Navigational Tools for The Willfully Lost

Navigational Tools for the Willfully Lost, 8” x 8”, closed. In current times, our world seems to be very much off its axis. We are in a time of plague, not just medical but political, ecological, and more. The wholesale denial of science and rational thought coupled with the embrace of superstition and misinformation are signaling a need for a return to fact-based actions and ideas, a renewed age of enlightenment. In an attempt to not be completely bleak, I offer this set of wry visual aids for those who will not, cannot see what is really happening. This book began with my application for a Jan and Frank Cicero artist’s fellowship at the Newberry Library in Chicago, Illinois, in the fall of 2021. For many months the project only existed as the title, a few notes, and a call list for the library. In the spring of 2023, I spent a month in the reading rooms looking at many wonderful books, primarily their many editions of Peter Apian’s Cosmographia from the 16th century, a time of scientific revolution. Apian included a set of five paper instruments in each of his editions. The paper instruments enabled readers to participate in 16th. century mathematical and astrological calculations. Seeing and manipulating the many examples of those centuries old and still functional devices was invaluable to me as I began to work on my own paper tools. I spent the fall of 2023 bringing the tools and the text to their finished forms. The book has 24 pages and five paper tools, all volvelle variations of my devising. The images are from my trace monoprint drawings. The fonts used are Baskerville, Gill Sans and Trattatello. The book was printed letterpress on my Vandercook SP15 printing press using polymer plates from Boxcar Press. The text is printed on Rives BFK, the tools on Chancery paper. The tools are backed with Text Wove paper, hand cut and assembled. The binding is a combination slotted tape/long stitch using flax and abaca cover paper made by Mary Hark. The edition size is 25 standard copies, two deluxe copies, and a couple of artist’s proofs. Will be completed in 2024.

Progress on My New Book

Printing has been completed on my new book Navigational Tools for the Willfully Lost. I am beginning assembly of the five paper tools that will be included in each book. This book arises from my research fellowship at the Newberry Library in Chicago last spring. Shown above are the movable components of the paper tools. The book will be completed in time for the Codex book fair.

Paper Puppets Workshop, PS1, Iowa City, IA

I will be teaching a paper puppets workshop for PS1. Sat. Oct. 21 & Sun. Oct. 22, 10a-4p at PS1 Close (538 S. Gilbert) with a pay-what-you-can fee structure: $20-$180

Learn the paper engineering for four different kinds of paper puppets: the flapping mouth, the talking head, the jump-up and the walking zombie. A variety of techniques for making axles, spacers, flaps, and other movable parts will be explored. Participants will be able to make their own individual models of all the forms.

http://www.publicspaceone.com/events/paper-puppets-fall-2023

My Talk at the University of Washington is on YouTube

I gave an overview of my evolving work, as represented in the UW Libraries Book Arts Collection in a talk for the Book Arts Guild at the University of Washington libraries, on March 9, 2023. The recording has been posted to YouTube. The introduction is by Sandra Kroupa, Book Arts and Rare Book Curator, UW Libraries. There are a few intrusions of announcements about the library closing hours. The recording is one hour long,  the talk ends after about 50 minutes and then there are some questions and answers.

I include this caveat from the BAG: “This was our first ever hybrid event and we’re clearly not that good with the camera in the UW classroom. The beginning is hard to hear, the ending is abrupt, and we haven’t figured out how to make her more visible while talking. But during her talk you can see her slides and hear Emily clearly, so the main part is good.”

Puppet Workshop in Seattle area

I will be teaching a workshop about my current enthusiasm: telling stories through the medium of paper-based puppets. This workshop will be held in-person in the large, airy,  free parking, easy-to-access ArtWorks great room in Edmonds on Saturday, March 11th from 10am to 4pm. Come and explore the relationship between form and content with me in person.  Space is limited for this workshop,  registration is required, and laughter will ensue. More details here: 
https://mailchi.mp/c956c2902134/emily-martin-workshop-march-11th-8115539

Jan and Frank Cicero Fellowship award

I have been awarded a one month Jan and Frank Cicero artist-in-Residence fellowship at the Newberry Library, Chicago for spring 2023. The fellowship will support my work and research for an upcoming artist’s book with the working title of “Navigational Tools for the Willfully Lost”.  I will concentrate my studies on the 16th century navigational and cosmographical texts of the Edward E. Ayer collection. The Ayer collection contains a large number of texts with paper tools such as the Apian Cosmographia 1584 and many more. My project will likely include a combination of paper volvelles, pop-up maps, and prediction/explanation devices relevant to our current time of plague, one not only medical but political, ecological and more, and completion is expected by late 2023, early 2024.

Madness: Reading Hamlet in the Time of Covid-19 and Other Plagues

Madness was created during the pandemic and went through many forms before it became what you see here. It’s appearance and content are very much shaped by my time in isolation. Initially, I copied out the play Hamlet by hand starting in March 2020 because I was too anxious to sit and read. I also was making paper puppets for companionship. The project kept changing as events swirled around me. I struggled to make sense of the project in a world gone crazy. The text is a crazy quilt arrangement of lines from Hamlet and my writing on repeating themes of fear, disease, Black Lives Matter, Asian hate crimes, the insurrection, so much death and isolation. Madness was printed letterpress with polymer plates from Boxcar Press on Arches Text wove paper. The background pattern is made up of my renderings of tears, drops of blood, Covid-19 particles and bullet holes. The paper puppet inclusions were printed on University of Iowa Center for the Book Chancery paper and are costumed in papers of wheat straw, sisal, daylily fibers, and abaca paste papers made by Andrea Peterson. The non-adhesive covers are flax and abaca papers made by Mary Hark for the outside and flax papers from the University of Iowa Center for the Book for the inside. Encased in a cloth covered clamshell box. The book was printed in an edition of 25 copies with a few strays. Madness was funded in part by a grant from the College Book Art Association and I thank them.