"Homage to My Mentor" (photo by Keith Taylor)

"Homage to My Mentor" detail (photo by Keith Taylor)

"Stay Loud" (photo by Keith Taylor)

"Water Report" (photo by Keith Taylor)

I came to book arts in the 1980’s because it merged both my careers: magazine publisher and hand papermaker. Book Arts continues as a passion and is part of the uniqueness of my wisdom and imagination. The handmade paper for Collective Paths is both plant materials and up-cycled blue jeans, which is a reminder of the cycle of life, death, and rebirth. In Care and Purpose, I use earthy pigments and natural dyes: walnut, persimmon, and indigo. Handmade paper in Stay Loud uses letterpress to emphasize the use of words to create unity. Stay Loud is also a record of my role which developed from constitutional observer, to protestor, then activist spirited by the occupation of our city.

As a publisher I became devoted to book arts because of it’s interdisciplinary and collaborative nature. Letterpress printing from polymer plates is integrated into my current work. Book arts provides the framework to make narrative and documentation tangible. I chose an unconventional format for Vanishing Flora and I used a time-honored format, a book in a clamshell box, for Handmade Path. Both works include text, are time based, sequential, and narrative. In both Vanishing Flora and Water Report I ask viewers to take responsibility towards the environment by evoking feelings towards the natural world that we more typically reserve for other humans; empathy, compassion, care.

There is intimacy when holding a book; all senses are engaged. The book is a vessel, it carries the mind in a way that text on a computer cannot. We understand through our skin and especially our fingertips. The work I make is passed to and transmitted through my hands, eyes, and heart to the reader/viewer. I invite you to bring your own heart towards a beyond that is right here inside my books.

Using the same materials and processes as my two dimensional work I explore interactive installations.  Installations attract a different audience, but they convey the same message as my two dimensional work. My work brings awareness to; counteract environmental depletion, to preserve, and to step lightly on the planet.

Additional representative elements in my work are re-contextualized botany drawings from my great uncle’s books. His life’ work was documenting native species by self-publishing his research and by sending hundreds of plant samples to arboretums nationwide. These are homages to my ancestor but also to the plants whose spirits unfold in the transformation from fiber to handmade paper.

As an emerging artist I had opportunities through work/study and scholarships. I am grateful for my education, and I continue to give back through my devotion to teaching, writing/publishing, and hosting interns. For several decades I contributed to the arts ecosystem by co-running a studio in the Minneapolis warehouse district. This public space hosted over 120 interns of all ages and all walks of life giving them expertise, training, access to facilities, and connections to community. Interns received hands-on learning experiences that were neither university affiliated nor academic in nature. For some it created a foundation for their creative practices. I have found an equilibrium by being involved both with local and national community work like serving on boards/ co-organizing conferences and creating in the studio for renewal.

"Vanishing Flora"