Wednesday, April 25, 2012

Bookbinding Themes

My growing desire to incorporate pattern in my paintings has led me back to Gustav Klimt.  I've always loved his art but there are amazing design treasures to be found in the detail of his pictures.  Of course I'm not the first to make this discovery.  His designs pop up everywhere.  I'm spending a lot of time just doodling with his recurring marks.

At the same time I've been trying to extend my bookbinding craft.  I've just completed a Japanese Album Accordion with a soft cover.  The red cardboard looked a little plain so I added a Klimt doodle to the first page of the accordion and cut a frame in the cover. 





This is such a simple little book with a very distinctive Japanese style.




I think I'll dedicate it to further studies of Klimt.


I've lost count of how many Reverse Piano Hinge sketchbooks our American students from Santa Chiara have made in the print studio in the past weeks.  It's been a wonderful extension of Rick Woodbury's  printmaking course because everyone has made a beautiful monotype cover for their book. 

For my demonstration book I used a beautiful piece of paste paper made by my Sydney artist friend, Wendy Shortland.  I'd never have learned to make these books without Wendy's help and now I am really keen to make my own paste papers covers.

Paste paper cover by Wendy Shortland

9 comments:

Jenny Woolf said...

I am a dope, I have never looked closely at these details in Klimt.I went to a whole show of his and even then just looked at the big picture. Oh well next time I see one of hs works I will look more closely.

vivien said...

these are utterly gorgeous Robyn

JANE MINTER said...

beautiful books and cover designs robyn i love classical japanese sketchbooks ... hoping to see klimt exhibition in venice ...the solar printing looked fascinating

Robyn Sinclair said...

Not a dope, Jenny. We usually see what we're looking for. I was looking for pattern.

Vivien, thank you. :)

Jane. Thank you. Sadly I think I'm going to be in Venice too late this year for the Klimt exhibition. Lucky you. By the way I love your iPad drawing.

quirkyartist said...

Isn't it interesting how, when you've cut your book boards & know the size, you can make a composition with the paste paper. I see you've done that. It looks great.

Robyn Sinclair said...

It wasn't hard to make a composition out of your beautiful piece of paper, Wendy. I was the envy of all the students making their own paper covers. Many were inspired by your marks.

Annie said...

Love your Klimt Doodle, he was an amazing artist.I have a lot of fun making books for sketching.
Great picture of Charlie whilst you were in Australia.

Robyn Sinclair said...

Thanks, Annie. Charlie now has his proper name under his photo. :) How I'd love to be coming to work in your studio again.

Nora MacPhail said...

Fantastic! Very original and creative!

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