Bind Date

New week, new project!
The Bind Challenge has been set by Canberra-based book artist and printmaker Lee Bratt. Designed to be completed in five parts, it is a challenge about opposites, about starting at the end and working backwards. The first part of the challenge has been to make a container with four compartments, which I've now done (left). Instructions for the second part of the challenge (which I'm assuming will be to make something to fit in one (or more) of the compartments) will arrive in a couple of weeks. The project is certainly a change from my usual way of working in which most, if not all, of the details are resolved in my mind before I begin and I can't help wondering if I'm going to come horribly unstuck along the way.

Manly Library Artist Book Collection

A couple of years ago, the Manly Library quietly began building a small collection of artist books.  Works are added to the collection through a biennial acquisitive Artists Book Award, donations and occasional purchases outside the award program. A changing selection of works from the collection is on display at the library and the entire  collection can be viewed online.

Despite its short life, the Award has acquired a certain prestige and attracts entries from established Australian and international book artists as well as from young and aspiring practitioners. The 2013 Award was judged by Noreen Grahame (Director of the Centre for the Artist Book) and Monica Oppen (writer, printmaker, photographer and bookbinder) and I was thrilled to have one of my recent works, DEATHMASK (above), included in the Award exhibition.

Affordable Bookbinding Equipment

For years I’ve struggled with traditional tapered backing boards, never having enough hands to hold the boards and book block steady while I accurately positioned them in the backing press and tightened its screws. I recently resolved to do something about this and searched online for a set of lipped straight boards that I hoped would make aligning the boards just that much easier. After a bit of effort, I happened upon Jim Poelstra – a Californian cabinetmaker who runs Affordable Bookbinding Equipment as a sideline to his regular business as a cabinetmaker. His website is a delight. It includes short videos that demonstrate how to use his equipment and is worth visiting even if you’re not in the market for anything at the moment. I particularly liked Jim’s small plough (held in the palm of one hand) and a simple nipping press that converts to a sewing frame. I finished up ordering a set of backing boards and they arrived within a few days. Well made, good value for money and they work.

Back in the bindery

It's been a long time between posts. Somehow January's good intentions dissolved in a mid-summer heatwave that was followed by an invasion of more than twenty house guests over a two week period.
Since then I've been travelling in Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia but have now returned with a brain bulging with ideas for new projects and a suitcase bulging with materials that I intend to use in some of these projects. First up will hopefully be a work incorporating some images of socialist posters collected during my travels, including (above) Determined to harvest a great Winter-Spring crop, Militia women exterminate the USAF. Watch this space!

Finishing Off

January at BEMBindery has so far been spent wrapping up stalled projects from 2012 to make way for the half-formed ideas that hopefully will turn into 2013's new works.
DEATHMASK is one of these stalled projects. It started in the second half of 2012 under a different working title, changed its form after I was unable to secure all the copyright permissions I needed and then sat gathering dust in a corner for a couple of months. I picked it up again last week without much enthusiasm but had great fun yesterday with some relief lettering on an inlay panel for the lid of a box that will house the finished work.

Season's Greetings

It's that time in December when anything in the bindery that is not finished now won't get wrapped up until next year.
This week's image is of multiple copies of BEMBindery's 2012 Christmas card. The card features a photograph of Curtains, a work that gave me great pleasure in the making. Its components parts have been posted around the world to their new owners and the card is a satisfying reminder of the work's brief existence.
I'm now going to take a break for a few weeks to spend time with family, get in some bushwalking and sea kayaking and just lie on the beach for a bit. I hope to be back towards the end of January.

Booked and Bound - 3

Just back from a few weeks out bush in time to wrap up the 'Booked and Bound' postings before Christmas. This one is to a design by Dee Carrington that she calls her 'Tags and Pockets' book. Although the materials used are a little too 'floral' for my male liking, I found the structure intriguing and would like to explore it further at some stage. The spine consists of a series of dowels with each signature (the plain green bits in the photo at left) wrapped around and attached to one of these dowels. The dowels are then joined by the use of wrap around pieces (the narrow patterned bands in the photo) that each attach to two consecutive signatures. The whole is then held in place by cords interlaced around the dowels at the head and tail of the book. It was by far the most complicated of the books on offer at the Mogo weekend and I must say that I was impressed not only with Dee's ability to conceive a work of such complexity but also to teach it to others.