RSS Feed

Posts Tagged ‘michelle ray’

  1. Book Artist of the Month: Michelle Ray

    September 30, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    threeships2-michelleray

    Three Ships was created by Michelle Ray in 2012 as a part of the BookArtObject Edition #4. BookArtObject is an informal group of book artists founded in Australia. The group membership includes book artists from around the globe and use their blog as the platform for discussion and as the arena to make small editions of handmade artists’ books in response to various texts.

    Three Ships is the title of a short story by author Sarah Bodman from her book, An Exercise for Kurt Johannessen. This short story acted as the springboard for Michelle’s artist book of the same name. While Michelle continues to explore this theme of the sea and everything that encompasses that theme, she finds inspiration in the memory of the three life boats from Ernest Shackleton’s Antarctic expedition: Stancomb Wills, Dudley Docker and James Caird, his stash of rare and old Highland malt whiskey, the safety and foolishness of the journey. The book also explores through mnemonic devices this relationship between time, memory and seeing.

     

    threeships3-michelleray

    The imagery and text are printed using photopolymer plates on Somerest Book papers and museum board, all housed in a sculptural clamshell enclosure. 

    Three Ships is housed in collections at the University of Denver and Vanderbilt University. This work was included in the Gallery Director Exhibition Award, Artists’ Book Cornucopia IV, from the Abecedarian Gallery in Denver.

    threeships-michelleray

     

  2. Book Artist of the Month: Michelle Ray

    September 23, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    tocomeuponastreet-michelleray

    During the Standards of Excellence Seminar in 2012, presenter Steve Miller, professor at the University of Alabama brought a fine collection of student work to share with the audience. One of these pieces was To Come Upon a Street, a collaborative artist book between Michelle Ray and poet, AB Gorham. Michelle met AB in her front yard while living in Tuscaloosa. AB is the new Small Craft Advisory Press resident artist as well as Michelle’s neighbor. 

    Bound in a hardcover case is a modified tunnel book on the right and an accordion on the left in an edition of 40. The text is written and designed by AB, while the visual design, printing and binding was completed by Michelle. The images and text are printed using photopolymer plates on machine made and handmade papers. 

    tocomeuponastreet3-michelleray

    The visual content of To Come Upon a Street captures the intimacy of the tunnel book structure through an act of voyeurism. The view is of a lewd street scene, where letterpress “ladies of the evening” echo the four complex stanza written by AB. The visual content is quite appealing despite its crude imagery. It strikes a balance between delicate tenderness and indecency.

    Michelle describes this work as creating a piece that is kitschy yet tender; a celebration of delicate visual smut and witty double entendre.

    To Come Upon a Street is housed in several collections including the Maryland Institute College of Art, The University of Utah and Chapman University in California. You can add this wonderful and humorous artist book to your private collection through Michelle’s Etsy shop: MichelleRayArt.

    tocomeuponastreet2-michelleray

  3. Book Artist of the Month: Michelle Ray

    September 16, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    admeasure-michelleray

    In 2011, Michelle Ray created this softcover accordion with pamphlet inserts in an edition of 35. Text and images are printed from photopolymer plates and linoleum blocks on handmade and Somerset Book papers. Admeasure is another artist book from Michelle inspired by the sea as well as maritime traditions and regulations. The term admeasure refers to the act of measuring the dimensions and capacity of a vessel for official registration. 

    admeasure5-michellerayadmeasure2-michelleray

    A note from Michelle:
    The act of naming things creates a sense of relative safety at sea. Like the pilot’s verse that guided sailors through dangerous shoals, Admeasure is about gaining a false sense of control through signifiers and ritual that guide one through a world that is largely uncontrollable. This book explores the dialectic tension between the dangerous unknown and measure, rules and tradition. While at sea, measurements, maritime law, navigation aids and other modes of dominance through organization are easily lost to the forces of nature and the psychology of a journey. 

    The content of Admeasure not only draws from Michelle’s own experiences in small boats, but also from a variety of standard journeys in the sea. These included Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, Homer’s Odyssey, and Bas Jan Ader’s In Search of the Miraculous.

