Lauren E. Simonutti's books

Lauren E. Simonutti was a gifted and prolific American fine art photographer. She passed away in 2012 at the age of 44. The sensitive and soft harshness of her images echoed her constant turmoils in the face of mental illness. She lived the latter part of her life inside her old house, capturing images that recorded her inner self. She had a very active presence online on deviantART, flickr and blogger, among others.

Two books on her art are available on blurb:

"Over three and one half years I have spent alone amidst these 8 rooms, 7 mirrors, 6 clocks, 2 minds and 199 panes of glass. And this is what I saw here. This is what I learned." ~ Lauren E. Simonutti

LAUREN E. SIMONUTTI: 8 rooms, 7 mirrors, 6 clocks, 2 minds & 199 panes of glass, c2011
Catherine Edelman Gallery
Cover image: She Left a Light on but They Were Never Coming Back  © 2007 Lauren E. Simonutti

The Devil's Alphabet, 2011
Lauren E. Simonutti
Cover image © Lauren E. Simonutti

You can read an earlier interview with Lauren Simonutti by Susan Burnstine on her blog, underexposed:

http://blog.susanburnstine.com/post/21902234398

Susan Burnstine's 'Within Shadows'

Image © Susan Burnstine

Susan Burnstine is a contemporary American fine art photographer. Her personal style of black and white photography echoes qualities of the late 19th/early 20th century Pictorialist movement. Through ethereal, out-of-focus images, Susan represents moods and elements of her dreams with cameras she built from salvaged lenses and other camera parts.

Her 2011 hardcover book, Within Shadows, contains 100 pages with 45 duotones, accompanied with text written by George Slade, Russell Joslin, Susan Burnstine and Susan Spiritus.

Find more information on her website: http://www.susanburnstine.com/books.htm

You can read an interesting interview with Susan by Jonathan Burnstine on aPhotoEditor:

http://www.aphotoeditor.com/2014/06/11/susan-burnstine-interview/

Eyemazing Editions 2014 Annual Pictorial

The Eyemazing Editions' 2014 Annual Pictorial is out. Edited and published in The Netherlands by Eyemazing Susan (Susan Zadeh), this is a large format hardcover book, filled with fascinating contemporary fine art photography by 42 international artists.

Check out the EYEMAZING EDITIONS website: http://eyemazingeditions.com

Echoes of Bluemars

For years, I listened to the Bluemars ambient music streams on the Internet, at night before or during sleep, or while writing or working in the studio. There were three separate streams: Bluemars (Music for the Space Traveller), Cryosleep (Zero Beat Guaranteed) and Voices from Within (Words From Beyond). Cryosleep especially provided the ambience for me to enter into a non-intrusive other-worldly realm where my mind seemed to float, suspended, as I savoured the lightness and textures of the sonic pulses.

On and off over the years, Bluemars suddenly stopped transmitting in 2013. However, in late 2013, overrider created Echoes of Bluemars; as curator, he has made certain that the revived fleet of streams remains faithful to its origins.

"In attempts to reestablish communication with the lost Bluemars fleet, an echo of past transmissions was found. Retransmitting signals from years ago, these echoes give us a glimpse into the past."

http://echoesofbluemars.org

The streams are definitely worth exploring.

There is also an Echoes of Bluemars Facebook page, if you're interested.

Enjoy!

Latent Image magazine

Five full pages, including an excerpt from my wood nymph poem and several images, were published in Issue No. 4 (Fall 2014) of Latent Image, an online magazine edited/published by Allison White and Nicole Langdon-Davies from Vancouver.

Their 'zine is "a story of images and words, juxtaposed." The online digital version is free to view; you can also purchase a hardcopy version.

2 of 5 full pages

Art shows in Japan

While in Tokyo, I visited the Hokusai exhibition at the Ueno Royal Museum close to where we were staying. It was great to see Hokusai's ukiyo-e masterpieces up close.

We travelled to Mount Fuji where we visited the Itchiku Kubota Art Museum. Many years ago, I had bought an oversized book (Opulence) that showed the wonderful kimono created by Itchiku Kubota. He had succeeded in reviving the long-lost technique of tsujigahana. If you're interested in seeing more about the Kubota kimono, go here.

Trip to Japan

J & I recently travelled to Japan, visiting Narita, Tokyo and Mount Fuji. It was a great trip! It's always inspiring to visit a country that has such a sense of aesthetics and design.

If you're interested in viewing an online slideshow of the trip, please hop over. Here are a few images from the trip... (I used an iOS app called Moku Hanga (woodblock print) to postprocess the photos.

