We meet at the Unitarian Universalist Society Church located at 152 Pearl Street in Burlington, VT. We will be in the Sophia Fahs Community Room, a large room located in the basement.

Click here for more information on directions/parking.

Program: Paper Engineering with Robin Cooper Collins

Please join us in May when Robin Cooper Collins shares her expertise in pop-up and movable books.

During the first part of the meeting, Robin will present From a Sows Ear to a Silk Purse, a talk she gave at the Movable Book Society conference in Portland, OR. The talk focuses on movable books that came across her work bench as complete train wrecks, and how they were brought back to life. She will also offer a glimpse at several unique and unusual books.

After the talk, everyone will have the opportunity to build a plate using one of the more unusual mechanisms she has encountered. The base papers will be provided but, but you will need to bring:

• Scissors
• Glue (White glue, PVA, and Elmers, etc. are fine, but not glue stick, because we will be gluing wood to paper.)
• Embellishments (decorative papers, paints, pencils, etc., as well as decorative cutting tools)

Robin Cooper Collins’ hand bookbinding practice is focused on the restoration and conservation of antiquarian children’s books. Her specialty is the restoration of pop-up and movables from the 19th and 20th centuries.

Reflections on April’s Meeting

Deborah Howe gave a fascinating presentation at our April meeting. She chronicled her investigation and work on the conservation of Dartmouth’s 15th century manuscript called the Brut Chronicle. This legendary and historical chronicle of England is valued as a working text and will be used for research.

Deborah led us thorough her investigation with slides and a working model that she created to bind the text. The final decision for conserving this manuscript came as a bit of a surprise to our group as a simple cover was chosen over the historical binding that Deborah reproduced and we greatly admired. We all gained new insight and appreciation for the work of a conservator and the choices made for academic conservation.

Thank you Deborah for traveling up to Burlington and sharing your presentation with us.

B.A.G. News

*** The Book Arts Guild of Vermont is pleased to announce that book artist Daniel Kelm will be coming to Vermont to offer The Book Restructured: Wire Edge Binding, a two-day workshop from 7/28/12 – 7/29/12.

Book artists produce a truly remarkable range of books – some diverging wildly from what we recognize as traditional book form. Wire edge binding, which employs a thin metal wire along the hinging edge of each page, was developed by master bookbinder, artist, and innovator Daniel Kelm to meet the challenge of creating a nontraditional book that opens exceptionally well and allows for unusual shapes.

During this two-day intensive workshop, which includes two projects, you will master basic wire edge skills for producing highly functional bindings of both traditional and unusual shapes. The first project – a simple codex of six identical page panels – teaches you the basics of integrating metal wire into a paperboard construction. The second project – an accordion with triangular pages that fold to form a tetrahedron – teaches you how to make books of various geometric shapes.

All experience levels welcome!

Dates: July 28 – 29, 2012 (Saturday – Sunday)
Time: 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. (including lunch break)
Location: The Bindery Place, Shelburne Pond Studios, Shelburne, VT
Cost (all-inclusive!):
- Paid by 5/16/12: $195.00 (members), $210.00 (non-members)
- Paid after 5/16/12: $210.00 (members), $225.00 (non-members)

Space is limited and B.A.G. members are getting a head start on registering, so sign up as soon as possible! Click here to download the registration form.

For further information about the workshop, please contact Jill Abilock at (802) 238-0883 or SixLoonsStudio@gmail.com.

*** The May/June exhibition at the Creative Space Gallery in Vergennes, VT includes work from our 2012 spring exhibit, Shaping Pages. Featured work includes handmade books by B.A.G. members Jill Abilock, Janet Ballantyne, Eloise Beil, Elissa Campbell, Elizabeth Rideout, Maryann Riker, Nancy Stone, Annie Watson, and Cynthia Weiss.

There will be a reception with the artists on Friday June 2nd from 5:00 p.m. – 7:00 p.m. You can also visit during gallery hours on Thursday – Sunday, now through June 24th.

*** B.A.G. members Carolyn Shattuck, Meta Strick, Ken Leslie, Marianna Holzer, Elizabeth Rideout, Jill Abilock, and Elissa Campbell are opening their studios as part of the state-wide Open Studio Weekend sponsored by the Vermont Crafts Council. The Creative Space Gallery is hosting books from our Shaping Pages exhibit during the event, so if you missed it in Burlington, you now have another chance to see it.

