Gallery – Focus on Book Arts

Challenge Book 2023

Shā Towers – Tabula Rasa (2021)

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This simple sewn pamphlet structure incorporates 140 lb. watercolor paper and Zanders Mill Elephant Hide paper. I created the hand lettering, mark making, and staining with a variety of calligraphic tools such…

Shā Towers – Seeds of Joy

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Materials include board covers, French Paper Company’s Dur-O-Tone paper for the body and spine and Zanders Mill Elephant Hide paper for the covers. The flags are hand-treated with walnut ink and watercolor…

Shā Towers – Extremists

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This artist’s book features a piano hinge construction using Arches 140 lb. cold press watercolor paper as the pages and pins and Zander Mills Elephant Hide paper as the concertina fold spine…

Sarah Morgan – Vote at Home

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Hedi Kyle’s book, Art of the Fold, provided the structure. I painted Tyvek for the cover. Leftover envelopes from mail-in ballots made up the folded pocket accordion. Colored pencil lettering and postage stamps…

Rhonda Luongo – The Realm

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Book board covered in tea-stained teabag paper, accentuated with gold and copper leaf, antique handwritten letter reproduced on archival cardstock stained with walnut and pigment inks, hand-colored collaged elements on archival paper,…

Paul Johnson – Happiest in My Workroom

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This is a two-fold pop-up panorama inspired by Lothar Meggendorfer’s International Circus. Dovetail joints join all the individual units so the whole structure can be taken to pieces. It is made with…

Naomi Velasquez – Patterns

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Materials: Found book, found maps, gesso, ink, acrylic paint, water based spray paint, adhesives, embroidery floss. Techniques and processes: Altered book, handmade stamps, embroidery, collage, spray painted stencils, typewritten printing. About the…

Michele Vaughan – Casa Colibri – Where My Heart Resides

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: I used this challenge book project to explore all things related to creating an artist book: structure, paper to print photos on, paper to use for the structure, adhesive, and using text. I…

Michele Kamprath – Desert Dreams/Redwood Home

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This structure is an accordion with a wrap-around cover/enclosure. The paper used for the accordion and the signatures was eco-dyed with maple, alder, redwood, and other local plants. One of the papers…

Mel Hewitt – My Heart Resides

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: The book began by playing with my favorite painting medium, ArtGraf graphite sticks, sanguine color. With Japanese calligraphy brush in hand random strokes reminiscent of chaos and cacophony were thrown throughout pieces…

Marvel Maring – Taking Flight

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Drum Leaf binding with colored pencil and pop-ups. About the work: This book is in honor of a woman who took care of me as an infant until the age of nine.…

Margaret Beech – CREATE

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Dylusions spray inks. Star book. Paper punches. Sakura glaze pen. Cutouts and pullouts. About the work: My studio is my happy place. I am my hands and feel driven to create and inspire others.

Margaret Beech – Be Inspired

Lorraine Crowder – Wish You Were Here

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: I identified sixteen places in the San Francisco bay area from which I might send a Wish You Were Here postcard. I printed out old USGS topo maps of the area and…

Laura DeGrace – Portland OR

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: The overall box/book structure is one I learned at a recent Sitka workshop here in Oregon. The teacher was ME Campbell. The paper is Japanese decorative paper (brown and green) and the…

Kazumi Seki – imbued

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Imbued consists of three parts: a crumpled paper, a piece of paper, and a container, and they are a metaphor of something I would let go of, my wish and myself. The…

judy hurcomb – Spinach, radishes, peas

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This book is made from 2 cardboard “bolts” which are used in retail fabric displays. Both the inside and outside of the coptic bound book is covered in seed packets (that I…

judy hurcomb – home

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This book is made from 2 cardboard “bolts” which are used in retail fabric displays. It is made of commercial and original images. Original images painted with acrylic paint are torn and…

judy hurcomb – a mask is a small price to pay

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: This book is made from 2 cardboard “bolts” which are used in retail fabric displays. Cotton fabric was used for many types of masks during the pandemic and is cut to look…

Jackie Patten – Among the Trees

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: During the creation of this book, I had the assistance of friends, family, book arts instructors, and other artists for which I am grateful. It reminded me any form of creativity is…

Genevieve Kaplan – May I

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: I used a seed catalogue page, yellow cardstock I hand-printed with mint leaves from my garden, double-sided tape, and ink in creating my book. The book form is the “Guest Book” from…

Gay Walker – Secret Places: On the Farm

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: I printed the images and text on card stock and bound the book using the drum leaf style in a dos-a-dos binding. I painted and drew upon the Arches cover and cut…

Elsi Vassdal Ellis – What Makes a House a Home

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: I raided one of my drawers that house book cloth shorts — there is not enough to be used for an edition but too much to toss. I then created paste papers…

Elsi Vassdal Ellis – Tesserae

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: Square Lego tiles used to create a mosaic pattern printed with 3 inks mixed on the press to create different color variations of the tile pattern. The first ink was white. It…

Angela Batchelor – And Here We Have Idaho

FOBA 2021 Challenge Book Technique and materials used: 12 Idaho State symbols are catalogued with the use of cyanotype images and transparency overlays, while lyrics from the State song are interspersed on each page. The pages are rust printed paper.…