Good news on the "pillow books"

Yippee! The University of Washington Special Collections just purchased all four of the "pillow books"! These were made at the beginning of my interest and work on progressive memory loss, and right before I started working with the elderly who are at various stages of dementia. I'm thrilled that they're going together to this wonderful collection. The UW collection also has a copy of all the books I created with the elderly.

So here are some images of the four "pillow books". There are more images and write-ups on all four books (and more) here.

Below, Random Cruelty



Tenuous Connections



A Dog's Tale



Cradles for Our Memories

Relay Replay, Sheila's book

I'm switching over to the new labeling, if I can remember to keep doing it. Not an exciting day, just trimming paper. Should be able to finish that part tomorrow. Still playing with different ideas in my head for the cover and such. There were also some Portland Open Studios chores to do.

OK, gotta go update my dorksume...

MiT book, we have a cover!

Yes, the cover is printed. I thought this day would just about never come. But it wasn't without some back-breaking labor. I'll blame it on the change in the season, but the screen did not flash very cleanly today, I had several holes. It can be a little hard to tell what was a hole in the screen itself and what was a gap caused by the unevenness of the very lumpy handmade paper (Nepal Heavyweight). Lumpy paper, I could live with, but the obvious holes in the screens, I always touch up.

And touch-up jobs are definitely back-breaking.

So today's lesson is touching-up your gocco print

Before and after I touched up the missing spot in the scroll close to the bottom, and also at the corner:





Before and after I touched up the missing spot in the right leg of the 'H':





Before and after I touched up the obvious hole in the line at the bottom:



And here, well, I had some coffee after lunch, and I had a bit of a jiggle, you can see the result inside the outer most of the concentric circles (compare that to the picture above). I decided to live with it:



A shot of the cover:



The tools of the trade. I use a 12/0 acrylic/oil brush. And very little ink, if any at all. Usually, there's enough ink on the print itself and I just use the brush to spread it around to cover up the hole. But if I do need more ink, I dab up the tiniest bit of ink I can, then I wipe as much off as possible on the plastic lid (what I use for a palette):



Here are the 7 books I've finished; they're going to Esther and her family.



And on other fronts:

I'm starting work for the collaboration my critique group is doing for our show next March at Cedar Crest College. I picked up the fabric yesterday (100% cotton, white, 3 and half yards of it); laundered it, and today stained it with a big bucket of coffee grounds I picked up at the local coffee shop.

I wish I had gotten a shot of it while it was in its coffee bath, it was pretty disgusting looking. But anyhow, here I'm rinsing out the coffee. I think it's stained a bit darker than I'd like, so I'll probably run it through the washing machine again.



And whoa, Relay Replay blog got tagged as a spam blog!

I got a note from blogger today saying that the blog (http://relayreplaypress.blogspot.com/) had been tagged as a spam site, and therefore had been blocked! After looking at the long headers, I decided it was legit and so followed the link it said to follow in order to unblock it.

I don't know why google's software tagged it as a spam blog, but I have one guess—all the posts are titled with a woman's name, I wonder if they thought I was posting nudie photos or something?

It's official, MiT now Relay Replay

I just started a new blog for Relay Replay Press. I will continue to document the daily grind here; I'll be using the new blog more like a web site, only posting with finished books and good photographs. I have the first 3 books up (photographed today).

MiT book, palm leaf book

I'm having the first 3 books (Martha, Marion, and Esther) photographed tomorrow by a pro, so these are kind of gratuitous, except to show that I was doing something today. In the little containers to the right you can see the mah jongg tile beads, and the ribbon that I'm going to use.

The baby blue ribbon seems out of nowhere, except that that's Esther's favorite color. Each time we started a new print, she wanted to use blue ink. We convinced her to try other colors (rather, her daughter convinced her to try other colors). My plan originally was to print the text part in the baby blue, but in the end decided to leave out the text. I did print the title and the colophon pages in blue though (they are the 2 pages at the top of the photograph that look like they're blank, but they're not).

Here I haven't strung the pages together:



And I just now noticed that 2 of the hands next to each other are almost mirror images of each other (they're not, just close). I was trying to not do that. Sigh...

