Grant Received for “Living Quilt for Santa Rosa” public art project

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CA wildfires, ecoart, flying geese, handmade paper, public art, quilt, Santa Rosa, wildflowers

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jane Ingram Allen has been awarded a grant by the City of Santa Rosa for a public art project to commemorate the October 2017 wildfires in Santa Rosa, California, that destroyed so many homes, businesses and forests. Jane’s artwork “Living Quilt for Santa Rosa” consists of a handmade paper quilt with seeds for wildflowers added to the pulp in the same colors as the quilt pattern. The quilt uses the traditional “Wild Geese” quilt pattern. The blue color in the quilt is paper pulp made from recycled blue jeans. The yellow-orange pulp is abaca (a type of banana leaf fiber) dyed with a non-toxic fiber reactive dye, and the white pulp is the natural color of the abaca. The wildflower seeds in the yellow-orange strips are for California poppies. The seeds in the blue pulp are for California bluebells and mixed blue wildflowers, and the seeds in the white pulp are for Baby’s Breath and white poppies. Community people will join the artist in helping to make the handmade paper quilt and weave a headboard and footboard of local trimmed branches for the “flower bed”. All of the materials in this eco-quilt are natural and bio-degradable and will change over time to become a living, blooming bed of wildflowers. “Living Quilt for Santa Rosa” will be installed in a public ceremony at Rincon Ridge Park, off Fountaingrove Parkway, in Santa Rosa, CA, at 2PM on Saturday, Dec. 1.

Everyone is invited to visit Jane’s studio in Santa Rosa on Saturday and Sunday, November 4 and 5, from 11AM to 5PM to help make paper for the project. During these two days, Jane will be holding community participation workshops to make handmade paper for the “Living Quilt for Santa Rosa”.  The workshops will be held during the Open Studio weekend at Studio Santa Rosa, 3840 Finley Avenue, Building 32, Studio 107.  For more information email info@janeingramallen.com

 

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Photos from “Papermaking for Printmakers” Workshop on Oct. 6

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hand papermaking, jAsian and Western papermaking, papermaking, printmaking, Santa Rosa

The participants in my Saturday Oct. 6 workshop “Papermaking for Printmakers” had a productive and creative day making handmade paper from a variety of plant fiber pulps. They learned Western and Asian/Japanese papermaking techniques for sheet forming, pressing, drying, watermarking, embossing, laminating and other special technique to create their own unique handmade paper suitable for priintmaking. It was a very congenial group because all of the participants in this workshop do letterpress printing together at the Sebastopol studio of North Bay Letterpress Arts https://www.northbayletterpressarts.org

During this workshop we made paper from the following pulps: Abaca, blue jean, eucalyptus and Sitka Spruce as well as some sedge, beach grass and paper mulberry. Here are some photos of the workshop. The photos are by Timothy S. Allen (allentimphotos2.wordpress.com)

I can’t wait to see what the printmakers will do with the sheets they made and how the finished prints will look.  I hope to post some photos of their prints on handmade paper soon on this Blog.  The next hand papermaking workshop at my Santa Rosa studio will be “Papermaking for Fiber Artists” on Saturday and Sunday, Nov.10 and 11.  This class is already full, but contact me at info@janeingramallen if you want to be put on the waiting list.

I am also teaching a special workshop “From Plants to Paper” at the Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation, 900 Occidental Road, Santa Rosa, on Saturday and Sunday, Oct. 20 and 21. We will make paper from local plants and go through the whole process from gathering plant materials to producing unique handmade papers from plants of the Laguna, such as dogbane, willow, sedge, cattail, bullrush and others we will discover there. We will also see what papermaking we can do with some invasive plants found in the Laguna.  Places are still available in this workshop, and to register go to this link:  https://www.eventbrite.com/e/from-plants-to-paper-papermaking-with-laguna-plants-tickets-49579227805

 

 

Introduction to Hand Papermaking Workshop on Sept. 29, 2018

It was a great group last Saturday for the Introduction to Hand Papermaking Workshop held in my studio in Santa Rosa, California. The participants in the workshop learned how to make paper using a variety of pulps and Western and Asian techniques for hand papermaking. We used abaca pulp (a banana relative), blue jean pulp (from recycled cotton blue jeans), Eucalyptus bark (prepared from local roadside Eucalyptus trees) and Sitka Spruce bark (gathered on the Oregon coast where Sitka Spruce trees are growing). Below you can see some photos of the workshop, taken by my husband Timothy S. Allen (allentimphotos2.wordpress.com)

Take a look at my Post on August 7, 2018 for a full list of the other Fall 2018 Papermaking Workshops. I will also teach a special class on the weekend of Oct. 20-21 at the Laguna de Santa Rosa, “Plants to Paper”. This workshop will be a chance to learn how to make unique handmade paper from plants found in the Laguna de Santa Rosa area and create a variety of papers during the two-day hands-on workshop. We will gather plant materials, cook, beat and make paper from several local plants. To register for the Plants to Paper Workshop go to the website for the Laguna de Santa Rosa Foundation: http://lagunadesantarosa.org/laguna_walks_classes.html Scroll down to see the workshop on Oct. 20-21 and click the link to register. Or, email me at info@janeingramallen.com for more information about upcoming papermaking art workshops.