Harvest Moon in Salt Lake City

I gave a talk at Ken Sander's Rare Books this afternoon, titled, "The Ascent of the Artists' Book in the Age of the E-reader". While hiking the John Muir Trail this summer I met 4 or 5 people carrying Kindles. Doesn't sound like the wilderness, does it? They are lightweight, hold too much information, and are easy to read at night in the tent with only a little head light, so they are perfect for the wilderness. I've decided to get one. For reading, to get information, they are really the way to go and will only get better. The good news is that because of that, people will start appreciating Artists' Books for the qualities they miss in e-readers, the texture of the paper, the smell, the feel of motion as they turn the page and the intimate relationship with the object. I believe that using the e-reader will create more respect for artists' books (as artworks rather than just dressed-up information.)

It was a real treat to find Duncan Phillips, son of U. Utah Phillips, in the audience at Ken Sanders Book Shop. Last time we were at the bookshop we made a book and gave the sales as donations to his "Long Memory Project," a continuation of his father's charity fundraising efforts. He gets together with other musicians to play his dad's songs, with Duncan playing his dad's guitar. You get nothing but good feelings from his effort and this music!

Donna with Melissa Sanders at the MBS book fair

After that we went over to the Movable Book Society's annual meeting and book fair that was going on at the Hilton. The society celebrates books that move within the covers, like pop-ups. We explained to the conference host, Ann Montanaro, that our gypsy wagon was really an artists' book. The very colorful outer "binding" protects and conceals the contents while it lures the beholder in. And opening the door, like opening the cover of a book, brings the viewer and reader to the interior "content" of the book/wagon. Then we tried to convince her that because it actually moves (on it's beautifully decorated wheels) it is probably the best possible example of a movable book. She was not convinced, but agreed to pose for a photo by the gypsy wagon as if she were.....

On Monday Donna and I are off to Brigham Young and Weber State Universities, then we head for Nebraska.

Wandering again!

On Thursday September 27, 2012 Peter and Donna Thomas left Santa Cruz in their Gypsy Wagon (The Artists’ Book(mobile)) beginning their second Wandering Book Artist Road Trip. It will be a cross-country trip teaching book arts (and ukulele) classes, visiting libraries that collect artists’ books, and making artists’ books. 

After crossing the Sierra, their first stop was Reno, Nevada where they visited the studio of Katherine Case’s Meridian Press, (check out her beautiful Nevada birds series of prints and cards)

Then they gave a lecture and bookbinding demonstration at the University of Nevada’s Black Rock Press (where Bob Blesse has a knack for teaching innovative book arts techniques). 

After a night on the Salt Flats.

The next stop is Salt Lake City where on Saturday September 29, 2012 they will attend the Movable Book Society’s annual meeting and give a presentation about their new commercial publication, 1000 Artists’ Books, at Ken Sanders’ Rare Books. See you there.

Parked for the Winter

People have been asking what happened to the gypsy wagon... We've parked it for the winter in Mariposa, California, a gold rush town in the Sierra Nevada foothills. It is parked under a big barn roof, right next to our 1926 Melbourne W-2 Trolley. We've been up there a couple of times this winter, with freezing cold nights and mornings at the 3000 foot elevation, which is usually just below the snow-line.

Looking out the front door to the oaks and pines.

Peter at the trolley door.

Inside the trolley

We got this trolley car from the Kelly Park History San Jose trolley barn. They had bought it as a parts car, had stripped it, and were ready to let the firemen practice putting out streetcar fires (?!) using it for their practice; we rescued it (but had to saw it in half to move it) and made it into a living space. The best part about it is the all around windowed walls!

Since we have not been traveling much this winter, we had time to be active in the studio and in the community.

In the studio: we made several new books, both letterpress printed editions and a few new one-of-a-kinds. Here is a link to our website to show you some books for sale now. Expect a new William Everson book, "The Alder" to come out later this year....

"Sierra Point"

(Click on Photo for link to website for this book)

"Sierra Nevada"

(Click on Photo for link to website for this book)

In the community: Inspired by all the community-based book arts groups we met with on our trip, we decided to put some effort into creating Book Arts Santa Cruz, a new group in Santa Cruz, involving many artists, binders, printers and papermakers. We've had several gatherings at members' studios and just participated in our first event, Poetry and Book Arts at the Museum of Art and History in Santa Cruz. Peter and I demonstrated papermaking and binding, others did printing, poetry, pochoir, marbling and more. If you are in the area and would like to join this illustrious band of merry book artists, check us out: Book Arts Santa Cruz.

Donna Thomas demonstrates the double accordion pop-up, while Kirsten Liske talks about her watercolor journalling techniques at the Book Arts and Poetry Event.