And here the pages are strung together wrapped up; the mah jongg tile beads worked out well, I thought. Turned out, the ribbon was too thick to go through the holes in the beads, so I had to make wire connectors. Good thing I already had the tool and the wires on hand. It's always somethin'!



And about that container...

Unfortunately, I think I've decided that container isn't going to work. I spent 2 days designing it, making mockups, and trimming the paper, and THEN decided I didn't like it. I'm not sure what I'm going to do about it yet.

MiT book...so close yet so far!

OK, I trimmed all the paper for senior #4's wrap/container, glued one up, and I'm not sure that I like it! Of course, I have all 20 of them trimmed, scored, and folded already. And NOW I decide that I'm not sure I like it.

So here's my problem—the book is a palm leaf book, which means there will be a string/ribbon/thread of some sort for the binding itself. At each end of the string will be a mah jongg tile bead. To close the book, you wrap the string around the pages, which in this case are the laminated prints.

When closed, the book will have its lumps/bumps/beads and will need a loose fitting container. And since the binding itself has a string/ribbon/thread already, I don't want to use another string/ribbon/thread for the container for closure, so the container was designed to have a flap that was heavy enough that it would just lie down flat and stay closed. I'm not a box maker, so I designed something that was more or less like an envelope, only 3 dimensional.

And the important aspects do work, ie, the flap does stay closed and the book fits loosely, but maybe a bit TOO loosely. I don't know. It just feels sort of sloppy.

I just went back and looked at it again, and it may not be so bad as I was thinking. Maybe after I get some sleep it will look much better tomorrow.

In the mean time, here's the graphics for the cover. It's supposed to look like the white dragon tile (aka the soap tile), only with her name in it:



After a bit of research, I saw that the white dragon tile (basically a box) can vary quite a bit from set to set. Some of them are very fancy. So I made my a little on the fancy side.

MiT book, the final stretch

I'm almost going to make my end of the month deadline for this book! Not too bad considering I took 4 days off to go to the Steens couple of weeks ago. Finished printing the title page and the colophon page (pictures tomorrow); started trimming and folding the container. That will need to be printed & glued as well. I should be finished by Wed. Then the appt with the photographer on Thursday morning. And, although I've been working hard on it, I wasn't stressed out over it; I went to the Steens, and I did a few other things. So all in all, I can't complain.

Also picked up more supplies for the next book, which I will get started once I get a few things done for Portland Open Studios, coming up in less than 2 weeks. Since I've hardly painted this year, I want to make the books a bigger part of the weekends, especially the Relay Replay books. I hope to have some brochures or even just handouts done by then.

MiT book, stalling for time

OK, I've been having a hard time coming up with words for this book. Part of the issue was that senior #4 was so very quiet! Her daughter was so helpful in getting this project completed—she brought over albums, documents, all kinds of things, and helped her mom choose what to print. But because the daughter was so engaging and so involved, I think my senior kind of sat back and just quietly printed. She & I didn't interact in the same ways that I interacted with the other seniors. On the other hand, she never would've completed the project had her daughter not been involved.

So in the mean time, at a loss for words (haha), I decided to just start adding more texture to my side of the prints. Not sure that you can tell the difference in the before (left) and after (right) pictures. The ones on the right have obviously been trimmed down to size and corners rounded (yay, corner rounder!). But they also have had blobs of white added to them randomly:



But I just thought of something—maybe I should not have any words, given that we didn't really have any conversations?

Here's another set. I've overprinted all 16 sets:

MiT book, corner rounder!

OK, so my senior's prints have all been attached to my prints. Here's the side of the senior's prints:



My side (I'll be adding text to my side still, but wanted to trim them up to their final size before I print the text). The top left blank page will have the title and the bottom right blank page will have the colophon:



Ta dah! The corner rounder!

MiT book, laminating day 2

So here's the process of laminating my senior's prints to my prints.

