When you were a kid, how did you spend your time?
I grew up in a comfortable middle-class family. My father spent a great deal of his
free time building furniture, my mother was very active in local theater. My sister and I
divided our time between "making things" in the workshop and putting on
neighborhood productions. We produced plays complete with commercials - we were true
fifties kids - circus entertainments, and fantastic spook houses in converted refrigerator
boxes. One thing my mother was very firm about regarding any of these productions, was
that we were to charge either buttons or straight pins as admission.
When did you discover painting?
In third grade, I was chosen to participate in classes at the Toledo Museum of Art.
Several of my paintings were included in art exchange programs with other countries. One
of my paintings was chosen to be the cover of a teachers' magazine. I was published!
Has your painting changed much over the years?
At this time I work primarily in paper - creating images by pouring colored paper pulp
through hand-cut stencils. I feel that my art has come full circle from the bold, colorful
paintings of childhood, through a period of tight, detailed images, and now back again to
bold, colorful, more childlike images.
What is it that you most enjoy about "pulp painting"?
Papermaking
for me is cathartic. Part of its appeal is that it's very physical - toting buckets of
water, beating large quantities of pulp, hand-mixing huge vats of color. It's different
from the Bob Cratchit-like existence that my former finely detailed style required -
hunched over my drqwing board with electric pencil sharpener close at hand. What other
medium requires that you be up to your elbows in brilliant color? It's wet, messy, and
wonderful - I haven't picked up a brush or a colored pencil since I discovered
papermaking.
Can you explain exactly how pulp painting is done?
Cotton rag fiber is the basic material. It is beaten to a fine pulp and suspended in
water. Chemicals and pigments are then added. This pulp is my paint; cups and squeeze
bottles serve as brushes; hand-cut stencils are my underdrawings.
To
begin, a large screen is dipped into a vat of pulp suspended in water. The water drains
off through an underlying screen and damp pulp is left on the surface of the screen - this
serves as a base sheet to which I add shape and color using stencils, cups, and squeeze
bottles. The pulp is layered and slowly built up. Some sheets are three-quarters of an
inch thick before pressing and drying.
There is always an element of surprise in pulp painting, as I cannot completely
control the blending of color and fiber. Each fiber retains its individual color - this
and the layering of fiber create a feeling of depth in the finished painting.
In
the Tall, Tall Grass was my first book using pulp painting as a medium. The story
is a distillation of summer afternoons spent with my daughter in the woods and fields near
our home: the hot sun - the drone of bees in the grasses - birds in berry bushes -
grasshoppers and crickets bouncing at our feet. ... In the book you will see these
blue-sky, hot summer days depicted in yellow - because they feel very yellow and hot. I
use strong color - not always the colors that nature chooses - but color that conveys the
mood and movement of a particular creature or moment.
Do you work alone or do you have help?
My books are really a joint family effort. My husband, David who is also an artist, not
only makes my screens and totes my pulp, but together with my daughter, Indigo, serves as
a wonderful sounding board. Together we review words and pictures and ideas for new books!
copyright Henry Holt and Company
