West Virginia, Part 1

We left the Smoky Mountains to visit with friends Alex and David Bennet at the Mountain Quest Institute near Frost, West Virginia.

In this majestic landscape, I ventured to visit the wonderful and impressive horses on the grounds of the Institute. 

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, waiting and ready for a photo

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, finally the correct shot

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, thanks for the photo

As I walked the land, I noticed silver threads of a cob web in the corner of a fence produced by the sun’s rays and a yellow-coloured fly sitting for a photograph. Do you recognize this fly? Is it native to West Virginia?

© 2017 Louise Levergneux

Insects as a subject never attracted me till my project Outside the Studio. I incorporated a few bees and beetles and enjoyed catching butterflies fluttering about with my camera.

Libby Barrett’s books capture my attention as I write this post. Libby lives and works in Maine and is often inspired by insects. Many of her book ideas offer possibilities for unusual interpretations.

Libby expresses her love for puns and interest in invertebrates in her artists’ book Web Site. This book is a whimsical interpretation of the theme of an exhibition entitled Spineless Wonders presented at the University of Southern Maine. The four-sided drop box holds an origami spider who's waiting for dinner. 

© 2009 Libby Barrett, Web Site

There in the corner, or under the stair, 

behind the bookcase, or most anywhere anywhere

waiting........ 

Silken thread woven, the vigil begins

hoping that dinner will be captured therein

waiting....... 

The web trembles, dinner has arrived

On today's menu, bluebottle fly

For the same show, Libby published an artists’ book entitled Coleoptera. The specimen box is full of little books about beetles. The illustrations are a combination of watercolour and coloured pencil. Each shell swivels to reveal information about the particular beetle illustrated or about beetles in general, and each book is secured in the box with a pin. 

© 2009 Libby Barrett, Coleoptera

© 2009 Libby Barrett, Coleoptera

© 2009 Libby Barrett, Coleoptera

Libby’s latest book Travel Bugs incorporates a series of collages of beetles for which she uses old maps and atlases as collage material. 

© 2017 Libby Barrett, Travel Bugs

© 2017 Libby Barrett, Travel Bugs

© 2017 Libby Barrett, Travel Bugs, detail

This book produced for a group exhibit where the only guideline was that the book structure had to be based on the accordion structure. I decided to stay with the basic structure and use images of my travel bugs as the subject matter. I wish that I could say that the cover paper was my design, but it came from my stash of purchased paper. I chose it because it made me think of the meandering path a bug might take.

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Watch your environment and see what surrounds you. Let me know what inspires you from the world’s details.

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Comment Note: I would love to respond to the comments I receive. Unfortunately, Squarespace does not provide the name of the commenter and no way for me to respond, unless I respond to the comment directly on the blog. I would love to reciprocate your time and comment on my last blog post--please end your comment with email address or name. Thanks for your comments, please continue!

Tennessee

At this point in our journey—in real life—Nashville, was on the horizon to visit with friend Dana Ryan Perez, I already wrote that post, so to the next city. But not before we lay our eyes on Dana's sense of colour. 

© 2017 Dana Ryan Perez, what a wonderful spot to sit and relax, Clyde seems to think so.

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We took a few days off from traveling and camped in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park which straddles the border between Tennessee and North Carolina. The sprawling landscape encompasses lush forests and an abundance of Mimosa trees still in bloom. The view and greenery were refreshing after crossing Kansas, and Oklahoma, but the forest brought unbearable dampness. Dry! Dry! Dry! is the reason we enjoyed the West so much.

Mimosa Tree

The park encompasses 816.28 square miles (2,114.15 km2), making it one of the largest protected areas in the eastern United States. We entered the main park entrance located just East of the town of Gatlinburg, Tennessee.

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I’m still searching for moments in life. How do other artists see these moments and create from them?

If you love mountains for what they represent for you, you will love Guy Laramée’s  carved book landscape entitled El amor for las montanas.  

A Mexican artist friend of Guy summed up his long-standing love affair with the landscape with El amor por las montañas nos curara—Our love for mountains will heal us.

