Writing a Meaningful Artist's Statement with Jane Davies

Fluke, 1987. 7 x 5 x 1 inch closed. Collage and acrylic paint on watercolor paper.

I have been anticipating this class for months. Originally I thought I could write one really good statement and cross that off my to-do list. It's not that easy. Jane suggests a new statement for every new body of work. Or maybe every 6 months. It does make sense. As we look at what makes a good statement I realize I would need to re-write it every time my work changes. With Jane's guidance we dug into ourselves and tried to explain what was important to us about making art. It was hard work, I usually just write whatever comes into my head. I ended up with 17 pages of text and notes. And three paragraphs that work well.

Duck Dreams, 1987, 7 x 5 x 1 inch closed. Collage on watercolor paper, acrylic paint.

At one point I went back and looked at all my earliest books to try to explain why the book format was so important to me. I think my interest in artist's books goes way back to a text book for an art class I took around 1965. There was a photo of a handmade book that had a glove stitched to one page and a ladder on the opposite page. This whole book as a revelation - it had a lot of art that I would not have defined as art. And I loved a lot of it. It was eye opening. I figured out which book it was and ordered a used copy. I'm very curious to see that again. 

In My Dreams We Travel in Boats, 2008.

So far I have 17 pages of rumination. Out of that has come a statement that feels authentic to me, it's certainly the best one I have ever written. I have learned more about myself, and I know more now about what I want to say in my art. I would definitely recommend this class to people who are willing to put in the work. It's like a college level class, with time consuming homework. But it only lasted 5 weeks, with more time to discuss for another 3 weeks. The more time and effort you put in, the more you will get out of it. 

Fluke, 1987, 7 x 5 x 1 inch closed. One of my favorite early books.

I wanted to take the time to look closely at everyone else's work and writing and try to respond to it. Partly because I don't feel I'm very good at looking at art in general. And I'm often not able to articulate what I feel about it. As people's statements came into focus they helped me to see their art in a new light. I had never realized how important and helpful a good statement could be.

And here is the statement:

Dreams have been a major interest all my life. When I was around eight I had a dream that terrified me. Little creatures were quickly lifting me up in the air, my family was far below, calling and reaching up to me. But the creatures carried me higher and higher, I couldn’t get away. I woke terrified, I had the feeling that dreaming was another world, as real as our “waking” world. I did not want to go back there for months.

I have kept a dream journal off and on since I was in my 20’s. When I went to art school in my 30’s I became consistent, and started using the dreams as inspiration. When I’m dreaming I can draw aside a curtain in my mind and see more of what’s going on there. I don’t understand most of my dreams. I always write them in the first person present tense and end with “I wake.” 

Books hold stories and are the perfect containers for dreams. They can be held in my hand, pages are turned, the images are sequential and so influence each other more. Books feel personal. I believe books can contain answers to all the big questions, where did I come from when I was born? Where will I go when I die? I just have to find or make the right book.

I find a penny

Dream Intruder artist book 7.75 x 6 x 1 inch. Acrylic ink, found papers, dreams. Drumleaf binding, eco dyed papers. by Judith Hoffman

I’m with my family. We’re deep in the woods at first. I find a penny. While we talk someone dies. We have to go somewhere else, we travel in a coach with horses. I find a dime. Mom dies on some steps outside a house. She is buried in the wall of the house. Then I find a quarter. That seems big. I think it means I will die. But then people start coming back to life. Mom comes back to life on the steps outside the house. I wake up. There is a nickel on the floor of the laundry room. I don’t want to pick it up. 

Momigami experiments with hand cream

 

Momigami experiment - left is the momigami, right is the original inkjet print on architect's tracing paper. I was surprised the momigami got much lighter than the original.

Momigami paper on left after rubbing on some acrylic paint or hi-flow inks.

