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HAND PAPERMAKING
NEWSLETTER
NUMBER 152 OCTOBER 2025
Newsletter Editor: Sophia Hotzler
Contributors: Aimee Lee, Lori Goodman and Teddy Milder, Michelle Samour, Paper Plains Project, Sid Berger.
Sponsors: Arnold Grummer's, the Papertrail Handmade Paper & Book Arts, Penland School of Craft, The Robert C. Williams Papermaking Museum, Carriage House Papers and Dieu Donné.
Hand Papermaking Newsletter is published quarterly.
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The deadline for the next newsletter (January 2026) is November 15, 2025. We encourage letters from our subscribers on any topic. We also solicit comments on articles in Hand Papermaking magazine, questions or remarks for newsletter columnists, and news of special events or activities. The newsletter is supported by our sponsors (listed above). If you would like to support Hand Papermaking through a sponsorship, contact us at rosa@handpapermaking.org.
Hand Papermaking is a 501(c) (3) non-profit organi-zation. Staff: Rosa Chang, Executive Director;
Mina Takahashi, Magazine Editor; Sophia Hotzler, Newsletter Editor/News & Social Media Man-ager; Karen Kopacz, Designer. Board of Directors:
Steph Rue, Lynn Sures, Kazuko Hioki, Emily Duong, Gretchen Schermerhorn, Sanaz Haghani, Anne 2
McKeown, Jerushia Graham, Veronica Pham, Andrea Sherrill Evans, Betsy Knabe Roe, Jenna Bonistalli, Jill Bramwell.
Co-founders: Amanda Degener and Michael Durgin.
Dear Readers,
With themand of sume mer, we welcome a season that speaks directly to the hear ofterial
papermaking. One of gathering, processing, and deep connection with both material and community! This issue features a rich collection of voices and projects from across the field: Aimee Lee reflects on toolmaking and tradition; Paper Plains brings mobile papermak-ing to rural communities; Michelle Samour explores her heritage through handmade paper;
Lori Goodman and Teddy Milder channel collective grief into sculpture; and Sid Berger honors Helen Hiebert's extraordinary impact on decorative papermaking.
—Sophia Hotzler
MEET THE MAKERS
Paper Plains Project
In this recurring feature, Paper Plains a collaborative, community-driven project, shares insight on their mobile papermaking studio that brings accessible papermaking to rural and under-resourced communities-bridging cultural divides, reclaiming access to the arts, and sparking connection through the simple act of making paper by hand.
Anna Haglin teaches papermaking to families in the farming community of Edgerton, MN.
Hand Papermaking Newsletter (HPN): Tell us about this project! What is the force behind starting this mobile papermaking studio?
Paper Plains Project (PPP): We started the project in 2019, while I was a printmaking professor at Minnesota State University, Moorhead. James lived in Minneapolis and had been working for Cave Paper for seven years. We met at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts in 2012 and have been together ever since. We were looking for a way to collaborate creatively, and this project seemed like the perfect excuse. I went to the University of Iowa; James went to the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. We had both been active in the papermaking community and deeply admired projects
like Combat Paper and the Peace Paper Project. We also love being outdoors and foraging for plants, so we pieced together the idea of making plantable native prairie seed paper using fiber from invasive plants.
HPN: Can you describe how the mobile aspect of the project enhances accessibility or changes the way people interact with the art and the mes-sage?
PPP: Paper Plains' mobility allows us to visit places where people don't have the equipment for-or access to-papermaking. The majority of our events are free workshops held at libraries around Minnesota. When people from different backgrounds are invited to do something "weird" together, they automatically find a bridge across their differences! They can find common ground in their shared situation. That's what we're looking for: a way to bridge divides.
I grew up in a rural town in southern Minnesota. I was lucky—we had an arts center that was supported by foot traffic from a local college.
Organizations like the Children's Theatre Company would travel down from the Twin Cities and run summer camps. It made such a difference to me as I was growing up! The arts helped me feel like I belonged in a place where I otherwise didn't. As Paper Plains took shape, I realized we were connecting the arts and rural life in the same way I experienced as a kid.
As a professor in Moorhead, I had students from the White Earth and Standing Rock tribal communities who taught me a lot. They helped me understand that Native folks were forced off their centrally located lands and pushed into more isolated regions of the state. So rural arts advocacy is also about reclaiming access for Native communities, im-migrants, and low-income folks who have been pushed into remote areas for one reason or another.
HPN: How have residents in these more rural parts of Minnesota responded to the project so far? Any surprising reactions or stories?
PPP: There are always a couple of kids riding around empty streets on
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bikes, buying flame-red Mountain Dew at the gas station. Sometimes we cajole them into making a sheet of paper, and they ride off with some seed paper in one hand and Mountain Dew in the other.
One time, a grandmother watched one of her grandkids make paper.
The kid had such a good time that she decided to drive around town on her golf cart, picking up other grandkids and their friends to bring them over to try papermaking. Each time a group finished, she'd show up with another load of annoyed-looking kids. There's usually at least one kid in each rural location who gets really into it and keeps coming back to ask if they can make more paper.