© 2012 Guy Laramée, El amor por las montañas nos curara. Carved Litré dictionary, inks. 43 x 14 x 27cm (15 x7 x11 inches)

© 2012 Guy Laramée, El amor por las montañas nos curara.

Heal us of what? 

Of over thinking? 

Of our obsession with knowledge? 

Of greed?

In fact, it doesn’t matter. Once recovered from a health issue, the only thing you can say is “sickness is over”. Health is like love. Try to describe it and you’re out of it.

© 2012 Guy Laramée, El amor por las montañas nos curara.

© 2012 Guy Laramée, El amor por las montañas nos curara, detail.

The 13th-century Zen master Dogen was going more or less in the same direction when he said: Although it is said mountains belong to the country, they actually belong to those who love them.

© 2106 Guy Laramée, TIBETAN CHINESE, altered Tibetan-Chinese dictionary, inks, pigments 15,25 x10,15 x 20(h) cm

Now tell me, do mountains belong to mountain lovers or is it the opposite, mountain lovers belong to mountains? What does “belong” mean, when we are uncertain that we own our own bodies? Is it that we actually belong to “all this”, to “life”? When you feel most alive, don’t you feel that “something” bigger than you runs in your veins? My work is about making us feel more alive. It is about losing yourself in the landscape and paradoxically, finding out you are the source of it all.

Haiku translator, poet, and writer Robert Blyth went in the same direction when he wrote: The mind is seen in the stone.

I would like my art to allow you to you see yourself in a stone. Because ultimately, we are not in the world, the world is in us.

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Get inspired by finding more moments to express.

Oklahoma

We made a stop in Tulsa, Oklahoma, one of the United States’ largest concentration of Art-Deco architecture. Art-Deco can be found throughout the city's older neighborhoods, in downtown and midtown. 

Mouth open, viewing amazing details all the way to the top of the Boston Avenue Methodist Church. The soaring 225 foot (68.5m) straight lines of the tower provide physical, visual, and philosophical linkage to the Gothic Cathedrals of past ages. The design of the edifice is credited to Adah Robinson and Bruce Goff.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Boston Avenue Methodist Church

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Boston Avenue Methodist Church detail

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Blue Dome, built in 1924, served as the White Star Gulf Oil Station in the day.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Alfred C. Fabry was the architect of the Mincks-Adams Hotel. The building is 195 feet (59m) high, making it the 18th tallest building in Tulsa.

I enjoyed the gargoyles presiding above the Boston Avenue entrance to the lobby of The Philtower, which complements the tower’s exterior.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, The Philtower, detail

The BOK Center, designed by César Pelli, is Tulsa's new arena which incorporates many of the city's prominent themes—Native American, Art-Deco, and contemporary architecture.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, The BOK Center

This city and its architecture brought to mind Thomas Parker Williams artists’ book entitled Spiral Dome.

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

Spiral Dome began as an idea for a call from a museum in Philadelphia to respond to one of the books in their collection. The book was an 18th-century handbook for building construction. I have always enjoyed James Turrell's Skyspaces and thought about doing something like that with 18th-century construction methods. I made my proposal and did not get in the show but the idea would not die. 

After many trials and testing, Thomas figured out how to make his artists' book a pop-up that would fold into a box. 

As I was designing the parts, I thought this concept could also be executed in steel as a real temple like structure, and the book "Spiral Dome:  Sculptures in Paper and Steel" was born. 

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome, mounted on a six-part folding base, the book fits into a storage box.

The Paper Sculpture is a movable book made of 145 unique cut paper parts bound with black Tyvek. The 145 unique parts include 19 ribs, 18 double hinge sets, and 108 exterior panels that form 18 sections. The starting rib is fixed to the base. To facilitate display, ribs 4, 7, 10, 13, 16 and 19 contain magnets that connect with steel contact points on the base.

