this and that – Page 2

Working with Dead Artists

by Judy Folkenberg

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

There are a number of artists I’m admire, but that are also dead. Yet I sometimes imagine us making art together…maybe as apprentice, or even as an equal. Well this dream can come true. Because artists leave a body of work, that I can incorporate into my own art (as long as the copyright has run out). British-born Eadweard Muybridge, who laid the foundation for modern cinema and died over a 100 years ago, and I make art together.

Muybridge’s motion photos of a man on horse at the University of Pennsylvania

Eadweard Muybridge, initially earned his fame for taking spectacular photos of the American west in the late 1800’s. But he was best known for his photos of animal locomotion done at the University of Pennsylvania. Leland Stanford (businessman, former governor of California, race horse owner, and founder of Stanford University) served as a catalyst in 1872, when he hired Muybridge to photograph his galloping horses. He wanted to know if all four feet of the horse left the ground at once (Stanford also hoped the photos might tell him how to breed a faster race horse, much to his rivals’ unhappiness.)

Muybridge wired 24 still cameras along a race track, and as the galloping horses passed by, the shutters were clicked on the cameras. Muybridge obtained a photographic record of successive phases in the horse’s motion and, discovered that all four hooves left the ground at once when the horse reached a gallop.

Muybridge’s motion photos of a tiger.at the University of Pennsylvania

Muybridge’s motion photography for Leland Stanford excited some wealthy east coast citizens and came to the attention of the University of Pennsylvania and the famous American artist, Thomas Eakins in the 1880’s. They invited him to their city to continue his motion photography—providing him with grant money and an outdoor studio on the grounds of the University veterinary hospital. Animals from the local zoo served as his models. The resulting photos were published in an epic portfolio, titled, Animal Locomotion.

But Muybridge nearly sabotaged his artistic career. It seems his personal life warranted as much attention as his professional life. At middle-age he married a pretty, younger wife, but was frequently absent from home. He soon discovered that his wife was having an affair with Harry Larkyns, a San Francisco theatre critic. In 1874. Muybridge discovered that Larkyns had gone to Calistoga, a small town in Napa Valley north of San Francisco, and made the six hour journey by ferry and train. He found Larkyns playing cribbage (shouldn’t they have been playing poker?) and shot him in the chest just below the left nipple. Larkyns staggered outdoors and died under an oak tree.

Arrested and jailed for the murder, Muybridge soon stood trial. (His wealthy patron, Leland Stanford, paid the lawyer’s bills.) A sympathetic jury came back with a verdict of “justifiable homicide.” Adultery was a far greater crime than the murder of a man who seduced someone else’s wife.

Smaller accordion bound books of Muybridge’s animal motion photos

What goes around comes around. Muybridge delighted audiences back then with his motion photos of animals walking and running across a University of Pennsylvania courtyard and laid the foundation for modern movies. And I came along and found his photos so enchanting that I “repurposed” them making art books with an accordion style form of binding. I hope that today’s viewer will get as much delight as I did out of seeing the rear end of a large elephant walking away from the camera lifting one large hoof after another and flicking his tail in my accordion style book.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

Making Books in Culpepper, Virginia

By Judy Folkenberg

judyfolkenberg.com (my art website)

“It is a beautiful truth that all men contain something of the artist in them.” Walt Whitman

Culpepper, Virginia: I’m heading down Route 29 to a small town, Culpepper, in Virginia about a couple of hours south of Washington DC. to teach a book binding course. It’s one of those sunny winter days, where the brightness makes you think it’s warm, and then you open the car door…and realize that it’s darn cold out there.

I don’t know much about Culpepper, but it was supposed to be pretty important during the American Civil War. And so it was. Situated on a railway line, halfway between Richmond, the rebel capital, and Wash. DC, Union headquarters, Culpepper became one of the most desired properties during the Civil war. Both armies wanted Culpepper, and the small town played “host” to each side some 80 times as they were occupied by one or the other army. During a five month occupation by union soldiers, every tree was cut down for fuel. Today, there is no tree older than 150 years in the county.

