| 10 Books in 5 Days

Create 10 handmade books in this 5-day dynamic and hands-on workshop, learning multiple new bookmaking and book arts skills.

In this dynamic, five-day workshop students can expect to leave with ten handmade books—some blank, others with content—along with multiple new skills, including letterpress printing, typesetting, pressure printing, relief printing, collagraph printing, the creative use of xerox machines and home printers, how to mix adhesives, how to make your own book cloth, how to make paste papers and other decorative papers, and how to make ties and inset labels for books. Demonstrations of printing, printmaking, and other techniques will be interspersed with work sessions. There will also be ample opportunities for students to work independently in the studio, as well as for class discussions about the use of books as a fully realized art medium.

The class will begin with instructor Maureen Cummins showing dozens of books—both blank as well as artist’s books and zines—from her collection. This will include books of her own, books by artists around the country, and books by past students. This “library” will serve as a reference point for understanding the relationship between form and content, i.e. which binding is appropriate for what media, including water media, collage, photography, etc. Participants will then make single-signature 3-hole and 5-hole bindings that will serve as notebooks for the week. From that point on, the instructor will guide the group in making: a five-signature exposed binding, a basic accordion/concertina binding (using prints made on the press), a side-stab Japanese-style binding, a French link-stitch binding, a do-si-do binding, a codex case-bound book, and a staggered-page binding (using collage material, prints, drawings, or photographs).

The final day will be spent with each student working independently in the studio, either filling one of their books with content or making an entirely new structure of their own.