I will have a limited number of books available for people to work with during the demo. Please feel free to bring your own books if there is something specific you’d like to learn.

Transforming Books into Visual Art with Rachael Ashe
Date: Saturday June 2nd, 2012
Time: 2pm to 4pm
Location: Opus Downtown, 100-207 West Hastings Street

The book in question was an old chemistry textbook from her university days that had sentimental value. When she approached me to create an altered book she had no particular requirements other than a horizontal composition, the rest was up to me. So of course I was overwhelmed with possibilities and completely blocked on what to do, up until two weeks ago that is.

My concept for this book was to create a sculptural piece with a more abstract composition than my previous altered book work. I began with a flurry of paper folding in a five page pattern with a slightly different variation on the right and left sides. The video above was taken using the iTimelapse app on my iPhone during about an hour or so of work at the beginning stages of page folding.

I added a decorative red paper with a gold design as the end pages once the page folding was complete, and then tried to figure out my idea of sewing thread throughout the book.

This part was tricky because paper is not at forgiving about sewing mistakes the way fabric can be, so I experimented a bit with a secondary book before fully diving in. I stitched the thread back and forth across the book in an irregular pattern because I felt it worked better and looked more interesting than carrying the same stitch across the entire piece.

Once the completed altered book was framed I needed to go back and increase the tension in most of the threads. I’d been working with the book flat or on a slight angle and discovered everything shifted once the book was in a horizontal position. Imagine me pulling the threads tighter as it hung on the wall, and you get an idea of this part.

In choosing the title for this I wanted it to relate to chemistry in a subtle way. I did my usual playing around with different terms in google search to inspire ideas and came up with, “Thread of Transformation”. It relates quite literally to the metamorphosis of the book itself, but is also a play on chemical reaction as a form of changing one thing into another.

I was very pleased with the finished altered book, but was nervous about sharing it with my client friend. I needn’t have worried because when I presented it to her over the weekend, she absolutely loved it. Hooray!

It’s a great reminder to follow your own path, and to remember to enjoy the journey.

The Bowen trip was fun because we invited a pile of friends to stay with us, which led to much good food and plenty of laughter. The star of the weekend was Bosco the dog (pictured below) because he charmed and entertained everyone.

We had a few good days of almost summer weather, and then the rain came. I don’t think anyone really minded, because it was a good excuse to stay inside, read a book, play games, and cook.

Here’s to a promising summer full of excellent weekend adventures with friends.

I feel invigorated, inspired, and excited after visiting the 2012 Sketchbook Project travelling show. It was here in Vancouver for only two days with limited hours at W2 Media Cafe. I made a point to visit both days and see as many sketchbooks as I could, which worked out to about twenty-five or so of the thousands of sketchbooks people have access to during the tour. It’s the work I saw within that small sampling of books that has me so excited, as well as the concept of such a large-scale collaborative project becoming a lending library full of art.

I really admire the set up of the travelling show. Each visitor is required to sign up for a library card before they can access the collection. Then away you go, selecting sketchbooks based upon theme, location, or random draw. The librarian pulls two books at a time for each patron to pour over, and it can be a mixed bag of amazing to so-so work depending upon the skill of each artist.

I took photos of some of my favourites, which you can see here. It was fascinating to see all the different ways people used the exact same little sketchbook. I am definitely inspired to get to work on the 2013 Sketchbook Project, even though it’s not due until the end of the year.

Valerie Arntzen, Vancouver BC, Canada

Kelly Leigh Miller, Louisville KY, USA

Emily Horton, Tyler TX, USA

Rachel Ramm, Dublin OH, USA

Rolando Del Real, Granda Hills CA, USA

Melia Ramirez & Sandra G, Valle des las Palmas, Mexico

Brenna Darroch, Fairfax VA, USA

Andie Wolf, Toronto ON, Canada

Lucy Howard, Bicester, Oxfordshire, UK

If you’re unfamiliar with the Sketchbook Project, it’s a collaborative art project organized by Arthouse Co-op, a group based in Brooklyn, NY. People from all over the world sign up to receive a plain brown 5″ x 7″ book and what they can do within those pages is completely open. The final works are contributed back to the Brooklyn Art Library where they become part of the collection, which people can access both online and in person.

I’ve mentioned it previously because I took part in the Limited Edition project earlier this year. The 2013 Sketchbook Project is now open, and I highly recommend you take part. It’s been a HUGE source of inspiration for much of the work I’ve been doing so far this year.