Clara Barton got her start here as a nurse, and she and poet Walt Whitman tirelessly nursed wounded soldiers. It seems that George Custer also got his start here in Culpepper. He had graduated dead last from his class at West Point amassing a record-total of 726 demerits, one of the worst conduct records in the history of the academy. Without the Civil War, he probably would have been kicked out of West Point. But the Union Army was desperate for officers so assigned him to Culpepper. One day Custer attempted to stop a train taking supplies to the south and was shot in the leg by a rebel soldier, who then shot and killed his horse.

Of course Custer was later killed in his battle against the Sioux Indians at Little Bighorn, and one can only wonder what would have happened if the rebel soldier had shot and killed Custer rather than his horse.

We arrive in Culpepper, a charming Virginia town with a lovely historic district, fine restaurants, and the only remnant of the Civil War are trees no older than 150 years.

The railroad that was fought so bitterly over, is now an Amtrak station–although an Amtrak station with a local historian sitting at a desk. My friend and fellow book binder, Linda, and I are shown to our room, by our hostess who runs “Artful Conversations” one evening a month and owns several businesses in the town.

There’s cocktails before the 45 minute lecture, and a gourmet meal afterwards. We are doing things a bit differently tonight. I will talk for about a 10 minutes, and then will teach the class how to bind two chap books (a book that got its start in the 1500’s) to take home with them.

And what a lovely time we had. All the students are passionate about books and talk about how their children and grandchildren love “real” books. They catch on very quickly on how to bind the two books and exclaim over their handiwork. Because as Walt Whitman said, all of us contain something of the artist in ourselves

During our gourmet meal afterwards, the conversation ranges all over the place; from 9/11, to truckers who now move the majority of goods all over the United States. It ranges from the battle of New Orleans and the British invasion there, and how one of the guests got locked in the Taj Mahal overnight when she traveled to India as a young woman. It seems that people who are passionate about books are also good conversationalists.

As the evening ends, one of the guests asks about the recipe for a white pizza hors d’oeuvre we had eaten. The dough was indescribably delicious. Our hostess smiles and says she found the recipe in an old Italian recipe book that she bought at a second hand book store.

The Places We Love

By Judy Folkenberg

judyfolkenberg.com (my art website)

To be frank, the black and white photos aren’t very good. They were taken by my father in the late 1940’s of a place where I later camped as a child, the most beautiful place in the world: Yosemite, California. I never called Yosemite, “the most beautiful place in the world,” because children don’t talk that way. You just know that somehow certain places are special–and you carry that knowledge into adulthood.

My brother, parents, and I camped in an army green tent with a peaked roof and an entrance with a tied back flap under tall ponderosa pines whose needles littered the forest floor; the sweet smell drifting through the air. We swam in the cold, pure waters with Yosemite Falls as our background. And we ate our supper in the clean sharp air from plastic sectioned plates usually with a breeze that drifted through the campground and across the water. The days were hot and lazy, a golden wonder; the nights chilly, as we snuggled in our army green sleeping bags on wooden cots.

Unfortunately that was then and the now has changed. I haven’t been back to Yosemite since I was seven years old. I understand too many humans clog its natural pathways. It’s expensive to get through the gates, it’s probably noisy, and it’s become far too popular a place to visit. I’ve been told there’s a theme park whiff about it. And, of course we all know, “you can’t go home again.”

You Can’t Go Home Again is the title of Thomas Wolff’s famous novel where the protagonist realizes that he can’t relive his youthful memories or go back home to the way things used to be. And the phrase is used tirelessly to explain how you can’t revisit the past. After all, the truth about childhood places is elusive and probably should be remembered with caution; like a girl’s first love we pick and choose what we want to relive

But what most people don’t realize, is that despite the title of the novel, there’s another quote the protagonist makes, which is not so well-known: “But…why had he thought so much about it and remembered it with such blazing accuracy, if it did not matter… All that he knew was that the years flow by like water, and that one day men come home again.”

