Author: annwyndean1

Over the past few years I have been compiling a sample book from the previous year using the plates that I had designed. It’s an idea that I quite like and somehow regret that I hadn’t thought of it earlier!

The small blind printed fragments are in groups of six with two machine lies between them. there are three sets of silk stitched threads along those lines. These reference the unpicked seams project that I have been working on. The cover features a piece of card from Fiona Dempster, see here, from our collaboration, which includes her handwriting underneath the blue print.

The weather has been against printing in the studio, but I did manage a day printing postcards. The designs are drawn from scribbles and prints held in my notebooks, rescaled to fit into the postcard size and shape. They are now drying before I can prick ‘unpicked seams’ on them and stamp the reverse. Roll on warmer days!

Fiona and I have exchanged the sixth and final book in our collaboration. We sent each other a bundle of papers in September 2022 and since the beginning of 2023 we have sent our books to each other across the world. The timings have been somewhat erratic, mostly due to the postal services but these last two arrive at their destinations in record time.

The Shape of the Print –  January 2024

At the beginning of the project I had made a printing plate designed around the bodice shape. I had used that plate to print the 72, plus spares, squares for the folding ruler, book 2. Here I was going one step further and cutting up the plate, something that I have often done in the past, taking the idea from unpicking and remaking a dress in the C18th.

I had several, approximately A4, in size, sheets of very fine paper from Fiona and faced with the dilemma  of where to go from there. Will they take dampening and then printing? I had little to spare for experimenting. So I just printed! I had cut up the bodice plate with one for the firm back cover of the Japanese styled book and managed 10 pages in each book.

The book is bound in a simple and a different way to previous Japanese bindings that I had done.

Size 18cm x 6.5cm

Fine Japanese paper

Back Cover Collagraph printing plate

Front cover painted papers, linen thread binding

Inside covers painted papers and written text.

Fiona’s Book VI is delicate and almost translucent, incorporating small fragments of my papers with her text. It sits comfortably in the palm of my hand. For further details see her postings here.

I think that we have both enjoyed the collaboration, the exchange of books, ideas and the rapport that has built up between us. A very positive exercise and one that brings a smile to my face.