Wax and the Artist Book II

Ania Gilmore, Lexington, MA & Warsaw, Poland
Library of Alexandria
Altered book, burned pages, wax, shellac. One of a kind. 5 x 7.5”

Wax and the Artist Book II, curated by Catherine Nash

A continuing study has evolved out of this personal curiosity... I wondered, "How are contemporary book artists combining beeswax/encaustics within/onto their artist books?" This second year of curating has pulled together completely new examples: the artist books of 17 featured artists from the U.S. and Europe exhibit a rich integration of encaustic both technically and conceptually.

Hanne Mattheison, Malling, Denmark
Book of Destiny I
Cover in white waxed linen cloth 5 x 3.5 in.

First presented in 2009, at the Third Annual, I presented this completely new compilation of bookworks in lecture format at the Fourth Annual Encaustic Painting Conference held June 11-13th, 2010 in Beverly, MA.

Tracy Longley-Cook, Dayton, OH Lateral Growth (from the series Stages of Growth) On right side, etched glass in front of Japanese paper.
On left, layered encaustic medium (about 1⁄4 inch thick) embedded with ocotillo thorns in a spiral pattern that emerge out of the wax base.
Back view shows graph image on acetate with a small sliced section of a chambered nautilus shell.
open 17”W x 11”H x 4”D closed 9”W x 11”H x 4”D

Pamela Paulsrud, Wilmette, IL
Drift Velocity
Altered book, encaustic, mixed media 9” x 6” x 1”

Raymond Papka, Versailles, KY USA
Box of Books Series - #6
Mixed Media Assemblage, 10”H x 7.25”W x 1.5”D

To help foster more connections, I have presented the artists in a print quality document available as a free downloadable pdf from the article section of my website. Just scroll down to the Artist Book section. Each artist is represented by a single page in alphabetical order. The information in this e-book is necessarily reduced from the original lecture, but I am hoping that you will let the artists’ own words and art inspire you to explore their work further by investigating their website links.

Jeanne Borofsky, Groton, MA USA
Pál Csaba, Budapest, Hungary
Ania Gilmore, Lexington, MA, USA & Warsaw, Poland
Tracy Longley-Cook, Dayton, OH, USA
Julie Shaw Lutts, Salem, MA, USA
Hanne Matthieson, Malling, Denmark
Laura Moriarty, Rosendale, NY, USA
Irmari Nacht, Englewood, NJ, USA
Haley Nagy, Chicago, IL, USA
Catherine Nash, Tucson, AZ USA
Melody Overstreet, Santa Cruz, CA, USA
Raymond Papka, Versailles, KY, USA
Pamela Paulsrud, Wilmette, IL, USA
Josie Rodriguez, San Diego, CA, USA
Laura Wait, Steamboat Springs, CO, USA
Beata Wehr, Tucson, AZ, USA & Warsaw, Poland
Heidi Zednik, Asheville, NC, USA born in Austria

Special thanks to all of the artists who answered my international call. Your work is exciting and inspiring!
Thanks also to Joanne Mattera for enabling this project.