If you want to visit fellow book artists on May 26 – 27 (Memorial Day weekend), you can find them in the following locations:

• Carolyn: Rutland, studio #88
• Creative Space Gallery: Vergennes, studio #125
• Jill: Shelburne, studio #130
• Elizabeth: Shelburne, studio #130
• Marianna: Hinesburg, studio #135
• Meta: Fairfield, studio #172
• Ken: Hardwick, studio #186
• Elissa: Montpelier, studio #211

Elissa created a Google Map with all of the locations to help you with your tour.  You can find maps and directions to studios on the VT Crafts Council website. You can also download a pdf of the 2012 Spring Vermont Open Studio Tour Guide. Please note that this is a really big file – 13.5 M

Book Arts News

*** Chemically Altered: Historic Paper Marbling, a lecture by Gretchen and Garrett Dixon from The Marbler’s Apprentice, will take place on May 14, 2012 at the North Bennet Street School in Boston, MA. The lecture, sponsored by the New England Chapter of the Guild of Book Workers is free and open to the public.

There will be discussion of the history, patterns, and fabrication techniques for chemically-altered patterns of marbled paper – Stormont, Shell, Broken, Romantic, Schroetel, and Tiger Eye. These patterns all involve the use of chemical additives to the watercolor paint in order to achieve their effect. These patterns were popular from the end of the 18th century through the 19th century.

For directions, please visit the North Bennet Street School’s website.

*** ArtisTree Gallery and Pentangle Arts Council, in conjunction with the Bookstock Festival, are looking for submissions for their upcoming exhibit, Unbound Vol II: Art using the book as a material/format. The show will be juried by Daniel E. Kelm, founder of the Garage Annex School for Book Arts in Easthampton, MA.

The broad theme of UNBOUND Vol II encompasses all of the possibilities of what we may think or may not think a “book” is. Is it story? An entry to another world? An exploration? What does it indicate? This 2nd annual juried show looks to explore these ideas of “the book” and all the ways artists use its format as a stepping off point or as a material to explore new ideas.

The exhibit is open to all 2D and 3D, installation, and assemblage artists working in New England and New York. Submissions must be postmarked by mail or Emailed by June 9, 2012. For more information, please visit the ArtisTree Gallery’s website.

Book Arts Classes

*** From 8/3/12 – 8/5/12, Velma Bolyard will be teaching Pulp Clouds: Hand Papermaking at the Long Ridge Farm in Westmoreland, NH. In this workshop, you’ll gather plants, cook pulp, form and dry sheets of your own papers.

Expect to make strong, useable, and beautiful waterleaf (un-sized) sheets. You’ll make a book from your papers, binding sheets into sample books utilizing structures that allow you to explore bookbinding as well. Each participant may expect to make a portfolio of sheets of various sizes from at least five different plants.

The fee for the workshop is $500.00 with a limited materials list. For more information, please contact Long Ridge Farm.

*** The Montserrat College of Art in Beverly, MA is offering a Shockingly Good Book Arts Course with Sarah Smith from June 4 – June 8, 2012. This course is designed to teach you the basics of two traditional techniques that are enjoying a modern resurgence: bookbinding and letterpress.

Along with mastering the art of setting metal and wood type, students will also have the opportunity to convert their own imagery into a printable format by creating polymer plates. Additionally, learn to sew, fold and glue some simple binding structures to bring images, text and three-dimensional ideas together. By the end of the course, you will have produced bound and printed models as well as a simple artist book of your own.

The fee for the workshop is $795.00 and you can register online. For more information, please contact either Kathleen Burke or Chelsea Sams.

*** The North Bennet Street School is offering a Bookbinding Intensive with Stacie Dolin from June 25 – July 27, 2012. The five-week program meets Monday – Friday from 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.

This class is designed for individuals interested in an intensive, hands-on bookbinding experience and is suitable for book artists and novice binders wishing to learn or enhance fundamental bookbinding skills. Explore a variety of book structures and binding techniques and the process for determining what materials and structures to use for a given project.

Field trips and other specific topics are part of the curriculum and will be based on student interests. The tuition includes a materials fee for paper, board, and other basic supplies; students are expected to provide some materials and all hand tools.

For more information or to register, please visit the NBBS’s website.