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

Spiral Dome was designed with 3D CAD software. 145 unique parts for the Movable Paper Sculpture were cut and assembled by hand. Ribs, base, and box are constructed of museum board; various papers were used for the panels and hinges. The hinge connectors and binding material are black Tyvek. Covers of the storage box and accompanying book are etterpress printed from polymer plates.letterpress printed from polymer plates.letterpress printed from polymer plates.letterpress printed from polymer plates.

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

© 2016 Thomas Parker Williams, Spiral Dome

While working on the Spiral Dome Movable Paper Sculpture, I realized it could function as a model for a permanent installation, which I call the Proposed Steel Sculpture. I made preliminary drawings for constructing such a structure. It is illustrated on the cover of the book.

To create the spiral in both models, 18 sections increment in height and dimension from the center of the structure by a factor of 1.014 for each successive section. The last section differs in scale from the first by a factor of 1.2666 or 1.014 to the 17th power. All elements in both sculptures – ribs, hinges or braces, and panels – increment by the same scale factor, as shown in the drawings.

Spiral Dome is part of The UC Berkeley, Environmental Design Library, Special Collections; the Columbia University Avery Architectural and Fine Arts Library; and the MICA, Decker Library, Artist Book Collection.

Don’t forget passed creations will influence your work in the future.

Kansas

Every year, I cross the country via different highways depending on visits to friends and family. The goal of this eastward trip was a visit to my friend, Dana in Nashville, Tennessee, a conference Michael was taking part in Washington, and visiting artists. 

As we crossed Kansas, un séjour in Dodge City was in order. In Dodge City, like most tourists, I followed the Trail of Fame that leads you through the downtown? Twenty-nine bronze medallions and markers are found and comprise citizens who believe in the community. My collection of manhole covers came to mind. What could I do with my series, my collection? How do I continue the project, or do I?

The images below resurrected my project City Shields for a day.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Trail of Fame, Dodge City, Kansas

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Trail of Fame, Dodge City, Kansas

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Trail of Fame, Dodge City, Kansas

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Trail of Fame, Dodge City, Kansas

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The action of collecting becomes an obsession for artists. Often the attraction to particular items grows parallel to our work. I found another artist who has a compulsion to remember and to be remembered by way of collecting.

Monica Holtsclaw is a book artist, quilter, and sewer of many things. Monica spends most days in her studio in San Rafael, CA, and also teaches at the San Francisco Center for the Book. Find out the dates of Monica's workshops by visiting her calendar page.

Monica’s artists’ book Memory Palace was insightful. The patience to wait and collect to create a book many years later is admirable.

The pages of Memory Palace are a storage place for a range of tokens representing experiences I saved over the last twenty years. In this way it is a vessel, holding objects I can retrieve at any time to awaken memories temporarily forgotten. Codified by color and arranged chronologically, each item signifies a particular time and place. The structure was chosen because of its resemblance to a series of rooms. A memory palace is a mnemonic device which helps a person to catalog and retrieve information. The creation of Memory Palace has allowed me to transform this mnemonic device into physical reality.

© 2015 Monica Holtsclaw, Memory Palace, 8 x 8 x 1.5 inches (closed)

© 2015 Monica Holtsclaw, Memory Palace, digital prints on 90lb watercolour paper, Iris book-cloth over binder’s board, foil stamped title

Another edition in the same genre is Monica’s Moving Forward created for the 2015 Hello Hedi Exhibition at 23 Sandy Gallery in Portland. 

I watched an interview with Hedi Kyle, in which she spoke about her background and gave a tour of her studio. It was a delight to see the objects and structures that influence her, and I saw many of my own interests reflected in what she shared. I found that Hedi is an inspiring collector. I have saved ephemera for years and have been reflecting on what I have saved and have been making work around the theme of these tokens of my past. For this book, I focused on my collection of ground transportation tickets, acquired from 2002 to 2014. I chose Hedi’s Crown Book structure because of the movement of the binding as it opens and its resemblance to spokes of a wheel. 

© 2015 Monica Holtsclaw, Moving Forward, 6.125 x 6.25 x .5 inches

© 2015 Monica Holtsclaw, Moving Forward, digital prints on 90lb watercolor paper, Yupo watercolor paper, Fabriano Tiziano paper

© 2015 Monica Holtsclaw, Moving Forward

Read what Monica has to say in her own blog posts.