Page from the Yosemite chap book that features my dad’s photos of Yosemite. This particular photo is of Yosemite Falls.

So, one day I will go home again. I will go back to Yosemite. But until that happens I can do something else. I can preserve that time as a child through my art. I’m a book artist. I will make small books (known as “chap books,” and the format has been around since the 1500’s) that feature my dad’s photos of Yosemite. Because even though they “aren’t very good,” there’s really no such thing as a bad photograph of Yosemite.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

I’m a Gambling Kind of Gal, so I Became an Artist

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

A friend once said that love and art are crap shoots. You take your chances, weigh your odds, and hope for success. And it seems that in art, a piece more often than not, doesn’t turn out that way you expect and sometimes the results can be pretty awful.

But awful results are just fine–although it took me quite a while to accept that. “It’s all a part of the process,” they say, a phrase I dislike and which by now has become a cliche. And, ” you learn from your mistakes,” another phrase I dislike, but which is sometimes true. (Sometimes you don’t learn from your mistakes.)

But I like to gamble and what better way to fulfill my risk taking behavior than to make art or write. The odds are often against me for any kind of quick success, but still I plunge ahead…figuring it’s worth the risk.

This is the awful piece of art that didn’t turn out.

A number of my ideas for art pieces come from seeing photos of other’s people’s art. I use that photo as a jumping off point to make my own piece. Sometime ago, I saw a photo that combined torn paper with wood. I love combining paper and wood and spent several hours hand-tearing the colored paper, punching the holes and getting it just right. But when I put it all together, it sucked. I tried it another way of assembling the piece and it still look awful. I huffed and I puffed and nothing happened.

So how do I change my odds? What I did, was to make another piece that combined paper and wood, and in short order it turned out great. Ironically, I didn’t even fuss or fret over the piece, and the whole gamble proceeded quite smoothly. You can see the result in the top photo of this blog post.

It doesn’t matter if you win or lose; you just have to play hand after hand in the art game to increase your odds of getting what you want. Because we don’t get it right, until we get it wrong.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

The Tools of My Trade

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

Tools allow us to be artists. They give us the freedom to take that imaginary creation in our mind and turn it into an actual piece of art to be seen by others.

I can’t punch holes with my bare fingers–or my teeth. I can’t cut paper with my hands. Without rulers and straight edges, my art would look crooked and sloppy. If I didn’t have book presses or weights, I’d have to sit on my books to get them to form nicely. I collect tools, hoard them, and selfishly guard them. I do not lend them to other book artists!

Here is a partial list of the tools I use:

Awls and Bonefolders: I’ve got to punch holes in the pages of books in order to sew them. Awls have been around for hundreds of years; monks used them to make holes in their manuscripts; Venetian (Venice was the early capital of publishing and bookbinding) bookbinders used them and all we 21st century book binders use them. Little has changed in the technology. A sharp implement embedded in wood does the job.

Bonefolders: These tools make clean creases and score the pages. I also use them to burnish the paper once it has been glued to the book binders board. Bonefolders also help spread the glue, and get any wrinkles out of the paper that might have resulted from the gluing. They are usually made out of, surprise, animal bones. Teflon now seems to be the material of choice. Sharp creases are important in making books and I love running my folders down the paper to get a clean crease.

Paper Cutters: These machines are the most expensive of my tools. My two large ones, a Kutrimmer made in Germany, is known as a board and and paper cutter. I also have a guillotine paper cutter (a Dahl, made in the USA) which can cut through stacks of paper and binder’s board. To keep the blades sharp (and yes, they can hack a finger off) I have them hand-sharpened by specialist.

Weights and Book Presses: I can’t seem to stop buying weights. We need these objects to keep binder’s board from buckling, to make sure book covers close properly, and to add that finishing touch. I have loads of them. My favorites, though, made by girlfriend’s mother, are tapestry covered bricks. You can’t go wrong with a brick as a weighty object.

