Hidden Labor in the Art and Craft of Papermaking
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12, 2024 1:00 - 2:00 PM EDT
In this talk, artists Aimee Lee and Velma Bolyard will discuss their creative work in and with handmade paper and the traditions they draw on, based on their recent essays in Papermaker’s Tears: Essays on the Art and Craft of Papermaking, Volume 2. In conversation with the series editor Tatiana Ginsberg, Dieu Donné Director of Artistic Projects, Aimee and Velma will discuss their research and personal experiences of keeping traditions alive through use. Aimee Lee writes about toolmakers Ronald MacDonald and Howard Clark, whose handmade tools have allowed generations of papermakers to beat pulp and form sheets. Velma Bolyard’s essay traces her personal journey of discovering shifu, woven paper cloth, and teaching it to others. Both artists make, spin, dye, and weave paper into dimensional forms and books, and draw upon traditional and contemporary practices.
“What is a papermaker’s tear? When a sheet of paper is freshly formed and still fragile, the pulp is easily disturbed. A droplet of water from the papermaker’s hands or from the deckle as it is being removed can easily fall onto the newly formed sheet, leaving a little crater. If not repaired, this will be a thinner part of the sheet, and like a watermark, it will be visible when the sheet is backlit. This is called a papermaker’s tear, or vatman’s tear. Though technically defects, papermaker’s tears are beloved by bibliophiles and paper enthusiasts because they are marks of the maker, little imperfections that remind us of the person behind the sheet.”
You can learn more about the new volume of Papermaker’s Tears: Essays on the Art and Craft of Papermaking here.
Wire watermarks by the late Ron Macdonald in the collection of Serge Pirard (Brussels)
ABOUT THE ARTISTS
Aimee Lee is an artist who makes paper, writes, and advocates for Korean papermaking practices. Designated as an Ohio Arts Council Heritage Fellow, she is a two-time Fulbright scholar to Korea, where she learned about making hanji, its applications, and its tools, and has studied with various Korean national and provincial holders of intangible cultural heritage since 2009. Her research led to the first hanji studio in North America, an award-winning book, Hanji Unfurled, and an active studio practice that includes jiseung, joomchi, paper textile, botanical paper, book art, and natural dyeing techniques. She has shared these techniques and stories across the world and from her private hanji studio east of Cleveland. Website
Velma Bolyard is a mother, artist and teacher. Living north of the Adirondacks, she forages for and cultivates fibers, dye and papermaking plants. She makes paper, threads, spins kami-ito, weaves shifu and most recently makes fish skin parchment and spins and cultivates wild silks for her artists’ books. A papermaker since 1977, her specialty is local plant papers and flax which she colors with plants and earth pigments. She delights in edges, selvedges, deckles, and ecotones where the woods meet open land; that’s where she finds the material and stories for her work. Small adventures, stories, sometimes show up as poems in her books. Velma retired from teaching special education and now focuses on making paper, shifu and artists’ books. She teaches papermaking and book arts at St Lawrence University and has travelled in North America and Australia to teach workshops and master classes, and recently returned from the CODEX Book Fair. Website
Tatiana Ginsberg studied papermaking and book arts at the University of Iowa Center for the Book and received her MFA from the University of California, Santa Barbara. In between she spent two years in Japan researching naturally dyed papers under a Fulbright grant. Returning to the U.S. she taught papermaking, printmaking, book arts, and drawing in universities for more than a decade. As Director of Artistic Projects and Master Collaborator at Dieu Donné she works with other artists to make new work in handmade paper. She also edits the series Papermaker’s Tears: Essays on the Art and Craft of Paper for The Legacy Press. Her own work combines traditional and contemporary methods of papermaking and is exhibited nationally and internationally. Website