TRAVELING IN A TINY HOME THAT IS REALLY AN ARTISTS' BOOK ON WHEELS

Peter and Donna Thomas have been making fine press and artist's books for over 40 years. When they started, as craftspeople at Renaissance Faires, they fell in love with the graceful beauty of "gypsy wagon" caravans that other vendors had made to sleep in or use as booths for selling their wares. In 2009 Peter and Donna built their own tiny home on wheels, designed after a typical late 19th century Redding Wagon. This blog documents their trips around the country, taken to sell their artists' books, teach book arts workshops, and talk about making books as art; as well as to seek out and experience the beauty of the many different landscapes found across the USA.

Peter and Donna started their business in 1977 and made their first book in 1978, so from 2017-18 are traveling to celebrate 40 years of making books with shows in a dozen libraries across the country. See the schedule on the side bar to find if they are coming to a town near you....

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Monday, October 9, 2017

From Swarthmore to Vassar

Last week we visited the Cathedral of Books (in the Peabody Library at John Hopkins University) and this week we visited the library at Vassar that really did look like a castle.






This week we saw some book related things we want to share with you:


The Philadelphia Free Library

We saw part of their collection of “horn books”. For those unfamiliar with the genre, a horn book is more like a chalk board than a book, a hand held object with written or printed text under a flattened layer of transparent animal horn. The PFL has hundreds of interestingly shaped horn books in their collection and had a few on display in the special collections.



University of Pennsylvania

We saw an engaging show of books from the Mid East and Asia. The use of color and the placement of text on a page differs wildly from our modern fine press aesthetic and inspired visions of possible books we could make in the future




Cornell and Vassar

Between Ithaca and Poughkeepsie we saw some incredible leaf books and some very colorful leaves.



Surprise! And finally....



We want to thank all the folks at Swarthmore for hosting a show of our books in their library as part of our 40 year celebration. We visited on Monday October 2, 2017, both to see the show and give a papermaking demonstration. The demonstration is worth mentioning because was the first time we used the new mould and deckle made for us by Brian Queen. Brian used a CMC machine to make the mould and deckles, and a 3d printer to make the watermarked screen.






Some of the best days are finished off with the best nights spent in leafy campsites. This one is in Lackawanna State Park in Pennsylvania.




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