Garden at Itchiku Kubota Museum

J in our Japanese-style room

Lotus ikebana in hotel lobby

J in the museum garden

Enjoying a Japanese-style breakfast

Japanese-style room

Food stalls at Tori-no-Itchi festival in Shijuku, Tokyo

wood nymph frontispiece

If you have purchased a hard cover copy of wood nymph, please send me an email to let me know the details (order date, name, address). I'll send you a copy of the frontispiece. Send to:

d e n n i s h u m [at] g m a i l [dot] c o m

New book: wood nymph

I recently finished wood nymph, my new book on blurb. It's an homage to Mary, my artist friend, muse and mentor. The book consists of a freestyle poem augmented by numerous photos transformed through various mediums: digital composite photographs, alcohol gel transfers on paper, beeswax and mixed media works on Japanese washi paper or wood panels.

This gives you an idea of the book's layout:

Mary posed for a photo shoot with me several years ago. This book is my interpretation, through images and words, of a wood nymph inhabiting a birch tree in the northern boreal forest, evokes struggle, transformation and rebirth through a deep longing for change, tempered by a strong determination to preserve an existing order. Though you cannot see her, the nymph still inhabits those woods, watching over us, smiling with amusement.

The 38-page book is available in 7" x 7" colour softcover and hardcover imagewrap formats.

To view a Preview of the book, click on the icon below.

wood nymph

by desean

Book Preview

Enjoy!

Another backlit prototype

My initial experiments with waxed papers infused with wax over a heating plate, then sandwiched between two glass panes, have not been fully success flu. First, the front and back surfaces of the wax infused pieces on paper are in direct contact with the glass panels. If the piece is flat and has no texture, this might be fine, but, following the workshop in Victoria, I am again more drawn to altering the surface with texture: dripping, scraping, sctayching the wax applied with a hake paint brush, embedding leaves, drawing on it, applying fabric textures, rubbing diluted oil and spirit washes in the crevices, etc. This means the piece will have texture.

However, I do not tend to want to mount the pieces on a substrate. I seem to prefer exploiting the translucent quality of the wax infused washi paper, backlighting the pice using ambient light from nearby lamps and windows. This allows the piece to change as the natural and artificial light changes,  showing the front and the back.

In the test piece below, I have mounted the piece between the glass panes in such a way that the textures front is separated from the glass pane; only the back of the piece lightly touches the back panel. In this example, the light from the back plays with the wax droplets—an effect you wouldn't notice if the piece was mounted in a frame with a mat or mounted to a substrate. Note how vivid the colours are when the piece is displayed in this fashion, compared to the image in the previous post.

Advanced Encaustics workshop in Victoria

Earlier this week, I attended a 2-day Advanced encaustics workshop in Victoria led by Leah Macdonald. It was a nice follow-up to last year's Introduction to encaustics workshop. We worked with different types of papers (thin Japanese paper to thicker, more textured papers). Of course, I preferred the Japanese paper because of its thinness and translucency once infused with wax.

Wood Nymph, pigment ink & pencil on Fabriano cold press,
infused with yellow beeswax, oil paint, leaves,  9.5 x 13 in, 2014

Untitled, pigment ink on Asuka washi,
infused with yellow beeswax, handmade paper, oil paint, 10 x 14.5 in, 2014

We also did one piece on a wood substrate.

Alien Contact, pigment ink, Kozo washi & Hahnemuhle Rag on wood panel,
infused with beeswax, oil paint, leaf, 10 x 14 x ½ in, 2014

We also explored making a simple waxed book using discarded and test prints, fabrics, thread, etc.

Suminagashi

I recently purchased a very practical and inspiring book on suminagashi (floating/spilled ink), the ancient Japanese art of marbling by dropping Chinese/India ink on the surface of water, then transferring the pattern to paper. Unlike the Western techniques of marbling, the process is very simple and does not require an additive to thicken the water, nor a dispersant to make the ink separate and expand. The 80-page book, containing 64 illustrations (38 in colour), was written by Anne Chambers, with a Foreword by Akira Kurosaki.

Suminagashi: The Japanese Art of Marbling: A Practical Guide
Anne Chambers, New York: Thames & Hudson, 1991

 Many years ago, I first explored suminagashi for use as a cover for a limited edition flutterbook of short freestyle poems entitled iro—colours. I have recently become interested once again, this time in order to create end papers for a limited edition flutterbook I am working on. It will feature a poem and archival inkjet prints about a forest nymph, printed on wax infused Japanese kozo paper.

Front cover of iro—colours by the author, 1987

Lyrical encaustic artists

While browsing encaustic artists' websites, I came across a few artists whose work resonated with me. The three artists below make use of Japanese washi or rice paper infused with wax, exploiting the paper's translucent qualities. Eisenberg and Guthridge both make use of photos printed with archival pigmented inks on Japanese paper, rendering semi-abstract segmented panels (Guthridge also superimposes panels)—like small windows of time for us to pause and look through. Roland first draws with coloured wax medium on a metal hotplate, then pulls monoprints from the wax layer.

All works evoke zen-like ethereal visual haiku poems, sometimes lit from behind, sometimes suspended away from the wall, fluttering, or mounted behind clear acrylic. The works seem to whisper to us softly in passing... inviting our eyes to touch....

