Holly Litherland: June 2012

A late but worthwhile addition:

While collecting my responses for 'How do you mark your page?' I discovered that alot of people use train tickets. I collected these and stamped letters on them but couldn't decide on a way to display them. suddenly i had a brain wave and decided to try stitching them together, like a ticket patchwork and i was really pleased with the results.

Exhibition Pieces

Final Pieces

A Shepherd's life

A First Book of French Poetry

'A Perfect Match' & 'How Do You Mark Your Page?'

A Perfect Match: Final Piece

For my other final piece i wanted to find a way to display my collection and felt that the mots appropriate way to do this is in a book as that is where you find bookmarks.

I decided to display a 'happy coincidence' connection between a text and a bookmark. After discussions with my tutors about how i was going to do this i decided to scan extracts from relevant books to some of my bookmark collection and print them on tracing paper, this meant i had to cut and paste the pages in photoshop o make sure the pages read in the right order. I then covered each extract with a piece of sugar paper as a way of dividing them and then bound these sections together to create 'a book of books' i then marked each extract with it's corresponding bookmark. I considered stitching the bookmarks to the pages as glue does not react well with tracing paper. However i then realised that this would obscure part of the text. I also considered attaching clear adhesive pockets to the pages to hold the bookmarks but was worried that this would spoil the aesthetics of the book.

I remembered that some books have ribbons fixed to the spine to mark your place. So i have decided to attach the bookmarks to ribbons so they can be moved but remain attached to the book.

scanning the pages for final book

making mock ups for the pages

extracts printed on tracing paper

individual sections for final book

book bound and ribbon markers attached to the spine

bookmarks attached to ribbons inside the book

Making hard covers for final book

Testing Stamp lettering on book cloth cover

Testing stamp lettering on endpapers

Picture Frames

I felt that i wanted some pieces which could go on the wall at the show as my main pieces were book arts based. I have to confess that i bought the frames first then considered what was going to go in them. I found the frames in charity shops as i wanted them to all be different but wanted to maintain a level of continuity.
One of the bookmarks i had found was an English revision sheet based on 'A Shepherd's Life' by W.H. Hudson. I really liked this one as it is typed on a typewriter and a type error in it has been fixed by hand.
I managed to find a really lovely copy of 'A Shepherd's life' at work and felt that it would be nice to photograph the book in a setting appropriate to it's content and display it alongside the revision sheet. I felt the image looked odd stood alone so i decided to create another set of images based on a bookmark i found, also revision based, in 'A First Book of French Poetry'. I used an old map of Paris as the backdrop for this image and photographed the objects together with the view that they would be displayed alongside each other.

Photograph of 'A Shepherd's Life' with sheep in a field in the background and added lens flare

Revision sheet on 'A Shepherd's Life'

Photo of 'A First Book of French Poetry' using a vintage map of Paris as the background

Bookmark found in 'A First Book of French Poetry'

How to make your own stamps

One of the responses from the how do you mark your page? Facebook page called for a dust cover. I felt that i wanted to use letter press as i enjoy the process but felt limited by the selection i have access to in the print studio, as i also enjoy typography i felt that i would like to create my own letters. After alot of thinking i came up with the solution.

You will need:

wood blocks (make sure they are the right sizes, or cut your own to size)
Sheets of foam
A marker pen
Scissors
PVA glue

Mark out your letters on the foam sheets with the marker pen, make sure they are wide enough and simple enough to cut out with scissors.

Mark out your letters with pencil onto the wood and cut it to size.

Attach the foam letters to the wood blocks using PVA glue and leave to dry.

(make sure that you stick the letters the 'wrong way round' so that when you print them they will look right.)

Once the stamps are dry they are ready to use.

I used the stamps i had made to create the dust cover for my final book.

How do you mark your page: Final piece

I felt that the most appropriate media to use for this project was book arts. This was one of my favourite modules so i was excited about the possible outcomes. With my responses from the Facebook page I wanted to create a book which effectively communicated them and engaged with the audience by inviting them to interact with the piece.

I began to experiment with possible page layouts and considered if a hand made book or an altered book would be more effective. I decided to use an altered book as it could then be a book that anyone was reading and could communicate with anyone. I looked through the responses and began to gather some of the objects which were mentioned, such as pill packets and train tickets.

Sketchbook ideas for page layouts and designs

Sketchbook experiments. scanned pages to experiment with collage and drawn elements

The book I chose to use as the main body of my piece.
The Notebook by Nicholas Sparks

The new covers...

My collection based on the responses: Feathers, cinema tickets, pill packets, rizlas, pen lids, hair bobbles, train tickets etc.

Final book 'How do you mark your page?'

Pages from 'How do you mark your page?'

Endpapers from 'How do you mark your page?'

How do you mark your page?

After becoming intrigued by all the different things i had found in the books at work i decided to gather responses to the question "How do you mark your page?". I felt the most efficient way to do this was to create a Facebook page, which can be viewed by everyone, automatically saves the responses and extends the question to a wider audience through people sharing the link with their friends.

At it's peak this page reached 583 people (30/05/2012 - 05/06/2012)
Information from Page statistics

How do you mark your page? (Facebook page)

References

After establishing my collection I decided to do some research to see if any one else had carried out similar projects.

I found two blogs which were based on collections similar to my own.

Brookline Booksmith, Find of the week Archive

Forgotten Bookmarks

I also bought a book called 'Forgotten Bookmarks, A Bookseller's Collection of Odd Things Lost Between The Pages' by Michael Popek.

Earlier in the year i did a presentation about Angie Butler (Pet Gallerie Press), a Bristol based artist book maker who visited us to give a talk about her work. Book Arts has been my favourite module and i loved Angie's work. I remembered her project called 'A Friendly Piece of Advice' Which incorporated beautiful origami bookmarks each with a hand written motto which were given out in a mobile library, each motto was written by someone in the village and given to someone else.

Pet Gallerie Press Blog

My Presentation on Angie Butler

I also researched the Univeristy of the West of England (UWE) Artist bookmark project.

UWE Bookmark project

My Collection

I love books and reading and I volunteer in a charity bookshop. When i was asked for a university project to produce a collection i decided that i would collect the bookmarks which are left behind in the books which people donate.

After carefully looking at my collection i decided to consider ways of categorizing them:

I considered shape and size...