We are planning the next "Adventure of the Wandering Book Artists" for the Fall of 2012. We will leave in mid-September, 2012. Our general plan is to head out for the Friends of Dard Hunter and IAMPA paper making meeting in Cleveland and our ukulele class at the John Campbell Folk School, then head for Florida, and return home through the South. Can we include you in the adventure? We teach bookbinding classes, give lectures in the book arts and show our artists' books. Let us know if you would like to help us set up a stop in your area. We also love to visit National and State Parks, play ukuleles and sing, so invite us to go camping or have a jam session with you. We are looking forward to the fall.

Yours,

Peter and Donna Thomas

PS

We are having fun hanging out with our grandaughter Emily during our time at home...

Wandering is great even if only for a week

The Friends of Dard Hunter papermaking group met last week for a regional conference in Santa Barbara and we took the opportunity to travel in the caravan for a mini-wandering.

First thing we taught a bookbinding class. It held in the house of fellow FDH member (and current president) Jill Littlewood.

Here are the finished books with their maker's hands.

We had a blast making margaritas in Jimmy Yarnell's tiny "cocktail beater". Obligatorily, we first beat some rag pulp in during the papermaking fair, then cleaned it out, added the tequilla and lemons and the rest of the magic mix. Thanks for the beater Jim.

A toast to a fun and inspiring conference!

No wandering book artists blog post is complete without some kind of odd vehicle thing. This is a picture of an old restaurant made with trolley cars as bookends to the building. It's located in Buellton and is just about ready to be bulldozed to make room for housing, so let us know if you want to save the trolleys and we'll give you the contact number...

We drove some backroads of California, leaving 101 at Santa Maria, traveling in a generally north eastern direction. We camped by the side of the road at a beautiful Los Padres National Forest hiking trailhead parking lot. (Actually it was probably for hunters or off roaders, but that does not sound quite as romantic.)

Ah, it feels good to wander in the wilderness...

We took a sunset hike on a dusty trail through the chapparal, then played some cowboy tunes before sleep.

Did you know that California has areas richer in oil than water? The town of Maricopa was built by folks who figured they could make some money by extracting the stuff in the early 1900's. Good idea!

Driving on the "Petroleum Highway, we stopped in for a visit to the Maricopa Museum. Across the street at Tina's diner we got all the info about the town. An old timer who owned his own oil well toured us through the museum. He said that the museum would close when he dies because none of the young folks value history, and no one stays in town anyway. (Maricopa, "elevation 600, population 600".)

Here is a vintage photo of the "Lakeview Gusher," which spewed 100,000 barrels a day of oil for months back in 1910 in Maricopa.

An abandoned pomegranate tree in town provided us with abundant treasure in pomegranates!

Well that's it for our wandering till next year. See you at CBAA in January, or come join Peter at the Feb 3-4 ACM Book Studies Conference, The Past, Present, and Future of the Book, at Cornell College in Iowa.

One more thing! A radio article about a fellow who followed our "Muir Ramble Route" on a bike across California can be heard here.

Its not over till the ukulele-playing book artist sings!

We have been home about 3 weeks now and it seems like 3 years for all that has gone on. We finally have adjusted to not moving on every day for some new city and new friends. We have almost crossed everything off the “to do when we get home” list we made on the trip… but if we promised you something, and have forgotten, let us know.

Back home and at the press once again.....

So I guess the trip is finally over, but it will not be forgotten. When we were in Boulder, Colorado, the library video-taped Peter's talk for their ScriptaLab site. It is about a half hour long and is now up on the library's server. They titled the talk, “What is a book? What is an artist’s book?” and they describe it as follows: “Book artist Peter Thomas talks about the nature of the artist’s book, what they can do, who makes them, and what they sound like.”

Click here to see the 30 minute video of our talk at CU Boulder.

And just to prove the old saying is really true...We just received a note from Ori Hoffer, the maverick news reporter from Park City Television, that he completed the editing of the interview he did with us when we were in Park City, Utah earlier this year. This is only four and a half minutes long and is posted on YouTube.

Click here to see the 4 minute TV short film.

Parked in front of the Santa Cruz Public Library for First Friday.

Now that we are home we get asked a lot, “When are you going to leave again?” But it is not asked like it sounds when typed. They want to know if we have plans for another trip. We have not thought that far ahead, but we will be taking the gypsy wagon to the "Friends of Dard Hunter" meeting in Santa Barbara in October, and we will probably make one more cross country trip in 2012 to visit the south. We will make a post on the blog to let you know about that, but until then, best wishes from your wandering book artist friends Donna and Peter Thomas.

The drum roll please....

Last but not least here is one last photo of the wagon, taken in Northern CA, that never got posted.