Jeri Eisenberg

Sugar Maple Floaters (Orange), No. 6, 2008
Archival pigment ink on Kozo paper infused with encaustic, 36 x 34 in. Ed. 4/12, triptych
Source: http://www.markelfinearts.com

Jane Guthridge

The Space Between, Triptych - 4
Source: http://www.janeguthridge.com

Paula Roland

Connecting Dots
Encaustic monotype exhibition (backlit)
Source: http://http://www.paularoland.com

Backlit floating frame

Buddha 1, pigment ink on wax-infused kozo paper, ambient lighting, 10"x8"

I've experimented with floating frames where I can sandwich a wax-infused print between two pieces of glass. For the example shown above, I printed a photo on Awagami double-layered kozo, then peeled the kozo image layer from the pulp backing. The resulting image was then infused with encaustic medium on the hotplate. The paper is very thin (approximately 30 gsm) and enhances its translucency by capturing ambient light from the back. I prefer this method of backlighting to using LEDs since it is much simpler and the mood of the image changes constantly with the surrounding light.

Back view

Backlit wax-infused photograph

Since I'm interested in the translucency of wax-infused Japanese unryu washi paper, I've been experimenting with backlighting a photograph printed with pigment ink. I used an extra deep IKEA RIBBA frame and LED diode strips. Though the result is acceptable, I still need to tweaks the positioning of the light strips, the addition of a reflective aluminum backing and the colour of the light. I'd also like to see if I can layer the prints.

Camera Work: The Complete Photographs

Another great art photography book that includes all the photographs published in the 50 Camera Work quarterly journals edited and published by Alfred Stieglitz between 1903 and 1917. It featured the work of Paul Strand and Eduard J. Steichen, among others. The American Photo Secessionists, led by Stieglitz, though part of the Pictorialist movement, had their own take on the future of photography.

In addition to the many photographs, the book includes an informative essay by Pam Roberts entitled Alfred Stieglitz, 291 Gallery and Camera Work in English, German and French. Available on amazon.ca.

Eyemazing: The New Collectible Art Photography

I recently acquired this fantastic oversize book by Eyemazing Susan; it features 423 colour photographs by 130 photographers who were featured in issues of the Eyemazing magazine over the past 10 years.

The Introduction by Karl E. Johnson, as well as the two articles, I Dreams and Memories of a Past Life by Steven Brown, and II Our Body, Our Cage. Our Body, Our Home by John Wood, provide food for thought and wonderment regarding the photography aesthetics of the magazine and its creator.

A great addition to your art library! Available at a great price on amazon.ca.

Encaustic heat table

James and I fabricated an encaustic heat table so that I can gently heat up the beeswax and apply it with a brush to thin Japanese paper. We used an IKEA KOMPLEMENT drawer inside of which I secured four porcelain lamp bases, lining the whole inside of the drawer with foil insulation. A dimmer switch allows me to control the temperature that is emitted from the four 100 W incandescent bulbs that heat up the aluminum sheet. The energy expended by the bulbs is much less than that which would be consumed by an electric griddle.

Inside the heat table

Anodized aluminum sheet covering the box (approx. 24" x 30").
Note the dimmer switch to control the heat intensity.

Wax melting in tin will be brushed onto the surface of the aluminum
plate and will soak into the paper, making it translucent.

Wax infused Japanese paper becomes quite translucent, a quality I am interested in exploring with my mixed media photographs. This process will be used as well for the pages of the accordion book (flutterbook) I am currently working on.

Handmade book project

Initial explorations on a handmade book 

After much research and material sourcing, I have started on a handmade bookmaking project. It will editioned book (possibly 2-3 copies). The working title is Artist and Hamadryad, an original poem on transformation revolving around a wood nymph who inhabits a birch tree and an artist-muse.

The poem will be layed out, then printed on Japanese unryu washi paper, accompanied with photos. The pages will then be infused with wax, becoming translucent, then the photos will be enhanced with oil stick pigments and embedded natural items such as leaves and metal flakes.

I will also create a series of "loup" masks with various waxed washi papers over a plaster face cast of a friend.

Language signs and symbols

Since childhood, I've been interested in how we communicate using spoken, gestural and written language: the signs and symbols of language, such as calligraphy, fonts, Chinese ideograms, Incan knotted khipus, braille, Egyptian hieroglyphs and Morse Code, as well as sign language.

Traditionally, the writing or recording process was done by the human hand with the help of tools. Those that are still in use today seem to rely more on digital devices and alternate methods, so that the analogue or "by hand" process of writing is slowly fading in popularity.

I have also been drawn to signs and codes since one must first know the code in order to decipher the written message. I'd like to incorporate signs and symbols (as well as coded poems) into my photography-based encaustic artwork, embedding such visual/tactile bits to enhance or evoke meaning.