Ahhh, Paste Paper!

Today, Randy Keenan and I conducted what the Books Arts Roundtable calls a Drop-in on Paste Paper. We both brought examples and Randy's were beyond awesome!! After a demonstration period we turned the participants loose. There was controlled chaos for four hours and at the end there was a mountain of paste paper to be taken home

Randy brought her ready made wallpaper paste and I mixed up a variety of homemade recipes for experimentation by the group. I told the participants to make notes so they could learn from their experiments but I forgot once again to do that myself. Oh, well, I'll have to experiment some more!!

Randy used contact paper as a stencil resist and it came out perfectly but I didn't manage to photograph that.

I learned from Jan Kerr the delight of making a detailed design and coming over it with a large tool which gives a wonderful two dimensional effect with one color pass.

It's clear that multiple layers are where the real fun begins.

There were some experiments done with unusual tools, such as a styrofoam block with many circles. Interesting texture was achieved by placing things under the paper which shows through when you come across with your scraping tool.

You may be wondering about the hanging system. I knew from experience that a few people can quickly amass an overwhelming amount of paper that needs to dry safely. I decided to string up two sturdy parallel cords between, in this case, some rickety easels.

Onto the cords I had pre-strung a variety of hanging devices that would hold the

paper perpendicular to the parallel cords.

Clothespins were adapted by taping on a sturdy piece of mylar with a hole punched in it. This way the paper would hang the right way and the hole was close to the size of the cord so that it would slide but had some resistance.

We slid two clips to one end for the first paper and subsequent papers were added fairly close to the previous paper along the parallel cords. I also had binder clips strung on the cords but the clothespins were better by far.

I had devices to enable a person to carry the wet paper to the lines and have a hand free for the attaching. There's nothing worse than making a lovely sheet and having it double back on itself or onto you and getting smudged. The best tool for that job turned out to be a simple wire clothes hanger with clothespins duct taped in place (so they wouldn't slide around) or a simple plastic skirt hanger. A lot of participants chose to manage the transfer without my gadget but I offer this solution to all future paste paper groups with my best wishes!!