2026facultystaff – Focus on Book Arts

Susan Lowdermilk—Eadem mutata resurgo. Though transformed, I will remain unchanged.

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Eadem mutata resurgo. Though transformed, I will remain unchanged. The title is a quote by 17th Swiss mathematician, Jakob Bernoulli. These words are also engraved into his tombstone.…

Susan Lowdermilk—Evening Grosbeak

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement North America has lost almost three billion birds since 1970. “Decline of the North American Avifauna,” published in Science, 2019, was the first-ever widespread avian population assessment. My…

Susan Lowdermilk—American Kestrel

Robin Feinman—Line Drawing

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This is a collaboration between me and my mother, who wrote the short poems. Each poem is four lines, accompanied by an abstract line drawing meant to convey…

Anne Sobbota—Inspired by Grace: Freddie’s Gloves

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Bringing emotion and sparking a conversation through combining the arts of printing, glass fusing, and book binding are inspiring to me. The gloves pictured in this image were…

Anne Sobbota—Whisper Ribbon

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I love to experiment with different methods of forming and displaying fused glass. Because the glass is fired, finding ways to include paper and the element of communication…

Roberta Lavadour—Spirit Guide

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This work grew out of thinking a lot about appropriation, and how materials, techniques, and imagery hold cultural weight. I’m fascinated by the New Age to white supremacy…

Roberta Lavadour—Love, Punky

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement My earliest memory is of walking to church on a maple-leaf stained-sidewalk in Bremen, Indiana, my Aunt Marie berating my Uncle Dewey for the black grease still embedded…

Cat Monroy—1996

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I thought I was pretty special, creating a book out of paper bags! I remember loving the sound of the paper and the texture of it. I wanted…

Cat Monroy—2006

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This book was created in 2006, 10 years after my first book (1996, the paper bag lunch book). It was made during a time when I was moving…

Castle Danz—A Voyage to Arcturus

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Recently Ingram announced they were discontinuing distribution of mass market paperback books (MMPBs). Many large publishers responded to the lack of distribution by discontinuing production of the format.…

Kris Stewart—Northwest Haiku

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This project is very close to my heart. It’s a collaboration with my mother, who wrote the haiku. Some of her poems are inspired by my artwork, while…

Kris Stewart—Unfurling Box

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This was such a fun project for a Type A person like myself. I didn’t have a model or instructions but thoroughly enjoyed figuring out the precise measurements…

Kris Stewart—Leather Art Journal

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This journal is part of a series I created using circles in various ways. In this case, the stitching on the spine subtly reinforces the strong circular closure…

Judilee Fitzhugh—Maple and Mandala

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I first became aware of the shadow prints of leaves on Portland sidewalks after the fall rains. India Flint’s book Eco Colour gave me a method of transferring…

Brenda Gallagher—Dreaming in a Field of Stars

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This book is made up of freehand painting exercises inspired by dreams. The pages were created using watercolor, watercolor pencil, Conte crayon, water crayons, stamps, colored pencils, and…

Brenda Gallagher—Southwest Desert

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This book was a practice for designing with multiple kinds of leather techniques. The binding was also a practice for learning a new binding structure. The inspiration for…

Brenda Gallagher—Resistance is Futile

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This book is a celebration. We are what we are and to resist what we are is futile. This work is a celebration of pride with rainbow top…

Anne Sobbota—Gather in the Garden

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Translating the art of handmade books into a medium that is not traditionally used to construct multi-page items is the challenge I wanted to explore in this work.…

Abigail Merickel—Pear Orchard

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement The Hood River valley in Oregon where I live is full of apple and pear orchards. During harvest these tall ladders swing and clang through the orchard as…

Erika Taketa—Biáng

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Biáng is a Chinese character that forms part of the name of a Shaanxi noodle dish, biángbiángmiàn. It is famously complicated to write and has an 11-line poem…

Christy Turner—Sarracenia

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This piece is a roughly life-sized portrait of a North American pitcher plant, Sarracenia flava, from my own carnivorous plant garden. I’ve always had a deep interest in botany and…

Christy Turner—Nest

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This linocut depicts a female Giant Pacific Octopus tending her eggs inside a long-abandoned human rib cage, contrasting the surprising maternal instinct of these incredibly intelligent creatures with…

Rhiannon Alpers—Ochre Color Experiments

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This multi-part, tiered-box artist book investigates ochre as both color and material trace. The work comprises two interrelated books housed within a three-tiered tray box with a magnetic…

Rosemary Rae—Restless Dragons, Enchanted Waves

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This wonderful and beautiful structure has its origins in China. I was first introduced to Zhen Xian Bao by Susan Joy Share and Paula Beardell Krieg during their…

Janet Boyko—Sashiko

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement A trip to Japan. A new practice. Sashiko is a handmade artist book holding a collection of practice squares, each one stitched in the traditional Japanese running stitch…