Book presses perform the same task. The large wooden one (the right one in the photo) was made by an Italian man who ran a book binding studio in Virginia. During the day he would play Italian opera music while his employees worked. A former employee told me that it was the most enchanting place to work. The more funky press (left in the photo) is a 1930’s textbook press. It squeaks when I turn the large handle at the top.

Other Devices: Cradles help you make a hole exactly in the fold of the paper. They help me be more precise in my work. A corner cutter, takes square corners and rounds them. I only use with soft (paper) covers. Rulers and straight edges are invaluable. They help make my art more precise, and let me run an exacto knife down the straight edge for precise cuts. Scissors and paintbrushes need no explanation.

“The practice of art isn’t to make isn’t to make a living. It’s to make your soul grow,” said Kurt Vonnegut. Good tools help me practice my art–and nurture my soul.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

Books and Cats (Go Together Like a Horse and Carriage)

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

Cats got their literary start in the scriptoriums of medieval monasteries. This relationship can be traced back to an 8^th or 9^th century poem, Pangur Ban (which means white cat). Supposedly written by an Irish Benedictine monk who worked in the scriptorium of Reichenau Abbey, a German abbey on an island of the same name, the author compares his scholarly pursuits with the cat’s activities of chasing mice.

“I and Pangur Ban my cat,
‘Tis a like task we are at:
Hunting mice is his delight,
Hunting words I sit all night.”

That monks and cats formed close bonds should come as no surprise. Mice and rats lived in the scriptoriums feasting on the precious, hand-copied manuscripts. Cats, on the other hand, feasted on the rodents. Scriptoriums were also solitary places, so this companionship between kitties and monks made a whole lot of sense even though monks ran the risk of kitties stepping in the ink jars and walking across the manuscript leaving their paw prints. Proof of ink-soaked paws are shown in the illustration (right), a medieval manuscript that a researcher recently discovered when going through manuscripts in Dubrovnik, Croatia. This habit exists to this day and age: cats now walk across the computer keyboard.

Many 20th century writers turned to cats as their favorite muse. Ernest Hemingway was famous for his numerous polydactyl cats, the descendants of which exist to this day at his house/museum in Florida. Poets William Carlos Williams and Randall Jarrell (“The cat’s asleep; I whisper “kitten” Till he stirs a little and begins to purr–) kept cats, as did the existentialists, Albert Camus and Jean-Paul Sartre. (It looks like the kitty is dictating to Sartre the copy of Being and Nothingness, which Sartre claimed to have authored). The beat writer, Jack Kerouac, adored his ginger Persian, “Tyke,” and compared the death of Tyke to the death of his little brother. William Burroughs had cats all his life and seemed to love them as much as he loved illicit drugs.

Mark Twain qualifies as perhaps the most famous writer/cat-lover. He considered cats superior to humans (“If man could be crossed with the cat it would improve man, but it would deteriorate the cat.” – Notebook, 1894) and owned cats all his life.

Cats even played a role in the writing of his classic, “Huck Finn.” Twain began writing the novel in the summer of 1876 in a small study filled with cats, in Elmira, New York.

A 1905 Washington Post article described Twain’s huge bed, where he spent a good deal of time writing. The reporter enumerates the various items on the bed; the books, writing materials, clothes and numerous other objects (“enough to furnish a Harlem flat”).

The reporter continues: “He looks quite happy rising out of the mass, and over all prowls a huge black cat of a very unhappy disposition. She snaps, snarls and claws and bites, and Mark Twain takes his turn with the rest; when she gets tired of tearing up manuscripts, she scratches him and he bears with a patience wonderful to behold.” –interview subtitled “Mark Twain’s Bed,” Washington Post, March 26, 1905, page F12

The most absurd thing in life is how much pleasure I get from TeddyBoy (my cat pictured in top photo). The second most absurd thing is how I lay the burden of muse on TeddyBoy’s furry shoulders, and how well he seems to bear it with nary a care in the world.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

The Back Story of “The Story of Ferdinand” (A Book for All Ages)

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

Some children’s books stay with us forever. We even reread them as adults. The Story of Ferdinand by Munro Leaf, published in 1936, is one of those books.

