Guided by Book Arts and Design teacher Rebecca Goodale, learn basic art and design principles of using black and white to achieve balance in composition in your work.

There are no available registration dates at this time.

NOTE: This Class will meet in a live, online format using the Zoom Platform.
Class meets 3 Wednesday evenings, Feb 1, 8, and 15,  6-8pm EST.

Nuphar Advena - By Rebecca Goodale
Nuphar advena from Cathance River, 2011. By Rebecca Goodale.

In this Introduction to Design and the Visual Book Series, you can take both three-week workshops or either one. In the first workshop of this series, we will cover the basic art and design principles of using black and white to achieve balance in composition.

This will be a two-hour zoom class for three weeks with a small amount of homework each week.

Black and White – Balance in composition, we will cover:

  1. The cutaway book, using black and white paper
  2. The Sensuality of Direct marks – black and white ink on black and white paper- Accordion book
  3. Texture and the two-section book – black and white china markers on black and white paper. 

Supplies needed: 

  • Black paper 
  • White paper
  • X-acto knife and blades
  • White dental floss, white or black binder’s thread, or black or white embroidery floss
  • Black and white bottle of ink
  • A set of small brushes ( or anything you have on hand)
  • Pencil and notebook
  • Small Elmer’s glue (or PVA if you have it)
  • Black and white china marker

This workshop is part of the Introduction to Design and the Visual Book Series:

  1. Black and White – Balance and composition (Online) – This workshop.
  2. Achromatic Values: Contrast and Subtleties and the Visual Book 2 (Online)

Images by Rebecca Goodale.

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Instructor: Rebecca Goodale

Rebecca Goodale has been creating innovative and sublimely made artist’s books for many years and frequently does collaborative work with other artists as well as public art installations. In addition to being artistically active, she was the founding program coordinator for the Kate Cheney Chappell ‘83 Center for Book Arts at the University of Southern Maine, where she inspired artists at all levels. Goodale’s books can be found in many institutional collections, including the Bowdoin College Library; the Maine Women Writers Collection at UNE; Herron Art Library; Library of Congress; Portland Museum of Art, ME; State Art Museum of Hawai’i; the Boston Athenaeum; the Children’s Museum in Seoul, Korea; and the Fogg Museum Fine Art Library at Harvard University. 

In 2015 she was named a Maine Master Crafts Artist by the Maine Crafts Association. Other awards she has received include a New Forms Regional Initiative Grant from the New England Foundation for the Arts and a Mellon Grant for the Humanities at Bates College. In 1995 she was a Resident Scholar for the Island Institute in Sitka, Alaska. 

Rebecca continues to teach design and book arts for various institutions and exhibits her work both locally and internationally.

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