Momigami

Sydney BAG met yesterday (we meet every month).

Avril had been to visit a friend in Bermagui, and brought us back the idea of Momigami.
It is the japanese word for kneaded paper.
You can buy momigami paper from art stores, but it seems you can use the momigami techniques on old book pages and it changes the texture and consistency of the page, rendering paper more like fabric.
Ever since I've been twisting, crumpling and generally assaulting pages of old books to see what happens to them.
I put a few atlas pages and a some from a Petit Robert French Dictionary through the 17 minute rinse cycle in my washing machine, to see whether that would twist and transform it faster.
then i put them through the dryer (and put some dry ones in the dryer too).
wetting / rinsing made the paper wet, and broke up the map pages - they look cool, but not as nice as the ones i kneaded. just running pages through the dryer did nothing at all.

Here are my notes from what I found online:
Folding the four corners into the center, one crumples the treated dry sheets gently into a loose ball, then packed into a tighter ball, squeezing and wrinkling. Unfold the sheet, rewrap, wrinkle and crumple.
After three to four minutes open up the sheet, grasp at the near corner and rub between the palms of the hand, paper against paper. Over and over. A good activity while watching TV, talking with friends or waiting on buses and in waiting rooms I think. More here

there's a video here of people actually making momigami.
this description of momigami includes oil. check out how she has weathered a printed image.

if you treat the paper after momigami-ing it, then you'll get a resist effect where the oil is (or isn't).
caren florance says it involves tapioca starch and gives a recipe but doesn't mention oil. And here's a great resource for all kinds of glues you can make (doesn't include tapioca, but does include several kinds of flour pastes). And here's one for a tapioca starch glue that is made in the microwave.

I took some pix, but it would seem the difference between the washed and kneaded paper is only in how it feels to the touch, not in the look. going to try laminating/collaging them now to see what happens.

Thanks avril for going to bermagui to do momigam!\
Pre-treated Petit Robert pages

And post

Post-treated atlas page

Pre-treated atlas page

Laser cutter-a-go-go

For the last five days i have been geeking out with a laser cutter at Sturt Winter school.
I had high intentions of posting every day but here it is Friday and I'm posting one big post.
We began by making a wooden box. Then engraving it, both with the laser cutter.
By end of day 1 I was totally hooked.
Hardest part was making illustrator do my bidding.
I can see now how people could make a mock-up of a book by hand and then make a series of 150. If they have access to a laser cutter and can work illustrator it would be simple.
So here's some stuff i made this week.

laser cut wooden box. laser engraved map of paris on perspex. The map came from the plan de paris I used when I lived there in 1988-9. You can see the original engraved wooden version sitting on the desk next to the box: it had a lot of grey, so the engraving was quite dark. Later I discovered the Trace Image setting on illustrator which made the map even better.

Had some memory problems with the illustrator file: when I lined up engraving and box cutting on the same file it didn't work. So I engraved a full 90x30cm piece of wood.  Then I cut out the box. Here is the leftover sheet from which I later cut more circles and boxes. 

laser cut and engraved wooden box: the image came from the book of Historical and Curious maps I bought a while back.

same box from the top (masking taped together because the glue was drying.

These circles circles and squares were cut from the leftover sections of the 90x30cm piece. I later drilled holes (using the laser cutter) in all of these circles. I'll use them in a dogtag or as a book closure.  

I laser cut segments of an e.e. cummings poem (maggie and millie and molly and may) from an old acrylic work on canvas paper. These letters are mostly from that. The squares are also from an old work. The cursive letter N was cut in wood.

   

Here's the e.e. cummings poem fully cut out (i cut this 3 or 4 times).

The full poem is here. The picture below is a different work, also laser cut. But because the acrylic paint is thicker in some parts the laser didn't cut all the way through (I had to specify page thickness: I measured the periphery with calipers, but couldn't do the inner parts). I'll cut the letters out with a knife later. 

perspex box with letters cut out, later I engraved it with the tuileries map from the curious and interesting map book. Of course every box marked secrets contains important stuff...

Laser cut and engraved poem (segments of Henry Kendall's Bellbirds). Page was then scored and cut into segments for a concertina 8.5cmx8.5cm. The scoring and cutting of a 90x30 sheet would probably take me an hour: the laser cutter did it in 46 seconds. The scoring and cutting of the words took more like 16 minutes but is reproducible in all kinds of medium (wood, perspex, paper...)