In case you spent a deprived childhood without reading the book, let me recap. Ferdinand, the bull, was born on a farm with other bulls who liked to run and jump and butt their heads. But Ferdinand liked to smell the flowers and sit under the cork tree. When some men came from Madrid to “recruit” bulls for fighting, they saw Ferdinand who was puffing and snorting, and butting and pawing. They were delighted and promptly declared him the is fiercest bull of all and loaded him into the cart. What they didn’t know was that Ferdinand had sat on a bee, and was reacting to a bee sting!

The day of the fight arrived. “What a day it was. Flags were flying, bands were playing…and all the lovely ladies had flowers in their hair.”

Alas when Ferdinand entered the bull ring, he promptly sat down in the middle of the ring and stared at the ladies with flowers in their hair. He refused to fight. Ferdinand was then sent home to his favorite pasture and spends his days sitting under the cork tree.

Ferdinand bull — One of the bull topiaries in the yard of the house, where the late Munro Leaf used to live.

Leaf wrote the 800 words in less than an hour. The reviews of the book were so-so, and sales started out slowly before taking off and selling 3,000 copies a week. The Story of Ferdinand soon knocked Gone With the Wind off the top of the best-seller list. Many of the sales were generated by adults purchasing the book for themselves. However, the book was not without controversy. Although Life Magazine called it, “the greatest juvenile classic since, Winnie the Pooh,” the Cleveland Plain Dealer “accused the book of corrupting the youth of America.”

Ferdinand was accused of being a fascist, a communist, an anarchist, and a pacifist. (Please folks make up your mind!) Hitler burned copies of the translated book, and Spain banned it until after Franco, the dictator, died. H.G. Wells and Gandhi, on the other hand, loved the book and FDR requested a copy be delivered to the White House. Interest in the book has not diminished. Translated into 60 languages, it has never been out of print.

A good children’s book appeals to all ages. As C.S. Lewis said, “A children’s story that can only be enjoyed by children is not a good children’s story.” Munro Leaf says he wrote the book because he wanted to make readers laugh and remind them that Ferdinand wanted to be true to himself. Reading Ferdinand again and again reminds me of just how valuable this lesson is.

The late author lived in a house about two miles from where we live.

Ferdinand house plate — This is the plaque on the house were the late author, Munro Leaf, lived in Garrett Park, Maryland

TeddyBoy and I would like to thank the current owners of Ferdinand’s House, Margaret and Karol Edward Soltan, who graciously allowed us to trample through their yard for photos.

She is an English professor at the George Washington University, and he is a professor of political science at University of Maryland. The Soltons maintain the bull topiaries in the front yard, an homage to Ferdinand.

TeddyBoy, the kitty in the top photo, did a PawReview of The Story of Ferdinand. Go to: teddyboysinclair.com and read his PawReview.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

A 1950’s Fairy Tale: Grandpa and the Lion

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

As we climbed into bed each evening and pulled the covers up to our chins, a daily ritual began for my brother and I when we were kids: the bedtime story, usually told by our dad. One of those stories, a 1950’s fairy tale, was different. It was a true story about a rescued African lioness who lived as a tame tabby cat with a Washington State couple, and my grandpa Folkenberg’s visits with the young lion.

Unfortunately, this bedtime story does not have a pretty beginning. Little Tyke was born at the Point Defiance Zoo in the late 1940’s in Tacoma, Washington to a lioness who had killed her previous five cubs. The small cub nearly suffered the same fate; as her mother flung her against the bars of the cage severely injuring her. A couple, George and Margaret Westbeau, who ran a rescue ranch, The Hidden Valley Ranch, in a neighboring town, took the small cub home. A constant round of bottle feedings and bandage changes (which caused excruciating pain to the cub), brought her back to health and she grew up to be a 350 pound lioness who lived in the house like a domestic tabby cat.

