Types of Adult Workshops

Making Books in the Classroom: A One-Day to One-Week Workshop

Through the development of skills such as visual and verbal storytelling, problem-solving, original thinking and hand-eye coordination, bookmaking promotes literacy, creativity, self-expression and self-esteem. Making a book is a cross-curricular activity, linking visual art with language arts, computer skills, social studies, math and science.

Teachers will learn how to make several styles of books, including one-sheet books, accordions, sewn pamphlets, Japanese stab bindings, as well as pop- ups, all of which can be used in the elementary classroom. Lise Melhorn-Boe has many years of experience working as an artist in the classroom, through the Ontario Arts Council’s Artists in Education Program and Learning Through the Arts. She will discuss the best ways to make various projects work at different grade levels and how to make curricular links.

Basic Popups: A Two-Day Workshop

Learn the basic techniques of making pup-ups with “Madame Pop-up” over the course of this two-day workshop . We’ll start out with cut and fold techniques, such as boxes and V-folds, and move on to attachments, backbones, towers and floating planes. With lots of samples to look at, you’ll soon be ready to make pop-up books or greeting cards. This workshop is suitable for teens and adults. Teachers are welcome—Madame Pop-up has many years of experience in Ontario classrooms. Making pop-ups is a cross-curricular activity that can be geared to young and old alike!

Beginners Bookmaking: A Three-Day to One-Week Workshop

This course will introduce participants to a variety of book structures, including accordions, sewn pamphlets, Japanese stab bindings and the flashy-looking flag book. As well as learning the construction techniques, students will create several books using their own material, learning about various ways to present that content, covering such concepts as relationship between image and text, and movement through the book.

Artists, photographers, scrapbookers, and writers are welcome. Teachers too! Many of these techniques can be used in the elementary and high school classroom.

Room Requirements:

• Long tables—at least one metre per participant
• A screen (in case I wanted to show slides)

• A sink—would be helpful, but is not absolutely necessary

This workshop can be run with a maximum of ten students

Materials for blank models will be provided by the instructor. Materials fee: $25.

For individual projects, students will need photos, drawings, prints, small paintings on paper, materials for collage or fabric and thread—whatever materials they are comfortable with.

For some projects, a written text would be helpful, the students’ own or a poem or short text from another writer.

Equipment
A student would need to bring:

• scissors
• a glue stick
• a small cutting knife and cutting board
• a folding bone if she or he has one (instructor can provide these if necessary)

Advanced Pop-up Books: A Two-Day workshop
Pop-ups Beyond the Basics

Learn how to combine basic pop-up techniques to make more intricate structures. Form solid and sculpted shapes. Create movement on the page using V-folds and hidden straps. Techniques can be used for cards or books.

Lise Melhorn-Boe has been making and exhibiting pop-ups books in Canada and the United States for many years. Her work is in the collections of the National Gallery, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the University of Calgary and the Museum of Modern Art, among others.

Equipment A student would need to bring:

• scissors
• a glue stick
• a small cutting knife and cutting board
• a folding bone if she or he has one (instructor can provide these if necessary)

Marrying Content and Form: A Three-Day to One-Week Workshop

Does a book have to have four corners? What if it is about hairy legs? Lise Melhorn-Boe has been making unusually-shaped books, in which the content determines the form, for over twenty-five years—books that resemble a TV dinner, a dog dish, a leg-shaped book, a pair of breasts.

Lise will share examples of her own and others' books and then guide workshop participants to consider how their own stories might lend themselves to a book form other than the usual rectangle. Participants should bring texts, images, rubber stamps, calligraphy pens, thread, fabric and small objects, which might lend themselves to incorporation into a book.

Family Fables: A Two-Day Workshop

Every family has its share of stories: tall tales or sagas, romances or fables. And most of us have albums or boxes overflowing with family photos. This workshop will give participants the opportunity to learn several basic book-making techniques and to create books about their families, using one or more of their own stories.

Lise Melhorn-Boe works with her own, and other women’s stories, using the texts as a springboard for inventive book objects. She will talk about her own creative process and guide participants through the creation of a book that is visually and textually integrated. She will provide examples of other artists’ work in which family stories have been used. Workshop participants will be encouraged to use familiar materials in new ways. Some materials will be provided for a materials fee of $15. A list of equipment and materials follows.

Artists' Bookmaking: A Two-Day Workshop

This is a workshop for artists who would like to explore the book form as a vehicle for their work. It will be of interest to poets, photographers, printmakers, textile artist, those who paint and draw in a small format, and anyone who uses text or narrative in their work.

The workshop will introduce participants to a variety of non-traditional bindings. Materials and instructions will be provided for 5 small books: a meander book, made of one piece of paper, a “flag” book, a simple pamphlet with paper cover, a Japanese -style stab binding and an accordion. Additional models will be available to examine, as well as a number of binding “texts”." Ms. Melhorn-Boe will discuss the design of an artist's book, using examples of her own books.

Rhythm in the Visual Book: A Two-Day Workshop
Friday evening: Slide Talk A perfume-free event

Saturday and Sunday: Workshop
This workshop will explore the relationship between text and images in the artist’s book. We’ll talk about which comes first—does it make a difference? Through a series of exercises, we will examine ways of using text to create movement in a book. Looking beyond image as illustration for text, we will explore how images can modify or contradict the text. For the second day, students should bring a short text and or images with which they would like to play.

Lise Melhorn-Boe has been making, and exhibiting artist’s books, in Canada and the United States for thirty years. Her work is in the collections of the National Gallery, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the University of Calgary and the Museum of Modern Art, among others. Visit www.lisemelhornboe.ca to see examples of her work.

Equipment and Materials
On Saturday, each student would need to bring:

• a small cutting board
• a metal straight edge
• a knife
• magazines to cut up, or any 2-D images of the student's own to cut up
  i.e. rejected / left-over) prints or drawings, paintings on paper, fabric, etc.
• Paper long enough from which to make an accordion:
  something long enough to cut into lengthy strips (maybe at least 22 x 30″
  this doesn't have to be anything special, just sturdy enough to glue images and text cut from the magazines on for an exercise in pacing.
• glue stick(s)
• graph paper if possible. No need to go out and buy it; it may not even be needed.

On Sunday, students will be using some of the concepts learned on Saturday to create a dummy for a possible project, so you would need images and/or text of your own, and paper upon which to work.

If this sounds too vague and people want to email me with questions, please give them my contact information.

Sculpted Pages: A One-Week Workshop

Canadian book artist Lise Melhorn-Boe has been creating unusually-shaped books for almost thirty years—books that resemble a TV dinner, a dog dish, a pair of breasts. Often her work incorporates pop-ups or sculptural book-structures.

This workshop will cover many aspects of sculptural book design, including a variety of folding and cutting techniques to create pop-up pages. Participants will be encouraged to explore their ideas and discover ways to take those ideas off the flat rectangular page. Design, theory and practice will be discussed in this five-day intensive class.

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