole, Michelle, Lynn and Kathy

Playing with Paper/A Valentine's Day Treat

In 2008 I took a workshop that changed my life and my approach to making artist's books. It was taught by Joan Michaels Paque and she was a paper engineer and weaver extraordinaire. After the class I was playing around with folding paper and created a small book with the crease pattern you see below. The book was put into a drawer for years until last week when I decided to clean out my cluttered office and found it again. I always thought of this folded structure as a book and only looked at it linearly, but now I make structures that fold around in a circle. When I twisted this one into a circle it created a structure that is flexible and interesting in many orientations.

I have been thinking about ways to modify this structure and came up with two variations. One is inspired by Valentine's Day and the other is the answer to the question: What happens if I make a smaller version and nest it inside the bigger one? I hope you like the results and try folding one yourself.

Enjoy.

-Gina

Crease Pattern

Stages of folding the structure.

Two orientations of the round structure. There are more below.

I cut out hearts from paper folded into the water bomb base.

Variation 1: Insert hearts cut from 4 x 4 inch paper into the slots to make a unique Valentine.

Variation 2: Fold a second structure from 3 x 18 inch paper and nest it inside the 4 x 24 structure.

Three ways to twist the structure.

Sometimes I'm Jagged on the Inside

I have a new accordion folded sculpture to share with you today. A few days ago I was wondering what the Turkish Map Fold would look like if I used rectangular paper instead of square paper to fold it. Then I got to thinking about the fold for the insert I used in The Road to Spring and Companion Star. Could it also be folded with rectangular paper? The answer is yes, and it makes a very interesting asymmetrical shape. Next I wondered if there was a way to fold this new shape from an accordion folded sheet of paper so that the parts would be connected to each other. This was tricky and took some fiddling, but in the end I was able to create the sculpture you see below. Later in the day a name came to me and it is the title of this blog post.

Here are some pictures showing the folding process. Enjoy!

-Gina

Finished piece.

Single folded unit.

I taped together several single units to figure out where I needed to cut the accordion and make a continuous folded sculpture.

Step 1: accordion fold then fold diagonals. Then cut the paper as shown.

Step 2: Collapse the paper along the diagonals.

Step 3: Fold in the triangle sides. Notice how one side has a small triangle and the other side is larger, but they don't overlap. This creates the asymmetrical look.

Step 4: All the triangle sides are creased. Now just inside reverse fold all of them to create the final shape.

My New Obsession

If you follow my blog, you know I love maps. I collect vintage maps and atlases, map stencils, and books on map art. I recently bought some Ken Oliver Color Burst watercolors and was playing around with them as background elements and wanted to know how else I could use them. I perused You Tube and saw people using them on stencils. I immediately thought of my city map stencil collection. Here are the results for my favorite map, Paris. Each one is different and I love that you can get a positive and a negative from one application of the Color Burst.
Enjoy (I sure am)!

-Gina

Sprinkle on dry watercolors randomly.

Spray with water and watch the magic happen.

Lift off stencil and place clean watercolor paper over it.

Remove second paper and there is still color left on the stencil. You can color a paper towel with the leftovers and use it in mixed media projects.

Finished watercolor of Paris map and the negative.

Here's the first Paris watercolor I made. I like the different looks you can get with the same stencil.

'Tis the Season

I try to make holiday cards each year for friends and family, but I must be a dying breed as I seem to get fewer and fewer cards each year. I thought I would share some pictures of past cards and this year's as well. Enjoy.

-Gina

2008 Star Book Ornament/Card.

Cards from 2011-2014.

A selection of this year's cards. 

CAP Book

It's December and I have been so busy that this is the first time I am sitting down to blog in a month. I have been a member of San Diego Book Arts for 14 years and next year is our 20th anniversary as an art organization. To commemorate this achievement a group of 40 members got together several times this year to create a collaborative art project (CAP). Each person created a piece based on member Diane Gage's moon haiku. The art was photographed and reproduced on 9 x 12 paper to be bound into books for an exhibit celebrating the anniversary. I did not create an art work for the book, but was asked to bind a book as a fundraiser for the project. Below are images of my book in progress. I based the structure on Elizabeth Steiner's Moeraki Boulders, which is bound through the middle of the pages. I created binding strips from a second set of prints of the book so that there is interplay between the works and their companions. I hope you like the results as much as I do.

Enjoy.
-Gina

Pages with slits cut for the binding strips.

Sample binding strip.