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NOTE: This Class will be held in a live, online format using the Zoom Platform. 
Class meets 10am-5pm Eastern, Sunday November 8th

This one-day class will offer step-by-step demonstrations and techniques on how to create decorative paste papers for use in gifts and future book arts projects. We will start by mixing our paste. Please pre-mix your methylcellulose listed on the supply list. Supply list will be provided at sign-up. If you have Canson, Fabriano or other similar colorful charcoal/drawing papers, they make a great base. Blick Art has a good selection. We will use simple everyday objects to create great patterns and also discuss how to use stencils and layering colors.

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Instructor: Richard Reitz Smith

Richard Reitz Smith is a letterpress and book artist who excels in marrying traditional techniques with technology and is the Book Arts Program Chair and Studio Manager at Maine Media. He is the owner of DoubleDoor Creative in Camden, ME. In 2015, Richard was the first Book Artist in Residence at Maine Media where he wrote, illustrated, printed, and bound a limited-edition abecedary of alliterative haiku. Richard received a BFA from Carnegie Mellon University in painting and illustration.

After working for three years developing products for Crayola and Liquitex, he returned to school and earned an MFA in graphic design (Tyler School of Art- Temple University). Then started a five-year tour of universities as an art and design professor which led him to New York City, where he taught at Pratt Institute and School of Visual Arts. While doing this, he freelanced as an illustrator and graphic designer for companies like The GAP, Macy's, American Craft Museum, Metlife, Pearson Education, and Scholastic. Then he took positions at Clicquot, Inc. and Clinique Cosmetics consecutively. For Clinique Cosmetics, he managed multi-million-dollar, international, seasonal product and promotional launches as the director of package design worldwide. For Clicquot, Inc. he was a one-person art department for the wine importer/promoter of Veuve Clicquot, Krug, Bouchard, and many other ultra-premium wines. It was in NYC, that he found and frequented The Center for Book Arts learning much about letterpress and the book as an art form.

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