1. Here's the roll of Gudy O. As it's unfurled, the corners want to roll up, so here I've tacked down 1 print in each corner to keep it flat:



2. After I place 3 more prints across the roll, I use an Xacto knife to slice the prints off the roll. The roll is slightly wider than 5 prints, so I get a bit leftover, which I'm saving, but of course:



3. I flip each print over and use the bone folder to press the adhesive to the print. This is the bone of 'fingerstothebone':



4. Then I remove the silicon release paper from my senior's print, now with the adhesive on the backside, and attach the senior's print to my print, and bone that down too:



5. The pile of silicon release paper...surely I'll find a use for these for some project or other:



Do the math again: laminated 104 prints in 3.75 hrs today = 27.7/hr. Not bad. 189 prints to go = 6.8 hrs! I'll be done by Tuesday for sure.

MiT book, laminating day 1

OY! I'm so glad I decided to get the backup adhesive!

A couple of weeks ago, I complained (oops, there I go again) about not being able to spend my money when I was trying to buy some Duromount. And after 4 days of leaving them messages, I finally was able to place my order. The only trouble was, they couldn't ship it out for another week, and it would be another week before it would arrive, which would put me on next Thursday, Sept 25.

I went ahead and placed the order, but decided that I didn't have that much time to sit around and wait, so I also purchased 2 rolls of Gudy O from Talas, which arrived yesterday.

I started laminating senior #4's prints to the mah jongg 'tiles' that I've been printing. So here's the math—16 images x 21 copies each = 336 sheets to laminate. It took me 2.25 hours to do the first 24...which gives me 31.5 hours to laminate all 336 sheets! Wow, I'd be laminating all week, even discounting the 2.25 hours I've already done.

After a little rest, I went back at it, and it took me 45 minutes to laminate the next 19, I got a system going, or I just got scared into working much faster...that brings the total down to about 11.5 hours, discounting the first 24 I'd already done. Much, much better. I'd just be laminating for the next couple of days.

Although I might have to take a break, boning the sheets down to the laminate is proving to be rather hard on my forearm, elbow, and fingers.

MiT, 5 more hands

The artwork for three more of the '8' tiles:



The two flower tiles, plus title and colophon:



The hands printed (plus the one that didn't get its picture taken last time):



And, here we are, practically the end of September already, and I picked another big bowl of strawberries. I had actually gone out with the little bowl first, thinking that was plenty big. But I was wrong:



And Random Movie: Burn After Reading. It was probably my least favorite of the Coen brothers' movies I've seen.

MiT, 9 hands

Here are 2 more of the B5 gocco screens I burnt today. This one 'reads' 0, 8, and 0.



This one reads 8, 8, 8. And yes, the middle hand is touching the other 2 hands. I'll deal with this when I print.



Here I'm printing the left hand. I've taped off the middle hand where the two hands touch. I use white paper tape, or artist's tape, whichever I happen to have on hand. Then I use the foam block on top of the tape. This works amazingly well most of the time. Once in a while, some ink does start to seep through underneath the white paper tape, and in this situation, where the 2 images are actually touching, it does require further intervention.

And the ink did start to seep under the white paper tape today, so I cut another piece of white paper tape, shaped it so that it approximated the line between the 2 hands, and taped that to the emulsion side. And that took care of the problem.



So, the 4 '8's of the same suit. The one on the left and the two on the right were the ones on the same gocco screen above, and touching each other. And here they are, printed separately, no worse for their hand touching.



And the '2008', '2' and '8' from the same suit, and white dragons in place of the '0's.



And here they are, all on the drying rack.



I do have one more hand printed, but it's waiting for it's other buddies before it gets its picture taken.

That, was more or less the whole day.

I'm READY!!!

Pick me! Pick Me! I is ready to be the VP!

Sorry, we interrupt this studio diary to bring you some complaints. BIG ONES.

I caught bits of the Sarah Palin interview this afternoon, and after a minute or so, I was so embarrassed for her that I couldn't take it anymore. I turned the radio off. I could do as well as that, and maybe even better, especially after a whole week of coaching. I had been looking forward to the debates, but now I'm not so sure. It might be way too painful (palinful?).

She made W look good. How sad is that?