Mostly the cutouts from the bellbirds. Plus the perspex and wooden bits from piercing the covers / boxes. I have since made a 5cm cube to hold the tiny pieces. I'm yet to assemble it.

there were some minor technical difficulties: the fonts available on the printer's PC didn't match those available in the PC on which I did all the planning. So most fonts are the default serif font from the cutter. This was a box segment which was the wrong size, so I added the holes and a letter from a cool cursive font. It will become a book cover. I also didn't bother to line up the holes properly on the laser cutter: which is why the bottom hole isn't quite aligned with the wood! 

the laser cut squares from an old acrylic on canvas paper work left a cool outline. I'm going to stick this down pretty much as pictured, and it's a new work. 

Some of the good bits from the 5cm squares. I'm going to make these into a work (pretty much as pictured).

5cm squares to make small book covers: the laser ran out of memory and stopped, so I had a partially engraved perspex sheet. Which turned out just as deliciously as the fully engraved sheet I think! And it took a lot less time.

Thu Kim Vu

Go see the work of THU KIM VU 

Check out the beautiful city-like, map-like structures.



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Jacaranda Newtown

This work was donated to Australia Street Infants School in 2014 as part of an art auction.

My apologies for the quality of this photo - I'm unable to find a copy of the completed work in my photo archives! If you buy it perhaps you can take a good one and send it to me!

One of the marvellous things about living in Newtown is the period where the Jacarandas bloom on every corner. This is my naif impression of that in a kind of aerial view version.

It was created as part of a series of Newtown Maps I did for an exhibition at Buzzz Bar in Newtown in 2013.

Painting a Jacaranda is a very hard thing to do. Even photographs don't do them justice. There's a film: What Dreams May Come where Robyn Williams goes to heaven, and it's a painting his wife (who survives him on earth) is painting. She has the same struggle. But the film does do justice to the beauty of Jacarandas (so watch it!).

South Newtown where I live is also filled with trees. Very few people would believe how much our back yards are filled with growing living trees and birds and wildlife. So that's what this piece is about!

Works donated to Australia Street Infants School

National Geographic Beach Blanket Celebrity Squares

Here are links to some information about each of the art works I donated to Australia St Infant's School Art Auction.

• The shops around the corner
• Jacaranda Newtown
• Ferry Ropes
• Word on the Street
• National Geographic Beach Blanket Celebrity Squares

Here is my artist's CV written for this auction.

Fimo Buttons: Part two

So last week I made some buttons out of air-drying Fimo.
This week I took some old 2d works and made them into books to show off the buttons.

these are some of the buttons, with a few coats of acrylic paint.

This one is a venetian blind binding (well,  string through the middle). The poem on the round pages is on both sides of the paper. the poem is The time it will come by Derek Walcott.

This little book is yet to get words. It's from a crayon rubbing I did years ago, the back is coated in old book pages and tissue paper sewing patterns. To keep some consistency I used the Priorite and Fragile stamps that are on the button. It's a one page book / snake book. The cover is on canvas paper, again, an old work re-worked into a book!

This third books is a concertina from a map of Toledo in Spain, again partly covered (and reinforced) with sewing pattern tissue paper. Again no words yet, but I will get to that! Priorite stamps to make it consistent. Cover a work 

This week, a tunnel book

The series using my grandfathers' WWII photos continues.

This is a tunnel book made from them.

The hardest part was finding the pictures which wouldn't over shadow each others. 

the concertina on the side are maps from a modern history book showing the Pacific in WWII and Asia post WWII.

Now to make it a slipcase or similar.

Where You Are - a book of maps

Visual Editions — VE5 Where You Are

I wanted to buy this... but now I think I'll make one myself!!
here's one of my maps of my morning walks.

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Auberge de Banne Star book

This book is made from the paper menu from the Auberge de Banne in France where we had lunch 2 days ago.
it's a concertina with bits cut out (and formed into a star for display).
stands about 10 x 3 when flat, probably 20cm round on display.
photographed in the courtyard of le Mazel (a 13th century mansion / chateau we're staying in right now!).