(All images will enlarge - just click on them.) My friend Eileen of the Good Junk Sanctuary came over and showed me how to make momigami. It's something I have been curious about for years. We made a couple of pages while we talked about art and life. She mentioned that you could use hand cream, cooking oil or a gel made from konnyaku powder that is intended for momigami. After Eileen left I experimented with hand cream. (There are lots of videos online for making momigami.) I'm using Vaseline Intensive Care but I think hand creams are pretty much all the same. I first made a number of pieces of momigami from different papers. I let them dry overnight, the hand cream seems to go away. Maybe it's absorbed? The next day I rubbed acrylic paint diluted with glazing medium or hi-flow paint on them. All the paints were very thin, I wanted a transparent layer that wouldn't obscure the original patterns. My goal is to have interesting collage papers. All the papers became softer, and heavily wrinkled of course. The more fragile papers developed little holes and tears along the edges which I love. Rubbing the papers with paint did smooth out most of the physical wrinkles but emphasized the visual texture. At times the backs are almost more beautiful than the fronts.

The section of a brown envelope on the right with the arrow head is the momigami. The paper had already been printed with some acrylic paints on a gelli plate. The light spots are titan buff, a fairly opaque paint.

The next day the momigami paper was rubbed with acrylic paint. Not much change, but the more opaque titan buff spots stand out beautifully from the ground. Hard to see the effect in the photo. 

The momigami piece is on the right, the original paper was printed on the gelli plate. I was surprised at how much lighter it became. This is also architect's tracing paper. It's very tough. 

I painted some thin blues and sepia toned paints over the momigami sample. 

These two pages came from a magazine. The small figure on the right looks particularly good for collage. 

The pages were then painted with blue and golden brown acrylic paints.

I like the network of lines caused by paint sinking into the wrinkles. These will make inspiring collage materials.

On the left - momigami on a gardening magazine pages. The ink came off the page and smeared  around some, making my hands inky and the page look dirty. 

This was another gardening magazine page that was fragile. To strengthen it I tried to coat it with mat medium on a gelli plate. The paper stuck to the plate so I let it dry then coated it with more mat medium and laid a piece of architect's tracing paper on top. When that was dry I was able to peel the whole sheet off. What I have is some beautifully grungy text and plants. 

Bits of a page that fell apart. I love the cracks and the subtle colors. 

The backs of the previous bits of paper. The visual textures and colors are lovely. 

Drab Reality

Drab Reality - artist book made by Judith Hoffman, 2022. Pages 1 and 2. Collage, drawing, gelli plate printing.

                                

Drab Reality, handmade one-of-a-kind artist book, 2022. 3.75 x 5.25 x 1 inch. Drumleaf binding. See still photos of all the pages on my website. I have been struggling to explain this book. Its version of reality is definitely not drab. But it's also not explainable. This book evolved from some experiments. I tried preparing the backgrounds with the gelli plate. I have also been experimenting with drawing on transparent papers for collage. There are more details on my website. 

Drab Reality will be in the Puget Sound Book Artists Member's exhibit at the Collins Memorial Library June 4 to August 1, 2024. And at the Evergreen State Collage, September 29 to December 20, 2024.

Yes, I made this book two years ago. I have been slow to get my photography set up back in place. I'm not good at photography, so it takes me hours and hours to set up, take some sample photos, make adjustments, re-learn the camera settings, etc. etc. I think I just wanted to go ahead and start another project when this book was finished. 

Testing papers for transparency

Transparency tests. The tests are laid on a piece of black and a piece of white paper. Each is coated with Golden mat medium front and back up to about the halfway point. The papers are: 1. An unknown paper recommended, but discontinued. I have a stack. 2. Calligraphy paper. 3. Abaca from Talas. 4. Wet strength tissue. 5. Architect's tracing paper (Dick Blick calls it Canary Sketching and Tracing.) 6. White Kozo from Hiromi. 7. An old pad of forms used for dispatching or tracing trains. 8. Colors of the Rainbow tissue paper. (the color is Kraft) Drawings on #1 thru 6 are with .005 micron black. #7 and 8 are with 01 Microns. The image will enlarge.