• Book Arts Guild of VT blog: http://www.bookartsguildvt.com/blog/

• Book Arts Guild of VT Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/bookartsguildvt

We meet at the Unitarian Universalist Society Church located at 152 Pearl Street in Burlington, VT. We will be in the Sophia Fahs Community Room, a large room located in the basement.

Click here for more information on directions/parking.

Program: Book Conservation and Repair with Deborah Howe

Please join us at our April meeting when Deborah Howe, the collections conservator at Dartmouth College Library, provides us with a rare in-depth look at the repair and handling of precious, ancient manuscripts. Through a slide presentation, Deborah will talk about a conservation treatment done on a 15th century manuscript called the Brut Chronicle, which was purchased by Dartmouth.

As it was received, the manuscript came in a tacket binding which was deteriorating and therefore was no longer protecting the manuscript. The treatment involved investigation and decision making on many levels, and Deborah’s talk will explore the actual treatment, what transpires to make choices about the treatment, and how those choices fit within the context of an academic institution.

This presentation will offer an exciting an opportunity to learn quite a bit about a very important subject!

Deborah Howe is the Collections Conservator at Dartmouth College Library. Previously she headed the conservation lab at Northwestern University Library for over 10 years. She has taught classes at Columbia Center for Paper and Book, the Newberry Library and currently teaches bookbinding classes at the Book Arts Workshop at Dartmouth. She is a long standing member of the Guild of Book Workers and on the board of directors of the Morgan Conservatory in Cleveland, Ohio.

Reflections on March’s Meeting

Our March Book Arts Guild meeting was attended by a group of fun loving creative book arts enthusiasts. Jill Abilock orchestrated our Build-a-Book Round Robin workshop. First Jill introduced us to a multitude of book designs. When we were beginning to get overwhelmed with the infinite possibilities of book structures, Jill let us loose. We worked in a rotating manner with materials and “in process” book designs that were passed to us.

At the end of the evening our original materials were passed back to us as a “book”! The books were all unique in their design and materials. We delighted over the how the collaborative process made books beyond our own individual imaginations. What a great way to get our creative juices flowing. Thanks Jill!

You can view images from the meeting on the B.A.G. blog.

B.A.G. News

"There Will Be" by Ann Joppe-Mercure

*** Our 2012 spring exhibit, Shaping Pages: An Exhibit of Artist Books & Fine Bindings is on display now through April 28th at the S.P.A.C.E Gallery in Burlington.

You can view images from the exhibit on the B.A.G. website. Be sure to check out our review in Seven Days.

*** Save the date! We are pleased to announce that book artist Daniel Kelm will be coming to Vermont to offer a Wire-Edge Binding workshop, a two-day workshop from 7/28/12 – 7/29/12. We know that this workshop will be amazing, so start saving up now!

Cost, location and other information about the workshop will be coming soon. For more information, please contact Jill Abilock.

*** B.A.G.’s Chair, Elizabeth Rideout, recently wrote an article for Dartmouth’s Preservation Services blog – Toning Book Cloth and Basic Color Mixing. A common use for this type of technique is to use a color-matched piece of muslin to replace a broken spine or hinge. Check out the blog post for tips and great visuals!

*** B.A.G. members Carolyn Shattuck, Meta Strick, Ken Leslie, Marianna Holzer, Elizabeth Rideout, Jill Abilock, and Elissa Campbell are opening their studios as part of the state-wide Open Studio Weekend sponsored by the Vermont Crafts Council. If you want to visit fellow book artists on May 26 – 27 (Memorial Day weekend), you can find them in the following locations:

• Carolyn: Rutland, studio #88
• Jill: Shelburne, studio #130
• Elizabeth: Shelburne, studio #130
• Marianna: Hinesburg, studio #135
• Meta: Fairfield, studio #172
• Ken: Hardwick, studio #186
• Elissa: Montpelier, studio #211

You can find maps and directions to studios on the VT Crafts Council website. You can also download a pdf of the 2012 Spring Vermont Open Studio Tour Guide. Please note that this is a really big file – 13.5 MB.

Book Arts News

*** The exhibition Paste Papers of the Pioneer Valley is running now through the end of May at the Mortimer Rare Book Room at Smith College. A reception will be held on Thursday, April 26 from 4:00 p.m. -  6: 00 p.m. Carol Blinn will be giving a paste paper-making demo at which you’ll be able to make your own paste papers.