Paper Cut Collage 8″ x 8″ | Etsy listing

Paper Cut Collage 8″ x 8″ | Etsy listing

Paper Cut Collage 6″ x 6″ | Etsy listing

Each one is available for purchase in my Etsy shop.

I thought I’d share the full interview questions and answers here, since most of what I wrote wasn’t used in the feature.

MMM: How did you get into altering books?

RA: Creating art from old books was an idea I processed in my head for a few years before I actually got serious about working with them. Up until about four years ago the primary focus of my work was photography, but as I transitioned from shooting film to digital I felt I needed to do more tactile work. I began creating mixed media collage, and this eventually led me to working with
paper and books. The big “AHA!” moment came when I picked up a copy of “New Directions in Altered Books” by Gabe Cyr and I realized the possibilities of creating three-dimensional assemblage work with books.

MMM: What’s the most challenging thing about creating these?

RA: The biggest challenge is to keep coming up with new ideas and ways to work with books. I am driven by the need to experiment, and prefer to come up with a different way of transforming the book with each succeeding work. What draws me to the process is that each one seems to have a new challenge in problem solving in order to bring my vision to reality. This is what keeps working with altered books endless interesting to me.

MMM: Why do you infuse nature into them?

RA: I live in Vancouver, BC, a city surrounded by mountains, forests, and the ocean. Nature is ever-present within the city, but I also don’t have to go far in order to immerse myself fully in natural surroundings. I think incorporating imagery of birds, trees, and even using found objects from nature in my artwork is a natural byproduct of the environment in which I live.

MMM: What meanings do they hold for you?

RA: I find meaning in the process of making the altered books more than what they represent. I’m much more interested in the meaning other people discover in my work for themselves. The audience often sees symbolism or meaning I hadn’t intended but I love that aspect of sharing work.

Thank you very much to Alice Yoo for featuring me.

Paper Cut Collage 6″ x 6″ | Etsy listing

Paper Cut Collage 8″ x 8″ | Etsy listing

Paper Cut Collage 6″ x 6″ | [SOLD]

I’ll share the rest of them tomorrow, and hopefully this week I will get to making larger pieces. Stay tuned….

A full set of my photos from the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival can be viewed as a slideshow on Flickr.

Drop by, say hi, and see my latest work in person.

Got Craft?
Date: Sunday May 6th, 2012
Time: 10am to 5pm
Location: Royal Canadian Legion, 2205 Commercial Drive

This is actually a self portrait collaboration with Boris. I loved the idea of a photo of myself surrounded by the red tulips, with me in my red jacket. Unfortunately I didn’t bring a tripod with me so Boris had to play that role. He didn’t quite get the angle I was hoping for so I made some additions and adjustments in photoshop. The results: an endless field of tulips and nothing but the colour red.

When we drove up to our first stop (a farm with giant fields of yellow and red tulips) my mind was a bit blown even though I knew what to expect. It’s one thing to see pictures, and quite another to have such intense colours shining back at you and stretching on into the horizon.

What you can’t see here are all the other people hanging about wandering through the flowers. I managed to make it look as if we had the place to ourselves.

I have more photos to upload and will be adding them to this set on Flickr.

These evolved even more spontaneously than usual. I chose pieces of sewing pattern paper and glued them down as the backgrounds for each before deciding what else I would do. It worked out very well, especially the top one with the lines suggesting the branches of a Sakura tree.

The materials used in these are the same as previous collages; sewing pattern paper, security envelopes, book page scraps, and red paper. I created the flower shapes using a paper punch rather than freehand cutting as I usually do.

These are not yet listed on Etsy, but will be later this week. Thanks to a conversation with my fellow artists I’m rethinking how I price some of the recent work I’ve created.

When I shared some of these the other week they seemed more like a sketch than a finished piece. I’d been contemplating what to do further with them in terms of finishing and display. I liked backing the paper cut designs with coloured paper, but I hated the idea of enclosing them in traditional matting and framing. Then I came across Bill Zindel’s Geometric Collage and my brain began churning around the idea of collaging them with many different patterned papers.

I used the same three different patterned origami papers with both of these, and pieced it together at the back. I backed everything with a second piece of black card stock and cut away the excess paper. They are mounted onto wood panels (what is normally the back) and I painted these black for a more dramatic effect.

Untitled | 6″ x 6″

Untitled (detail) | 6″ x 6″

Untitled | 8″ x 8″

Untitled (detail) | 8″ x 8″

The patterned paper gives them a nice KAPOW of colour and plays off the smaller shapes within the larger form.