 I like to layer papers when I collage, I want the papers to be somewhat transparent or translucent. My drawings are often done on architect's tracing paper.  I coat it with Golden mat medium to make sure the ink doesn't smear in the collage process. Then I collage the drawing to the substrate. The mat medium does help to make the papers translucent. 

Transparency test. Colors of the rainbow tissue paper in soft ivory. The figure was drawn on the paper, coated with mat medium, cut out and collaged to eco-dyed paper. The soft ivory pretty closely matches the substrate paper. The brand Colors of the Rainbow is archival and comes in many colors. The paper is not strong when wet.

I have been testing papers lately, looking for other fairly transparent papers in tones I like. I tested all the likely looking papers I could find in my studio. After drawing on each sample I coated it front and back with the mat medium. Below are some drawings and collages I did to further test some of the papers I liked.

Old train dispatch or routing paper with drawing. Coated with  mat medium, cut out and collaged to eco-dyed substrate. I don't really know how to describe this pad. It's clearly associated with trains. I would love to find more, but I assume it's not archival. 

The figure was drawn on Abaca paper from Talas. I believe it's 9 gsm. This is the thinnest paper I tested. It works very well, although it's a little hard to drawn on. It's also my favorite for having the paper disappear. I think it would be beautiful for mark making.

All these tests were inspired by Sally Hirst. She has a blog post here about making papers transparent. And a YouTube video here. Her process is different from mine - she spritzes her papers before coating with medium. And she uses a different medium. Sally does test an even thinner Abaca which has to be ordered from Etsy. I found that too thin to draw on, but it would be great for mark making.

A dream about a drawing class.

Quick sketch of me in the dream, done right after writing the dream down in the dark. I was lying down in bed.

 

I sign up for a drawing class. The first day I'm a minute late. The instructor has locked the back door to the room so I have to go in the front one. He makes a comment because I'm late. I am embarrassed.  The second class I'm in the bathroom when the bell rings. I have already gone in and left my purse on a desk. But when I go back there is a woman - middle aged, white hair - writing formulas on the blackboard. The teacher is working on some papers and doesn't look up. So I sneak in and go to stand in the back, in the doorway of a closet, trying to not be seen. I'm hoping to get to my seat during a break. A few other people come to stand in the back too. A guy with sandy short hair starts talking to me. He says something about my dog Toby. Part of the time I can't understand him.  I ask him to repeat but still can't make sense of what he is saying. Toby is his dog, a rescue who took a liking to me at another time. I wonder if the woman at the blackboard is writing fire extinguisher formulas. Over time she covers a blackboard that has 3 big panels and extends all the way across the front of the room. The class is silent and taking notes. When will we draw? I don't have a drawing pad. Can I find Jim and get some money to buy a pad? I can't find my glasses so I have to wear the red weak ones. They look like red goggles. I feel very self conscious. I wake. 

 

A Krampus Mask you can download and make yourself

For Christmas cards last year - in 2023 - I made a Krampus Mask. You can go here, download a pdf, and make your own mask. If you don't know who Krampus is  - He used to be Santa Claus's sidekick. Maybe a balancing of good and evil? He seems to have been part of pre-Christian Northern European customs. I believe he was called Knecht Ruprecht in parts of Germany. There was a fad for Greetings from Krampus postcards for awhile - and now there are modern, very creepy versions. Check wikipedia for more info.

The mock-up Krampus masks and sketches.

I started with several mock-ups and a quick sketch - trying to get the eyes in the right place and correct proportions. The sketch ended up looking sad rather than scary, so I took it into Procreate on my iPad and made some alterations.

After altering he may be a bit more scary, or angry. I'm not fond of creepy.

Then I added color by layering the sketch on a red gelli plate print - again in Procreate. The final step was to add some white hatching so there was more dimension. This one was much easier to cut out and assemble than last year's Green Man.

Enjoy your new identity. I hope you all had a great holiday.