    Admeasure is included in a variety of collections ranging from Scripps College in California to the University of Iowa to Atelier Vis-à-Vis in France.  Admeasure is also featured amongst the pages of the recently published 500 Handmade Books Volume 2. 

    admeasure3-michelleray

     

  4. Book Artist of the Month: Michelle Ray

    September 9, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    homeiswhere-michelleray

    In this unique artist book created in 2010, Michelle Ray explores human relationships in the scope of the houseguest. Home is Where I’m Alone Unless I Have Company includes a series of interviews conducted with houseguests capturing feelings on personal and public life, intimacy and human interaction. These interviews are inkjet printed on scrolls encased in a wooden enclosure. This artist book is held at the Mandeville Special Collections Library at the University of California in San Diego.

    A note from Michelle:
    An artist’s book is an ideal medium for conveying the duality of private and public living, as books are democratic objects that live in the public but demand an intimate viewing experience.

    homeiswhere2-michelleray

  5. September // Book Artist of the Month: Michelle Ray

    September 2, 2013 by Erin Fletcher

    godcreatedthesea-michelleray

    As I read the concept behind God Created the Sea and Painted it Blue so We’d Feel Good on it, I am reminded of the Michel Gondry film The Science of Sleep and how we create vessels in the physical world to guide our journeys through our imaginary worlds. In 2013, Michelle Ray used such an experience as the inspiration for her most recent artist book. 

    godcreatedthesea3-michelleray

    Michelle first learned how to use a map while sailing. Out on the sea, where there are no landmarks just an ever-changing landscape.

    As Michelle explains: In reference to the sea, this edition’s text states, “There are no markers in this/ monochromatic/ parking lot.” In the absence of these markers, we become painfully aware of their significance. This work is about experience, perception, memory and the space in between composed of symbol, sound and object. This is the space of mediation, the space where significant things happen; it is the ocean on which my imaginary crew and I sailed­, the place for which there are no maps.

    godcreatedthesea1-michelleraygodcreatedthesea2-michelleray

    Imagery and text have been printed using photopolymer plates on handmade cotton/abaca, French Construction and Neenah Environment papers. The photographs that follow were taken to document the printing and binding processes of God Created the Sea. 

    godcreatedtheseaprogress-michelleray

    Photopolymer plates on the Vandercook.

    godcreatedtheseaprogress3-michelleray

    Prints laying out on the drying rack. 

    The enclosure is made of linen and basswood. The linen is printed with the image of a whale skeleton along with the title in gold. This piece was produced in an edition of 50 at the Small Craft Advisory Press as Michelle’s creative project in the MFA Book Arts Program for The University of Alabama.

    godcreatedtheseaprogress4-michelleray

    Outer linen cloth wrapper.

    godcreatedtheseaprogress5-michelleray

    Basswood enclosures.

    God Created the Sea is already housed in several collection across the United States and in the United Kingdom. In addition, been awarded Best of Show at the Foundry Art Centre in Missouri and runner-up at The Sheffield International Artist’s Book Exhibition in the UK.

    Michelle is the recent recipient of the Artists’ Book Cornucopia IV Gallery Director’s Exhibition Award presented by the Abecedarian Gallery. This announcement is when I first discovered and fell in love with her work. Although, I’ve never had the pleasure of seeing Michelle’s work in person. Her work is clearly crafted beautifully, balancing rich content and concepts with thoughtfully executed structures. Her work will be featured in a solo Reading Room exhibition from April 18 – June 7, 2014 at the Abecedarian Gallery in Denver, Colorado. Oh, how I hope I find myself in Colorado next spring. Read the interview after the jump and come back each Monday during the month of September for more posts on the work of Michelle Ray.

    read more >

  • My name is Erin Fletcher, owner and bookbinder of Herringbone Bindery in Boston. Flash of the Hand is a space where I share my process and inspirations.
    The StudioNewsletterInstagramEmail me
  • Archives