Once I figure out my pricing I’ll be making these available in my Etsy shop, as well as sharing them with the public at Got Craft? on May 6th.

I snap an endless amount of photos of the beautiful flowering trees found everywhere in our city at this time of year. I cannot get enough of them, their beauty is always a magical sight to see.

I’ve been holding onto a few scrap pieces of book pages I’d cut shapes from and made use of them in these two finished pieces. Note the book page at the top of the Black Oyster Catcher collage, and the one at the bottom of the Sandpiper collage to see what I mean.

Sandpiper Collage | 10″ x 10″ | Etsy Listing

Black Oyster Catcher Collage | 10″ x 10″ | Etsy Listing

Both are available for purchase through my Etsy shop.

To get an idea of some of the work you can make in this class, check out the set on Flickr of work made by students from previous workshops.

For further details and to register for the class, please visit the Blim website.

Altered Book Workshop at Blim
Date: Saturday, April 28th, 2012
Time: 2 to 5pm
Cost: $74.80 ($65 + tax + $2 service charge)
Location: 115 Pender St. E, Vancouver

Sarah in her studio

How long have you been an artist and how did you become one?
I’ve been doing this hard-edged geometrical collage work for about three years. Before that, I did a lot of waiting around for something good to happen, trying to keep my head above water. I’ve been a bookseller, I’ve done manual paste-up for a newspaper, designed textiles, worked in a chocolate factory. For a long time I made photo-realist figurative textile pieces that were quite popular with people but for me were just a placeholder until the right thing came along. And now it has.

Do you work full time or part time as an artist? If part-time, what do you do to support yourself?
I am able to work full time as an artist only because I have a wonderful and supportive husband with a steady paycheque. Otherwise I couldn’t do it at all. Vancouver is a tough city to be in the arts. Government funding is at an all-time low, and galleries, theatres and artist-run centers are closing down. Mostly, when people aren’t slaving away at their desks trying to make a down payment on a condo, they’re snowboarding at Whistler. Yes, there are curators and amazing galleries and people who love the arts, but it feels very subculture to me, very marginal. I hope that will change in a few years.

Work in progress on the studio table.

What are some of your favourite materials to work with?
I work almost exclusively with archival, cotton-based paper. I love Clairefontaine Maya paper, a richly colour-saturated heavy cardstock with absolutely no texture to it. Because my collages often have large glued elements, I need a heavy weight, maybe 140 to 300lb., in order not to have warping. I’m also madly in love with my Plexiglas templates, which I had fabricated for me. They’re so simple and so beautiful.

Targets on the studio floor

Tell us a bit about the process you go through to create your work:
My work is precise and detailed, which means I do a lot of preparation, taking careful measurements, dry fitting, making sure things will come out the way I intend them to. It’s a lot like composing music, the individual notes mean little until they combine into a melody. Mostly I don’t know until the end if I’ve made something good, or a complete disaster. One of the things I’ve struggled with is learning to waste paper through experimentation or at least fearless creating. I’ve been in extreme poverty a couple of times in my life and I can feel the echo of it every time I make a tiny mistake that ruins a piece of matte board I just spent eight dollars on.

"Last Night" by Sarah Gee

"Playing with Fire" by Sarah Gee

Where do you find inspiration for your work, and what keeps you motivated?
I’m not really a worldly person or a particularly referential artist. For example, I don’t look at a sunset or snowy mountain and feel it has a place in my inspiration file. I don’t travel or take reference photographs. I don’t even sketch all that often. Instead I’m seeking to create balance and harmony through geometrical arrangements, arrive at some kind of inner resolution. So I guess both the inspiration and motivation comes from self-determination. That sounds really, really boring, I know.

"Receptor" by Sarah Gee

Tell us about other artists who have inspired you:
I’m inspired by the hard-edged painters who came to prominence in the sixties and seventies, Frank Stella, Tadasky, Josef Albers, Frank Hammersley, Miguel Angel Vidal, as well as our own Vancouver artists like Michael Morris and Gary Lee-Nova. I also like anything obsessive, when you get the sense, when looking at a piece of art, that the person who made it was inventing deeply private formulas, ways of seeing, in order to make sense of the world. When I see “Outsider” artists working in complete isolation, like the astonishing Archilles Rizzoli, Henry Darger or James Hampton, making beautiful things despite a life of deprivation and no schooling, I’m so moved by that.