For more information, please visit the Rare Book Room’s website.

*** Unbound: Speculations on the Future of the Book, a symposium exploring the future potential of the book, will take place on May 3 – 4, 2012 at the Bartos Theater at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge, MA.

The symposium showcases practices by writers and artists in and outside of MIT, putting them in conversation with scholars and thinkers from across the disciplines who are framing discourse about this technology’s possible futures, promises, and challenges.

Keynote speakers include James Reid-Cunningham (Associate Director for Digital Programs and Preservation of the Boston Athenaeum, also a bookbinder and book artist) and Bob Stein (founder and president of the Institute for the Future of the Book.

The event is free and you can register online. For more information, please contact Amaranth Borsuk or Gretchen Henderson.

*** ArtisTree Gallery and Pentangle Arts Council, in conjunction with the Bookstock Festival, are looking for submissions for their upcoming exhibit, Unbound Vol II: Art using the book as a material/format. The show will be juried by Daniel E. Kelm, founder of the Garage Annex School for Book Arts in Easthampton, MA.

The broad theme of UNBOUND Vol II encompasses all of the possibilities of what we may think or may not think a “book” is. Is it story? An entry to another world? An exploration? What does it indicate? This 2nd annual juried show looks to explore these ideas of “the book” and all the ways artists use its format as a stepping off point or as a material to explore new ideas.

The exhibit is open to all 2D and 3D, installation, and assemblage artists working in New England and New York. Submissions must be postmarked by mail or Emailed by June 9, 2012. For more information, please visit the ArtisTree Gallery’s website.

Book Arts Classes

*** Susan Bonthron is teaching a Tunnel Book class on May 19th from 9:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m. All materials are included except those you may want to incorporate in your tunnel book, such as photographs, postcards, etc. The tunnel is a book with content, so I do urge you to think about what you want to commemorate/play with/include in it.

The fee for the class is $90.00 and includes lunch. For more information, please contact Susan via Email.

*** The North Bennet Street School is offering a Bookbinding Intensive with Stacie Dolin from June 25 – July 27, 2012. The five-week program meets Monday – Friday from 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.

This class is designed for individuals interested in an intensive, hands-on bookbinding experience and is suitable for book artists and novice binders wishing to learn or enhance fundamental bookbinding skills. Explore a variety of book structures and binding techniques and the process for determining what materials and structures to use for a given project.

Field trips and other specific topics are part of the curriculum and will be based on student interests. The tuition includes a materials fee for paper, board, and other basic supplies; students are expected to provide some materials and all hand tools.

For more information or to register, please visit the NBBS’s website.

*** The North Bennet Street School is also offering a Springback Bookbinding workshop with Amy Lapidow from June 8 – 10, 2012. The workshop meets from 8:30 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.

The spring-back binding is a structure originally developed in Britain for ledger books or anything that needed writing across the gutter. This flat spine is achieved using a rigid spine and lever system to snap the book open. In this class we will make a more portable version of this historic structure. This is an advanced beginner class.

For more information or to register, please visit the NBBS’s website.

• Book Arts Guild of VT blog: http://www.bookartsguildvt.com/blog/

• Book Arts Guild of VT Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/bookartsguildvt

presents:

Shaping Pages

An Exhibit of Artist Books & Fine Bindings

Now on display at the

S.P.A.C.E. Gallery

"A Matter of a Soul" by Nikki King

Shaping Pages challenges the traditional form of books and the written page in general. Engulfing viewers in the fascinating world of artists’ books; Shaping Pagesis designed to spark viewers’ curiosity about this multi-media art form where content; imagery and structure work symbiotically to create a visual experience and journey for the viewer.

Exploring the idea of shape and how it is applicable to each artists’ life and work; Shaping Pages has been interpreted by some artists as shape; form and structure while others use text or personal emotion to express what shape means to them.

We invite you to get lost in the pages throughout April, made possible by the members of the Book Arts Guild of Vermont.

The exhibit is curated by Book Arts Guild Exhibit Chair Nikki King.

Dates: April 6, 2012 – April 28, 2012
Gallery Hours: Thursday – Saturday 11:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.

S.P.A.C.E. Gallery
266 Pine Street
Burlington, VT 05401
(802) 578-2512