Artist Books at West Dean

Part I - Paper laminations

This was an easy process for creating a translucent, paper-based panel. Ingredients are diluted PVA glue (50% pva, 50% water), tracing paper and various found objects to trap inside a paper sandwich. You also need a paintbrush, a roller and a plastic bag to work on (you fold the bag over and roll it to squeeze out the glue and bond the two pieces of tracing paper together).

I tried various bits inside - crochet was fairly successful. Ginkgo biloba leaves have such an iconic shape it's hard to make a bad image when using them. The most successful was an afterthought - I had various scraps of waxed backing papers from working with a thin roll of double-sided tape lying around on the table from an earlier experiment. I threw the scraps in, along with some torn pieces of bright magenta paper. The result is a random, modern-looking abstract panel. The final piece is made from a piece of orange webbing, some string and a few threads from steel wool (the kind you scrub pans with). The steel wool rusts almost immediately, giving it an antique feel.