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Next stop Tulsa, Oklahoma, what will I find? What will inspire my traveling studio?

Colorado

This week, I’m taking you back to where we began our trip.

The first artist studio visit planned was Helen Hiebert in Colorado. After reaching Eagle-Vail, Colorado, we had issues with trailer brakes. We had to postpone our visit to Helen's Red Cliff Studio since it is high in the Rockies and one needs working brakes for that kind of terrain.

After a phone call to Helen, we all decided that it was best to take care of the situation and meet later on in the year. Helen was nice enough to let me into her studio via photos. Here is what I missed!

Helen is In the photo below, we see Helen in the—what she calls messy and full—dry area of her studio. Karen Kunc visited Helen’s studio to discuss and contemplate the book project in progress they were collaborating on.

© 2017 Helen Hiebert, the studio

One of my favourite artists’ books of Helen's is Pop-Up Hand Shadow Book published in 2012, as an edition of 50. This book features four illustrated animal hand shadows in a theatrical book structure. The animals are brought to life by the viewer playing with a mini flashlight (packaged with the book), casting shadows onto panels behind the pop-ups in the book. A verse about each animal, by poet Nora Robertson, appears on each page.

Every September, (the weekend after Labor Day), Helen hosts a retreat in her studio. Last year’s group, poses at the entrance to Helen’s studio, which is in the old Red Cliff School House. The theme for the 2017 retreat is Sculptural Books. The focus will be on creating pages, panels, and unusual book structures before, during, and after making paper.

© 2016 Helen Hiebert

© 2016 Helen Hiebert, a group photo from last year’s retreat watching Helen give a papermaking demo.

Helen also has a papermaking area in her studio where she creates her own paper.

© 2017 Helen Hiebert, a drying system is on the left and a press is in the back.

Helen teaches a fair amount. Here we can view Helen’s set-up for filming her next online class—Paper Lanterns. For anyone interested in this online class registration details will be on Helen’s site by August 1, 2017.

© 2017 Helen Hiebert, filming set-up

© 2017 Helen Hiebert, this pamphlet shows different parts of Helen’s business. 

Interested in pop-ups? Read Helen’s book Playing With Pop-Ups and enjoy creating 20 projects to play with ranging from cards and books to buildings, graphic design pieces, and more.

Playing With Pop-Ups features a high-end gallery of artists, whose beautiful work will inspire you to make your own amazing paper art.

Having a peak in Helen’s studio was fun even in a virtual manner. 

Let’s see who else I can visit.

Environmental Scientist and Artist

We started our new lifestyle 19 days ago and I’m still trying to pull my shit together. These first few posts on visiting studios will be out of sequence since I—me—didn’t get going fast enough.

I’m organizing my life, my art, and our travel trailer. Every day is a trip in more ways than one.

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Nashville, Tennessee, was the seventh stop along my journey. I visited a great friend and artist Dana Ryan Perez, an Environmental Scientist by degree. Dana focused on slime molds (algae) for her master’s. She is also a certified Master Gardener. As for her art, it came much later, but science is always part of Dana’s creative process.

© 2017 Dana Ryan Perez, Sustainable Botanical Prints is the title of Dana’s three-year adventure. This piece is a Japanese Maple print from her Salt Lake home garden. It is steam and pressure printed to extract the natural pigments in the leaves, printed on Lettra paper. No chemicals involved.

I am a gardener like my mother before me and her mother before her. We touch the land, nurture the seeds, harvest the fruits and share the bounty. We are caretakers of the earth. I am a printer like my father before me and my son after me. I set the type and crank the press. There is heritage in this link between nature and technique. There is a love for the land and a love for rendering it into art. This has been a three-year adventure in mixing science and craft with the unpredictability of Mother Nature. 