Little Tyke, lioness — Little Tyke cuddles a kitten between her paws.

She lounged on the kitchen floor, loved watching TV from her seat on the sofa, and napped with her head resting on the lap of Margaret Westbeau. When the Westbeaus took road trips with her, she would often stick her shoulder and paws out of the car window, her fur blowing in the wind. Pit stops were made and she would take care of business by the side of the road, just like a well-trained house pet, never running away. If the Westbeaus stayed in a motel they always got one room with two beds: one for them and one for Little Tyke.

Part of the Zoo’s motivation in allowing the Westbeaus to rescue the injured cub, was that George owned a freezer plant, where he stored large amounts of meat. And there could be no better home for a carnivore who eventually reached 350 pounds, than a family who owned a meat freezer plant. Lions eat up to 16 pounds of meat a day.

But there was one glitch, Little Tyke refused to eat meat, no matter how hard the Westbeaus tried. They would decrease the amounts of meat in her food to miniscule portions, but she still refused. They were so desperate that they even tried going from just 10 drops of beef blood to one drop of blood in a meal, but Little Tyke turned up her nose. There’s even a photo of George holding a cut of meat up to her while she turns her head away. They finally gave up and served her a special vegetarian diet that would take care of her nutritional needs.

It’s unclear how my grandparents, who lived in California, knew the Westbeaus. They had numerous relatives in the Portland, Oregon area, so perhaps there was a connection there. Several visits were made to the ranch; to my grandfather’s delight, but to my grandmother’s apprehension. My grandfather would rush out of the car to greet Little Tyke, who placed her fore paws on his shoulders, embracing him. They would roll around the kitchen floor playing together while my grandmother would remain in the car, or stand off to the side, stiff-lipped and frowning. The magnitude of the visits was so great that my grandfather could talk of nothing else for days when he returned home.

Little Tyke defied expectations in another respect–her species’s reputation for being fierce hunters. Her favorite companion, for example was Becky, the lamb, who often rested between her paws.

Other photos show Little Tyke with a kitten between her fore paws, a small toddler climbing on her, and day old chicks frolicking around her. She would even allow “Imp,” a black kitten to share her food. She wandered among the peacocks, who also lived on the ranch.

She was so tame, that she rode unshackled on local parade floats. Little Tyke also was featured in an ad campaign for a local auto dealership, sitting in the driver’s seat surrounded by three men. (Note the apprehensive look on the faces of the men in the back seat.)

There are also home movies, which show Little Tyke walking with Margaret in the snow and cuddling with her, cheek to jowl. In another scene, George climbs out of the river in his swimsuit and wrestles with his favorite feline friend.

Of course, Hollywood soon beckoned and that rarely ends well. Cecil B. DeMille, an early Hollywood producer and director, had Little Tyke audition in 1952 for a part in “The Greatest Show on Earth.” And in 1955, Little Tyke appeared in Art Baker’s popular TV show, “You Asked for It.” After her final TV appearance that same year, Little Tyke became ill with viral pneumonia, and died in July in the arms of George at Hidden Valley Ranch, her home. The stress of filming and the sudden change in climate from Washington to California had been too much for her. She was nearly 10 years old at the time of her death.

Little Tyke helps sell cars at a local auto dealership, Herb Satterlee Motors. George Westbeau sits in the front.

My brother and I loved the story of grandpa and Little Tyke, told numerous times by our dad at bedtime. It wasn’t your typical fairy tale, but it had many of its elements: enchantment, magic, wonder, and a most fantastic creature; a lion, who was so tame that you could pet and frolic with her. But fairy tales also resonant with adults…at least this adult. The story of Little Tyke delighted and shocked me and gave me a glimpse of something greater. That the improbable could happen. That miracles might be possible.

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

(A book titled, “Little Tyke,” was written by George Westbeau–with added chapters by Margaret in later editions. It’s available on Amazon in soft cover and on Kindle and published by Quest Books.)

