Recently I have been engaging in more book arts practice, making accordion books, doing linocut block printing, and experimenting with working with handmade papers and making ink. I also use text and my own photographs as part of this practice.

Book Art


m’ send’ de la terra lundana

(a handmade photo book assemblage)

Completed in March of 2021 in pandemic lockdown in Toronto, this project developed into a tribute to the memory of my four grandparents, whom I was very fortunate to know until I was 21 years old.

The title is taken from a line of poetry written by my maternal grandmother in her native dialect of Boianese. The rest of this assemblage is comprised of two poems (by Gianna Patriarca and Pier Paolo Pasolini, respectively) and one Calabrian folksong. The first two sections of images are photographs taken from rural Italy and the last two sections are taken around rural Ontario.

This project allowed me to enage with my own images as text and to think about framing this visual text within a narrative, allowing for the photogaphs to exist simultaneously with and independently of the written text. In the end, this assemblage is something both deliberate and serendipitous in its creation and subsequent meanings.

Materials:

Bristol board; Cardstock
Laser printer paper; Kraft paper
Inkjet ink; Sharpie fine point ink
UHU Glue
Twine

March 2021


“His Fig Tree Came in the Mail”

(read the original research note upon which this book project is based is here)

Materials

Papers: handmade paper off-cuts and stationary; watercolour paper; rice paper
Photos: inkjet/laserjet on cardstock
Pigments: acylic (red); watercolour (plant-based); water-colour (soil-based); block printing ink (brown, green, black)
Soil: Toronto and Calabria

Seeds

Chicory
Swiss Chard
Beans (assorted)
Tomato (chocolate cherry, yellow cherry)
Peas (sweet)
Eggplant (round Sicilian)
Peppers (chili)