I have moved from the pressroom to the city farm, printing my way through the garden with the ink from pigments in the leaves and stems. Drawing them out with steam, pressure and time. Some give willingly, others prefer not to let go of their precious color. Using this sustainable process to transfer the pigments onto paper and fabric has become more predictable with time, but each unveiling reveals the unexpected. The prints are vibrant and ethereal, leaving behind only water and debris for compost.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Dana's studio is quiet for the moment while Dana's settling in Nashville after living in Texas—home for her soul for 46 years and 17 years in Utah developing her art work.

And you know—I love insects, rocks, plants, books, printing, textiles and generally making a mess!! 

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Dana's cabinet of tools certainly not a mess!

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Dana's wonderful, colourful weights are one of many surprises in her studio

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Dana's  collection of acorns

Dana introduced me to many species of trees while walking around the campus of Vanderbilt University in Nashville.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, biggest Southern Magnolia on the Vanderbilt campus

I photographed the Common Bald Cypress’ amazing cones—round balls which split open along the lines producing rounded scales something like thumbtacks. It is an important swamp tree along the Mississippi River as far north as Illinois and along the southern coast. It is one of the few trees that can grow in standing water.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Bald Cypress

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Bald Cypress cones

What caught my eye was the Southern Magnolias with their unmistakable large creamy, white flowers and shiny evergreen leaves. Many of them planted on the main campus since they are not native to Tennessee.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Southern Magnolia fruit

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Southern Magnolia opened flower

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Southern Magnolia flower detail

It was a colourful visit and has inspired ideas.

Next will be Manassas, Virginia, but I will take you back to Colorado with Helen Hiebert first.

Farewell Boise!

A bittersweet farewell to our two-year stint in Boise, Idaho.

I’m glad to be on my next phase of life and artwork; but I will miss our home in Avimor—the best and probably the last brick and mortar home we will own.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, home in Avimor/Boise, Idaho

I regret leaving my best friend Dale Rogers, who supported me in dark times.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, Kenzie Rogers, my Sheltie fix for the last seven months

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, a little tribute to Kenzie who passed away a week before my departure, she will be missed

I loved hiking in the foothills of Avimor when wildflowers covered the hills.

© 2017 Michael Sutton, in the Foothills

It was a struggle in the last two years to fit all my equipment in this small space—paper, binding cloth, cutters, glue... and my Topaz after having such a large space in Utah. I made it work. I got to love my small studio with its large window bringing in the brightest light from the north. It was a cozy creative place.

I need to figure out how to create in a much smaller space—in a 90 square feet of home—well I should say no space! How will I approach creating on the road with the suggestions I received after my last blog post? I will blog later on the subject.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, my studio

I’m looking forward to the French welcoming ritual my family and friends have back home. See what I mean! C'est la bise après tout!

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I’m hoping to visit artists studios on the road, and my first stop was to be Helen Hiebert in Colorado. With unforeseen difficulties, I did not get to meet Helen in person. Maybe the next time! Next, Dana Ryan Perez's studio, a fiber and artists’ bookmaker in Nashville, Tennessee.

Idaho Flowers

As you might realize, I’m late with my blog post this week. The studio and house are almost empty, no more equipment lying around. My Epson printer is back on the floor waiting to jump into its box. The only thing to play with is my new GoPro Hero 5 camera to record videos on our journey.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, my empty studio

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, what you can do with a closet dooe and four crates!

Dilemmas, dilemmas—how to create while traveling. Please share any ideas on how to produce while on the road. I would be glad to experiment with your suggestions and let you know how it goes.

Communication with other artists in the past few weeks has been scarce. No work completed reflecting my studio life. Another reason to ask “Where do I belong?” 

Hiking in the foothills of Boise last week, I shot photos of Idaho wildflowers. I would like to share these photographs with you by giving permission to use them in your work if you desire. Use them for an artists’ book, a collage or anything else you may need. All I ask is that you share the finished work with me and my readers as part of a blog post.

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

© 2017 Louise Levergneux, wild flowers of Idaho

For this post, these photos were saved for the web. If you need a larger size file, email me and I will send you the original file through a large file transfer service. 

Happy creations! See you on the road.