But, on a more cheery front, I finally got started on the graphics for senior #4's book, in between working on various Portland Open Studios duties. Here are 3 'hands' for a 2008 winning American mah jongg hand:



I can fit 3 onto a large gocco screen (B5), so will need 5 screens to do all 14 tiles/hands.

Senior #4's daughter sent me a lot of information about American mah jongg. Each year, the Mah Jongg League publishes a booklet that contains all the winning hands for the year (and they change every year). And I guess each year, they have winning hands that basically 'spell out' the year's number. For example, here's a winning hand for 2008:

FF 2008 8888 8888

Where the 'F's are the flower tiles; then each of the sets of 4 numbers must be in the same suit, except for '0', as there are no '0' in Mah Jongg tiles, so they are replaced with the white dragons.

So in this first screen I've just burnt, I have 2 '8's from 2 different suits, and a '2'.

The Grand Exhibition

OK, Margaret's words, not mine. But, we did finalize on all the words for the exhibit today. This is for the book project with the seniors.

I've been calling it "MiT," which stands for Moment in Time; that was my original project name when I applied for the grant.

I never did care for that name though. So this is the John Wilson Special Collections exhibit title, subtitle, and write-up (thanks to Jim Carmin, the JWSC library who helped put it together):

Relay/Replay: Artist’s Books that Illuminate the Creative Lives of the Elderly

November 15 – December 31, 2008

Portland artist Shu-Ju Wang spent eight months working with four seniors at various stages of memory loss. Through conversation, painting, printmaking, and collage, she engaged these delightful individuals; together they created artwork that became the foundation to this collection of artist's books. Shu-Ju has been making artist’s books using the Print Gocco for 10 years, and this collection draws heavily on her skills as a Gocco printer and book maker.

Also, please join us in the John Wilson Special Collections on Saturday, December 6, 2008 at 1:00 PM for an informal talk by the artist about this project (which was funded in part by the Regional Arts & Culture Council).

For more information contact Jim Carmin, John Wilson Special Collections Librarian at 503-988-6287; or jimc@multcolib.org.

---------

Outside of that, I've been busy catching up on Portland Open Studios work for a couple of days. Finally finished the profile I've been working on for the last 2 months on Shelley Hershberger, another artist. That should go up on the Portland Open Studios blog on Saturday.

Random Movie of the week: Brideshead Revisited. Although it was a fine movie, it was clear that there was so much more going on than could really be condensed into a 2+ hour movie.

MiT...will anyone take my money?

I tell ya, I didn't know it would be this hard to spend some money on art supplies!

On Saturday, I did my homework and figured out what I needed to buy for senior #4's book. And today, I set about making phone calls. One place, an 800 number, never answered their phone, the whole day; I left a message, they never called back. It is a reputable place, since other artists have purchased from them...so why don't they like me!? Sniff.

The 2nd place actually called me back at 7am (I left a message on Saturday), but of course we were dead to the world and never even heard the phone ring. They left a message. When I called back, I discovered that I needed to provide my zip code so that the proper sales person can call me back. OK, fine, I gave them all the information they wanted. Then nobody called me back. Wah!

I'm just the lonely practically senior citizen artist waiting for the phone to ring, and they won't call me back.

Oops, is that complaining?

On the bright side, I delivered Marion's books to her today, and she was really pleased with them, so that was good. At first, she was alarmed that her name was on the cover (see photos here), she thought people would think she was bragging. But when I told her that everybody's books will have their names on them, then she was ok with that.

Also finished goccoing the textures on the Rives BFK this afternoon. I should be able to start working on the actual images tomorrow.

MiT book, "texturizing"

This was a very low energy day. For some reason, I really just didn't want to do anything, and not much was accomplished for most of the day, except for sitting around and reading the paper.

But I suddenly got a burst of energy after 7pm, and so work continued.

I want to use the mahjongg theme for my 4th senior's book, and also because all of her prints were photo-based and very cleanly printed, I want to create some contrast with the images I print. So here's the plan: laminate the heavier Rives BFK to her prints which are on Rives Lightweight. On the BFK, I will print a set of mahjongg related images; I want these to have the antique patina look of those old bone mahjongg tiles.

