With artisan crafter Kelsey Pike's new book Modern Papermaking: Techniques in Handmade Paper, DIYers and artists of all stripes will take delight in a beautiful book layout that highlights the art and science – and details the tools and processes – of home and studio papermaking. Those who are brand-new to papermaking can begin with at-home crafting via the author's own favorite recipes for papermaking; and the book's content is conspicuously textured to inspire the first-time or experienced papercrafter to move forward with design and production of papers that are uniquely theirs. Full-color photographs and diagrams on every page hasten readers' technical footing on small-batch pulp and paper production, while the beauty of color, texture, and infinite variety available to the papercrafter is never lost from sight.
Regardless of prior experience, readers will appreciate that construction of the simple tools they will need – a press, for example, and other equipment the reader is shown called the couching table, and the mould and deckle – are separately treated, each in its own dedicated book section, as part of a coherent narrative. This organizational scheme renders papermaking accessible to any weekend crafter (or full-time artisan!) who needs help mapping the “moving parts” to a project-driven framework, beginning with planning and setup, and culminating in paper production.
With analogous sensitivity, the author addresses differences in available workspace, project time commitments, and artistic/technical-entrepreneurial goals by offering alternatives at several key steps in hand papermaking. For producing pulp, for example, optional use of a mallet, stand blender, Hollander beater (with operation diagrammed and explained) and several other pulping methods are presented with sufficient detail, once again without technical overburdening. Similarly, the choice of an appropriate location for ones papermaking endeavors spans the considerations of the small-space apartment dweller, on up to those who will ultimately fit-out professional studios for papermaking. The author insightfully characterizes papermaking as “equal parts art and science” (p. 73), and thus record-keeping, color testing, grading, and the logic/examples of several types of pertinent calculations (e.g., weight and thickness for uniformly produced papers), define benchmarks aimed at informing the crafter's future paper production, use, and/or product sales.
This reviewer developed an appreciation for Kelsey Pike's papercrafts some years ago, and has been interested, too, in the inextricable role paper plays in the records of history. For centuries, much social, intellectual, and technological progress has been founded – recorded, transmitted, preserved – upon pieces of paper. And paper has supported and supplied art and its development in so many modes and forms. Production of handwritten and typed letters, cards, periodicals, books, ads, playbills, original artworks, prints... These continue to be seen on paper in an age of more-or-less parallel digital conveyance. That readers of Modern Papermaking are prepared to make sustainable substrates for some of these handwritten and printed materials is cause enough for the book's publication; but with this skillfully organized book in-hand, one is enlivened to see, too, how papercraft affords its own artistic mission, its own stations. Adding new media tool kits is always good for artists! The seasoned artist might now craft paper of their own design, no longer sourcing from a finished paper supplier that just never quite suited the artist's ends anyway. And for other artists and craftspeople, their paper is, in itself, the very expression of their aesthetic goals, with fine-tunings that perhaps belong only to them, or to the domain of papercraft alone. Papermaking, from its earliest instance of popularity around the year 105 BCE (see p. 10; early paper provided the literal foundation for Chinese woodblock prints) has been associated with artistic endeavors, not only as a support to artistic expression, but now more than ever, constituting an expressive art form in its own right.
It is a joy to behold this colorful volume, with its rich use of photographs and diagrams illustrating the implementation of hand papermaking processes, start-to-finish, along with stunning photographs of Kelsey Pike's finished work, and her detailed explanations/strategies for making and modifying each. Crafters and DIYers can make beautiful paper with personality: papers that the casual note-writer and artist-professional alike will love. Readers who are aware of the author's nearly two decades' experience in papercraft will not be surprised by her many helpful troubleshooting tips and words of advice, delivered in a most cordial, fun narrative. In this increasingly digitally-driven world, paper holds a new sense of value. If paper is more special now than ever before, as this reviewer believes it is, then Kelsey Pike's book is important for all who contemplate what, exactly, paper is...what it can be...and why it matters... Above all, it is important for all who want to join the fun and create something beautiful. Roll up your sleeves, because a great adventure awaits with Modern Papermaking!
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