Where can people find you both online and offline:
People can find my website at sarahgeeart.com I have a gallery and a blog called Studio Life there.

They can also follow me on Twitter @SarahGeeArt

The paper cut designs I’ve been focused on lately is part of the work I am hoping to explore further with this residency. I just hope I’m articulate enough in my proposal to make it interesting.

These four designs were created over the course of the past week. I’m using black card stock, and backing these with brightly coloured paper. Each iteration begins with the same basic crescent shape to create a larger organic form, and is done through freehand cutting of the paper.

I’m excited to see the group of these together. I know I can keep working in the same way to create infinite variations of these organic designs. They are enjoyable to make because there is an aspect of meditation to the repetition of cutting, and looking at the finished form gives me the same feeling I get when working on them.

Book Art: Iconic Sculpture and Installations Made From Books
by Paul Sloman
Amazon listing

1000 Artists’ Books
by Sandra Salamony, and Peter & Donna Thomas
Amazon listing.

I may have some of my work published in 1000 Artists Books. I’m still waiting to hear if it made the final cut. Either way, it will be a welcome addition to my collection of art books.

They are very enjoyable to work on. I like the play with movement, colour, shape, and pattern, and coming up with new things to do with the same old materials. I think eventually the birds will disappear from these and they will become studies of only shape and form.

6″x 6″ collage on wooden panel | Etsy listing

6″x 6″ collage on wooden panel | Etsy listing

6″x 6″ collage on wooden panel | Etsy listing

8″x 8″ collage on wooden panel | Etsy listing

These four new collages, along with a few older pieces, are available for purchase in my Etsy shop »

The top image is of the sketchbook work, and the bottom image is of a “paper test” on a scrap piece of map.

I really want to work with recycled/reclaimed paper and since I recently acquired a pile of large topographic maps, this is the paper I hope to work with going forward with the paper cuts. I really like the combination of materials and design, and the paper the map is printed upon is fairly decent to work with.

Read on for more about Kirsti and her work.

Painting at Yesnaby, Orkney. (photo by Darren Carcary)

Tell us about yourself:
I am a designer and illustrator. I dabble in a few different disciplines – a product of the times I guess, and my desire to constantly try new things. I studied graphic design and illustration and have worked as both for the past 14 years. My work within those fields is pretty diverse as well.

How long have you been an artist and how did you become one?
I have always been artistically inclined. My grandmother is a painter, so my artistic inclinations were nurtured and supported from the beginning. I drew constantly as a kid. And I had (and still have) a keen interest in nature and animals so that was my primary subject matter–usually animals chasing down and eating other animals. Lots of foxes and wolves, and terrified and bloodied deer. I liked to keep it real.

Even with that set-up, I didn’t set out for a career in the arts, however. I didn’t actually know there were options for arts-based careers other than being a painter–which is weird and a little dull on my part because I had no end of access to illustrated books. But I was aware that being a painter wasn’t the easiest living, so I focused my attention on sciences in high school, intending to go to vet school or into forensic entomology. Science, death and insects were a killer combination for me at the time. But first year college found me recovering from academic burnout, and I accidentally walked past the studio arts room when I went in to pick my courses, and that proved to be irresistible. After a year of mucking around with general arts classes, I was accepted into the Graphic Design and Illustration Program at Capilano College (now IDEA at Capilano University), not even knowing what graphic design was.

picture book illustration | rough drawing & final illustration detail

Do you work full time or part time as an artist? If part-time, what do you do to support yourself?
Depends on what you define as an artist. I don’t identify as being an artist. Or at least, I’m uncomfortable with the term on some level, in relation to myself. Not to say illustration isn’t art – actually, I’m not going to open up the art vs illustration debate. But I don’t feel that doing it makes me an artist. And I don’t really think the work I’m doing qualifies yet. Also, I think it’s that the work I’ve been doing most recently is client-driven–while the decisions I make are my own, they are influenced to different extent by outside forces–so I think I’m reserving the term artist for (hopefully) when I’m able to make work that is purely driven by my own whim, and feels legitimate enough (to myself) to be defined that way. I’m fully aware that I probably contradicted my earlier statement. Also, I might change my mind about the whole thing next week, or next month, or next time we talk. I don’t actually care much about the solidity of definitions, I just go by what feels right at the time.

Identity design work-in-progress.

Short, uncomplicated answer: I support myself with design and illustration work. And I support my picture book illustration work with my design work and my more commercial illustration. I paint when I have the time (rarely). I do sell pieces sometimes, but never intentionally. I rarely, if ever, exhibit. I’d like to change the selling part. But first I need more time to make the work…and I’m working on that.

