Workshops taken and giving

Last year when I was in the US I took a class with Karen Hanmer at the San Francisco Center of the Book. The class was making a pyramid book made up of triangles. When I returned Val, who organises workshops for Papermakers of Victoria asked if I would run the class for PoV. That is happening Sunday Week 21 April out at Bundoora Stables, PoV's studio space.

Karen mentioned in her notes that the method could be used for other shapes like hexagons and squares so I have made up a model using hexagons, the first problem was getting an even hexagon. I tried using a compass to draw a circle then mark off the circle into six. This should have worked but didn't because my pencil slipped in the compass. Next trial I folded a strip of card in half and cut off a triangle at 60 degrees to the fold, I then used the cut side to measure the second side and cut another triangle at 60 degrees to the fold. I then unfolded and used this as a template to cut my sheets. I had already printed some etchings of bees onto some handmade paper so these became the backing for the hexagons.

Bee Hive 2013
Acetate etching on handmade paper 

The Hexagon

That leads into another workshop taken this year with Liz Powell. It was called Eco Friendly Etching and we used zinc plates and copper sulphate. I was quite pleased with my second plate that was a delicate line drawing but not that impressed with the first. I printed a few versions of both plates and made up a small book as suggested by Liz. She was a great teacher very patient. The book was formed with a concertina spine and windows in pages that were folded in half and glued to the concertinas.

some new leather bound books

My postcard for the Yabbers postcard exchange from our session of plant and metal dyeing

My contribution to the Contemporary Art Society Brooch show, all pieces around 5 x 10 cm