One Lovely Library

“Libraries raised me.” —Ray Bradbury

When the good citizens of the small Massachusetts town, Lancaster (founded in 1653), decided to build a memorial for the 39 home town soldiers killed in the Civil War, they built “a free public library, with well-laden shelves, a reading-room, and needful appliances.” (Little did the founding fathers know, that “needful appliances” would include computers some 125 years later.)

Rather than a statue to honor them, the town’s citizens felt a Library would better commemorate the soldiers’ sacrifices.

I lived in Lancaster for about three years during my girlhood, and once a week, my mother would take my brother and me to the Thayer Memorial Library. It was a sturdy brick building, with large floor-to-ceiling windows. Bookcases lined the walls of the first floor and the walls of the second floor balcony, which was reached by a spiral staircase. Large round wooden tables were scattered throughout the Library…you could spread your books out and gaze at them, thumbing through the pages.

My favorite books included a series with “Little Maid,” in the title (A little Maid of Massachusetts Colony, A Little Maid of Bunker Hill, A Little Maid of Mohawk Valley, etc,). No, these were not books about household servants but a series of historical novels about little girls who helped fight the revolutionary war.

In these books, little girls carried secret messages to generals, helped capture English privateers, and served as spies. Of course, they performed these duties all while being impeccably dressed in pretty dresses with pinafores, and in their high button boots. Those little girls could accomplish anything, and I almost believed the Revolutionary War wouldn’t have been won without their efforts.

Memorials to fallen soldiers come in many guises, but I can’t think of a better one, than a “free public library,” to the town’s future residents. I didn’t know the names of the solders but their sacrifice resulted in a gift that was immeasurable: light-filled rooms full of books, which fostered my imagination and a life-long love of books.

I encountered librarians who didn’t mind a small girl asking loads of questions, and who helped me choose the “best” books.

As Ray Bradbury said in the opening quote; “libraries raised me.” And I can’t think of a better parent.

(National Library Week is April 9-15, 2017)

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

By Hand

http://www.judyfolkenberg.com/ (my art website)

Enchantment comes in many forms but rarely when we expect it. So when I signed up for a two day course in making clam shell boxes at the Cat Tail Run Hand Bookbinding Studio in Winchester, Virginia, I anticipated a detailed workshop on the finer points of box-making. One box would have a curved spine, a more complicated structure.

cat tail bindery photo — Cat Tail Bindery

Clam shell boxes, are boxes most often used to house rare, fragile, or valuable books, or loose papers. Each box is custom made and the parts of each box must be cut precisely by hand, and measured multiple times before cuts are made. Pasting is done by hand and at each stage of the structure, several things can go wrong. As often as not, your eye is the best guide.

We arrived for our two-day workshop on a warm October day. We walked on a small bridge over a Koi pond and entered a large, light-filled, high-ceilinged studio in the Virginia countryside. We listened to the music of Bach while a gentle breeze wafted through our space.

We worked in a space full of tools and books, handmade paper, and rolls of book cloth with a dedicated teacher who has restored General Sherman’s battle plans, books from George Washington’s Library, the White House, and Ford’s Theatre. Our activities were over-seen by Molly, the cat, and Bailey, the black lab.

photo of Molly the bindery cat — Molly, the bindery cat

We left the digital world behind and entered a world where things are done by hand and we could sit back and admire our work at each step of the way.

When I make a book, or a box to hold that book by hand, I feel a connection to communities from hundreds of years ago: To monks in monastery libraries who labored by candlelight; to book artisans in small shops along the Grand Canal in Venice; and to palace libraries that exist to this day. Yes, the materials have changed over hundreds of years, but the techniques are the same and many of the tools are similar. And isn’t that one definition of enchantment–to be part of a grand community of artists and artisans, going back hundreds of years?

judyfolkenberg@verizon.net

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“Libraries raised me.” —Ray Bradbury

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