Janet Boyko—Pretty as a Picture

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Plain as paint, or pretty as a picture? Handmade circular artist book dressed up in powder puff pink. Inside, vintage magazine advertisements promise transformation—perfect nails, smoother skin, a…

Janet Boyko—Gone Digital

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Some things vanish so gradually you barely notice they’re gone. Remember when information had weight? Gone Digital is a handmade artist book collecting the ephemera of analog life—objects…

Rhiannon Alpers—Cicadoidea: Cicada Explorations

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Originally conceived as sculptural studies of cicada forms, this edition expanded into a broader exploration of origami, storytelling, cicadas, and handmade paper. Developed through an ongoing collaborative process…

Cat Monroy—2026

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Small but mighty. This little book was made on a whim. The covers were made from pages of the paper magazine Flow. I love this stitch because it…

Kristi Galbraith—Alternating Currents

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Alternating Currents is an electrically charged artist book featuring custom weavings, definitions, and stamped letters to highlight the range of words, feelings, and memories that are stirred up…

Pietro Accardi—Purple Chrysanthemum

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement An unusual modern marbled pattern called “chrysanthemum.” My wife suggested that the pattern is also similar to a lotus flower. Materials and Techniques Silk and acrylic paint; marbled…

Jennifer Woodward—Mirroring

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This piece was created during a residency on a farm on Bainbridge Island, Washington. Plant fibers were harvested and processed locally. Materials and Techniques Handmade paper sculpture made…

Jennifer Woodward—SLOOOOOOOOW

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This piece was made as a reminder for myself and others. It’s okay to take it very, very, slow. Materials and Techniques Handmade paper sculpture made with recycled…

Selene Fisher—The Neighborhood

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement As I was building each little house, I started telling myself short stories about the people who lived there and their relationship to their neighborhood. I used my…

Rosemary Rae—Scattered Pieces

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Scattered Pieces is an assemblage of random imagery, paint, and words all stitched together to create spontaneous wonder. I enjoy creating paper landscapes where blue-sky-play blooms on perch and page, owls dance…

Erin Fletcher—Suspended Whispers by Roja Chamankar

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement The poem in this book has been translated from Persian to French to English in an experiment to see what concepts and phrases are literally lost through translation.…

Jeri Oswalt—The Book of Calm

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement The outside world was swirling and I could not settle to design a project. I began a daily stitching practice on linen scraps. They had no purpose. This…

Raluca Iancu—Overpasses

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Overpasses are among the most familiar forms in contemporary life, especially within car-centric regions such as California, yet they are rarely examined beyond their utility. I am drawn…

Raluca Iancu—Landslide

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Disasters are the perfect locus to observe the line where function and dysfunction bleed into one another. The illusions of control and privilege are irreversibly challenged. We discover…

Raluca Iancu—たくさん富士山 (Takusan Fujisan)

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement A playful interpretation of Mount Fuji. Materials and Techniques Japanese handscroll book with mokuhanga relief print.

Kristi Galbraith—F is for France, an ABC Book

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement F is for France was created specifically for an ABC book exhibit called “Books as Art 4” that was held by the Northwoods Book Arts Guild in Fairbanks,…

Naomi S. Velasquez—Challenged

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This artist’s book speaks to relationships affected by book banning in libraries. So many of the most frequently banned and challenged books represent marginalized voices sharing important narratives…

Celeste Chalasani—In My Garden

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I worked In My Garden to stretch myself artistically. The question I posed to myself was, “Is it still stumpwork if your background fabric isn’t fabric?” I also…

Celeste Chalasani—Wild Berries of the Pacific Northwest

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement For “Wild Berries of the Pacific Northwest” I used stumpwork techniques to recreate the berries that grow wild in the redwood forests where we live. We love to…

Celeste Chalasani—Clematis Journal

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement Clematis Journal was inspired by a visit to the Rogerson Clematis Garden near Lake Oswego, Oregon. We had traveled from our very gray, overcast home to Portland in…

Helen Hiebert—Weaving Album #1

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I launched my own 100-Day Project, creating 100 weavings over the last 100 days of 2013, at a time when I needed something to help me focus and…

Cindy Luxhoj—The Incredible Journey

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement I made this art book project in a five-day “Hidden Worlds” online workshop instructed by Lesley Patterson-Marx through San Diego Book Arts. The miniature books were designed as…

Cindy Luxhoj—Tribute to Georgia

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement My Name is Georgia by Jeanette Winter, published in 1998, celebrates the life of iconic artist Georgia O’Keeffe, my favorite creative. A Tribute to Georgia is my excavated…

Tammy Andrade—Field Notes from a Lady Botanist

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement At heart I am a lover of things with a history. Family genealogy was once a great passion of mine, and I have collected many historical items, photos,…

Genevieve Kaplan—minimum responses

Click on any image to enlarge. Click again to close. Artist Statement This floppy little book—and the poem it contains—was inspired by the desert landscapes and windscapes of southern California. Themes of fragility, attention, language, and scarcity are examined through…