My Reader’s Diary was mentioned recently in a blog article by Sarah Nicholls of the Center for Book Arts in NYC. Top 10 Books, Zines & Comics is a good introduction to what’s on offer on Etsy. She lists 10 categories (zines, comics, diaries, journals, albums, letterpress books….) with an example of each and then a link to search for more. Check it out here. The one to the left is the zine “Stastictical Analysis of The Things That Happen But Don’t Matter” from Sarah McNeil.
Several years ago my friend Debbie gave me a copy of Tara Bryan’s tunnel book, World Without End (that’s it to the right). A tunnel or peephole book is a set of pages bound into accordions on two sides and viewed through a central opening. Scenery or shapes are cut out of the pages and then assembled in layers. Inspired by theatrical stage sets, this book form dates from the mid-eighteenth century and continues to be popular. I immediately deconstructed Tara’s book to figure out how she made it (very ingeniously with a single sheet of paper) and then wrote up instructions for a class I was teaching at SFCB.
For the Fall 2008 Ampersand, Debbie wrote a profile of Tara, and I thought I’d include those instructions in the issue as well. Then John Sullivan, who is the new president of PCBA (the member organization that publishes Ampersand), cut and scored sheets with a blank tunnel book on it, so members could easily make their own. You can buy a copy of the Fall Ampersand here.
Ed Hutchins’ article Exploring Tunnel Books includes a history of tunnel books and a photo gallery of example books. There are good discussions of what makes the structure a book, rather than a novelty piece, how various artists have adapted the form, and how one might incorporate text.
Book artist and teacher Carol Barton has been instrumental in popularizing tunnel books with book artists. You can see some of her early work, along with several other artists’ examples.
Maria Pisano’s The Four Elements Series are elegant miniature tunnel books (scroll down on the page to see them). There are good pictures of each book, allowing you to see inside as well as how she made the covers. There’s another tunnel book on that page too, called Tunnel Vision.
Peter & Donna Thomas have made a tunnel book inside a ukulele. They have more traditional tunnel books pictured here and here.
Recently as my friend Cathy was showing me her latest quilting project, I felt a pang of jealousy and then frustration. She’s been working in fabric and color and with patterns of those colors for a long time and very successfully. I’ve been trying to design broadsides that marry type and patterns of color with little success — type alone or patterns alone yes, but not together. I blurted out “where would you put type or words or a quote in your quilts” and after a minute she said “in the white space between the colors.” I went from frustration to “aha!” Later, in an email, she suggested I look at maps as patterns. From there I was off and running.
I started playing around with shapes from a map and putting words in the roads and streets. Looking through my book of quotes, scanning for ones appropriate to maps, I remembered that many of my own haiku are about my walks. And that’s how my latest book got started. Above is one of the spreads. Below is the resulting book, titled “Walking“. You can see more pictures here.
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Instructions for making this origami skeleton, designed by Marc Kirschenbaum, are available here. They aren’t for the faint of heart though, as it’s pretty complicated and involved. Much easier to make is the “shape book” below, made from an old paperback (there’s a tutorial here on the cheeky magpie blog).
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This video shows Sam Ita designing, making and assembling a pop-up for his book 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. While the engineering of the pop-up is very cool, what I covet is his electronic paper cutter!
 Kristy Higby’s Red Ghost |
After working all day getting ready for the Book Arts Jam this Saturday, I was in the mood for a mindless break from folding and gluing. An email from my friend Sharon provided me with the perfect fodder: a post she found called 10 Brilliant Book Artists. I spent a happy hour clicking through all the links before going back to making flip books. (Kristy Higby’s book to the right is one of the books mentioned.)