To achieve that, I put down 2 layers, using the same 2 open screens that I used for these two prints.

On the left, the first layer printed with some reddish brown ink daubed on the open screen with a palette knife, and printed very lightly. On the right, the 2nd layer printed with the mustard yellow mixed with white; this was printed using a different open screen which was created by flashing against a black output from my laser printer, and THEN some of the emulsion completely removed by sticking some scotch tape on there and peeling the emulsion off. So you have some areas of very dense ink and areas of lighter ink elsewhere. That's perhaps the most obvious on the upper right, where you can see the shape of a piece of scotch tape.

Each press yielded a slightly different and somewhat unpredictable result, which is just fine for my purposes here. I'm only about 1/3 way finished printing these. The 3rd layer will then consist of various mahjongg related images.



I've been thinking about changing my hair...it's been long and straight for many years now, and I've been thinking of going shorter and wavy. I found this picture of Annette Benning with short wavy hair (isn't she a cutie pie)—



And stuck a picture of yours truly in there (don't look too closely, it's a sloppy photoshop job)—



But blond hair just makes me look Japanese, so I took the blond out (along with some color from her right ear)—



And although I'd love to have silvery hair, I don't think that's quite in the cards for me either. So here's a somewhat more "likely" rendition. "Likely" in quotes because it's really much more likely that I'll wear it limp and unwashed, and not the stylish version you see here—



You can compare this new look to that of my James McAvoy impersonation here.

MiT book, "Marion" is completed!

Yay!

Although I had to make a 2nd screen for the cover image. The original image I made was too small; and also, it was just the text which I decided I didn't like. Plus—now this was a gocco problem that I had not run into before, because I hadn't tried this before—but I had flashed a small screen (B6), with the text "Marion" on the bottom. Now notice that this book has hard covers. So as I pressed down, the frame that holds the screen pressed down on the hard cover itself and the screen never even made contact! I could print it if I moved the whole cover up so the frame did not come in contact, but then the name would be way on the bottom of the cover.

It was a good thing that I had one extra book that I could spare! So yes, senior #1's name is Marion. This was the 2nd screen I made, with the soft blue-gray background and "Marion" as a negative image.



Title page, Family Picnic.



A couple of the inside pages:





Reproductions of her watercolors. These are slightly reduced from their original size.



What is this, you ask. Well, I'm so proud of myself that I just have to show off. These are the table top parts from those tv dinner tables. These were hand-me-downs from someone else, and we never had a use for them.

A few years ago, I got this bright idea to disassemble them and, with a little modification, use the legs to build print display racks, which I did. And they've been very useful! So these are the leftover table tops which had been leaning up against the wall. And last night, I figured out that I could use them as presses after gluing text blocks, covers, whatever. Just put a few bricks on top, and they're good to go!

And not having much time to dawdle, I've started experimenting with senior #4's book. They're drying in the press now!

MiT book, all done with gluing for now

For better or worse, I'm finished with the gluing part for senior #1's book.

For better, because I'm done.

For worse, because things are not all squared up! I was pretty frustrated with that, and finally just decided to live with it.

From the trouble I had with printing on long strips through the the inkjet printer, to alignment problems with the stack cutter, it was just endless.

Otherwise, caught up on a lot of Portland Open Studios web site updates. Although I still have an artist profile that I need to write up. Did the interview back in June and never wrote it up!

MiT book...I sure use a lot of glue

That was what I did today. Gluing. Gluing the cover sheets to the cover boards. Gluing the filler sheets on the inside covers. And now I'm out of glue. Will continue gluing tomorrow, after I get more glue.

On the positive side, I examined the covers, and only 2 were bad as far as pva seepage goes. And I have enough good ones for the text blocks. That's good news in that I wanted to keep the covers pretty clean and uncluttered, as the inside is pretty minimalist. So I can just print my senior #1's name on the cover, as I originally planned.

The Random Movie: Tell No One, a French thriller. A complicated plot but very well put together. There weren't any of those head-scratching moments of what-just-happened? Also saw Man on Wire a few weeks back, about the people that strung a cable between the twin towers back in the 70's and the guy that walked across. It was terrific!