What are some of your favorite materials to work with?
I love a 3B pencil and a non-precious sketchbook. I adore paint. Watercolour and I have a love hate relationship. I go back to it constantly even though I find my inability to work well in it incredibly demoralising. When I travel, I try to do as many on location paintings as I can. And I dream of having the (financially comfortable) time to get back into a nice, big oil painting so I can putter endlessly. A have at least two series in mind I’d like to take a crack at.

Old and St Andrew's Church, Montrose | on location, Montrose, Scotland, watercolour, 7"x10"

Right now, I’m really enjoying digital work as well–though with a real connection to traditional mediums; I don’t like digital-looking digital stuff, I just don’t feel a connection to it. I’m working on a picture book that I’m colouring in Photoshop. It’s opening up all sorts of possibilities that are closed to me through the nature of certain mediums, and my inabilities to bend them to my will. And it’s taught me a lot about colour in a very short time. At the same time, it’s making me want to get back into using paint again. Even though it’s digital, there are still happy accidents. And I find that pretty delightful.

Reflection | oil on canvas, 4'x4'

Tell us a bit about the process you go through to create your work:
Rumination. Research. Procrastination. First Stab. Creative dismay. More rumination (could be mistaken for procrastination). Diving in for real. A series of creative crisis. Breakthrough. A lot hours in the studio. A lot of missed weekends and sunny days. Decisions, decisions, decisions. Conclusion. Sometimes, celebration.

Where do you find inspiration for your work, and what keeps you motivated?
There are very few things I look at without thinking about how I’d go about drawing it, or mixing that colour, where that reflected light is coming from, or trying to commit the image to memory for later use. I’m motivated by the frustrations I have with my inability to draw and paint how I want to, which is also the same thing I’ve found paralysing in the past – though, I think now that I’m older, I’m over that. I’m now totally ok with knowing I still have about 850 crappy paintings or drawings to make before I turn out something good. I’m motivated by ticking time. I feel like I’m getting to the party kind of late, and I need to catch up. I’m also motivated by knowing that this is it, this is the only thing I’m half good at, so I better put my head down and keep going. Commit.

Other than art, what are you particularly excited about right now?
I’m writing part of this from Kaua’i, so in the immediate picture, I’m pretty excited about waking up in the morning (hopefully to some dry weather) and taking my morning coffee down to the beach as I have done for the past week, to watch the humpback whales, and, if I’m lucky, see the large pod of spinner dolphins that have been feeding just off the beach near the place I’m staying. I’m also super excited to get back into the water and do some snorkelling. I’m a bit obsessed with the snorkelling – it’s been pretty poor weather here (thunder, lightening, 80km winds, torrential downpours, flash flood warnings, highway closures, road wash-outs, palm fronds falling like missiles) so it’s not super warm but I’ll stay out in the water watching fish until I’m shaking with cold. They’re just so incredibly beautiful and varied and mesmerising. Everywhere you look, there’s something different.

Anole, photographed in the National Tropical Botanical Garden, Kaua'i.

In the big picture, I’m pretty excited to see the light at the end of the tunnel of a very long project that has consumed my life for the last few years. I’m excited about getting my evenings and weekends back. Having the time to get outside in the sun and explore my city again. To have free time. Catch up with friends and family. Get active. Putter in the garden. Do a bit of travelling. Purge my closet, clean my studio. Rethink work and what I’ve been working at.

Where can people find you both online and offline:
A general collection of work is at kirstiwakelin.com
My book illustration is here: mysecretelephant.com

While Evan’s work isn’t normally the style of art that grabs me, his talk about process and materials drew me in and convinced me to like his work. His opening line of being focused on shape and form is what did it because this is exactly what I am currently obsessed with in the paper cut work I’ve been doing.

These bottom two photos were taken on the side of the studio that belongs to Evan’s studio mate. I was curious about the dried lizards and what he intended to do with them. Sadly, he wasn’t around to ask. I know exactly where you can buy these in Chinatown but I’d never seen anyone purchase them.

It’s always a treat to get to poke around in an artist studio, and to hear them speak about their work. Next up in the series is an Intimate Studio visit with painter, Nicola Tibbetts. Registration is available through the Eastside Culture Crawl website.

I’m very pleased with this because I didn’t think I’d make it all the way to the end. The process of cutting paper is very addictive…