HPN: Do you have any exciting plans, hopes, or goals for the future of this project?
PPP: We're honestly so shocked to be doing this six years after we started.
We didn't know folks would still be interested! We would love to travel to other parts of the country to see how other communities navigate life with invasive plants. I know there are other talented papermakers out there doing good work with invasive plants, so I'd love to hear more about what's worked and what hasn't. There's one huge event we're invited to every year in Minneapolis-the Monarch Festival, held the first weekend of September. It lasts seven hours and attracts about 15,000 attendees.
I haven't had the time or energy to staff it the past couple of years, but I have my fingers crossed for 2026 (please reach out if you're interested in a wild day of papermaking with us!).
We're also so excited to see—and occasionally be a part of-program-ming with the Minnesota Center for Book Arts. That's where we prepare our fiber, and we can't believe we get to live in a place with such a great facility. Ultimately, we're so grateful for the community here and for artist-teachers like Amanda Degener, Bridget O'Malley, and the late Jana Pullman, who helped make Minnesota a hub for papermaking. Their work paved the way for Paper Plains.
- Paper Plains Project
Anna Haglin is an interdisciplinary artist based in Moorhead.
MN. Community engagement and the environment are topics she frequently addresses through her artwork. She spent many years training as a book artist, printmaker, and sculptor before becoming the Assistant Professor of Printmaking at Minnesota State Univer-sity, Moorhead.
James Kleiner's art practice is rooted in papermaking, photogra-phy, and printmaking. He studied at Perpich and the Minneapolis College of Art and Design before becoming a papermaker at Cave Paper in Minneapolis. James met Anna at the Minnesota Center for Book Arts in 2012, and since then they have been foraging, hik-ing, and artistic collaborators ever since.
PAPER EXHIBITION
collective grief - in memoriam
In this feature, Northern California artists Lori Goodman and Teddy Milder reflect on war, loss, and resilience through over 110 hauntingly beautiful paper sculptures, born from a cross-continental collaboration and created as both a response to global atrocities and a gesture toward healing through the act of making.
of Hand Papermakers and Paper Artists (IAPMA). We discovered a synergy in our artistic sensibilities and a shared love of travel. In 2023, we traveled together to Germany and Poland, returning just as the Israeli kidnappings and the subsequent horrific war in Gaza be-gan. These events became the inspiration for our first collaboration.
We were awarded an artist residency in January 2023 in Urubamba, Peru, where we began exploring the construction of small paper sculptures reflecting devastation and atrocities—both historical and contemporary, including the current threats to democracy.
Before leaving for Peru, we beat and pigmented abaca pulp, drying it into patties for transport in our luggage. We also packed a sugeta, moulds and deckles, neri, and various other papermaking supplies and threads.
In Peru, we created a makeshift paper studio on a small covered porch, typically used for natural dyeing. After purchasing a blender at a local market, we searched long and hard for a suitable "vat," visiting hardware stores, construction supply shops, and market vendors selling various plastic tubs. Unable to find a rectangular tub, we settled on an oval baby bathtub, which fit only one of the moulds and deckles we had brought along. We made do!
Recycling cardboard, we constructed armatures for our "burnt
out and bombed" buildings, which we wrapped in black abaca sheets we had formed. Our drying area was a beautiful backyard, surrounded by vistas of the Andes, that seemed to drip into the garden. We created about 10-15 prototypes to bring back home with us.
Upon returning, we began a parallel process of improvising
in our individual studios. Frequent phone calls and image exchanges spurred us along as we problem-solved from a distance. Teddy traveled four hours north to Lori's Northern California studio every few months so we could make paper together and introduce our sculptures to one another. We worked with self-imposed constraints of color, size, and rough shape-but with freedom within those boundaries. We'd sit down to work, not knowing what was going to happen. Armatures varied, incorporating painted reed, dowels, and wire, lashed with waxed linen or pounded kozo strands.
Over the course of a year, we completed more than 1oo sculptures, similar in shape and form, but no two alike. They were dressed in various threads and fibers. Together, they formed a stark landscape, echoing our grief as the Gaza war deepened and democratic institutions felt increasingly precarious. Realizing we needed to include a gesture toward healing and hope, we created an additional ten sculptures, this time pigmented with a glowing saffron color. The resulting 9 × 12-foot installation includes over 11o small sculptures.
At its first showing in June 2025 at the Barn Gallery in Eureka,
we witnessed viewers move slowly around the work-some brought to tears, others lingering to discover each sculpture's unique presence. The installation sparked heartfelt dialogue and reflection. Many told us, must have been powerful to do something with your hands, in the face of so much grief." And indeed, the act of making became a way to process despair, transforming it into shared space and conversation.
We hope our installation reflects the beauty found in the
struggle to nurture hope, while remembering and honoring the devastation, loss of life, and culture caused by senseless violence, atrocity, and war. We hold all who suffered and died in memoriam.
collective grief - in memoriam will next be presented at Arts Benicia, California, in Where the Spirit Meets the Bone - Grief and Healing, October 25-December 14, 2025.
— Lori Goodman and Teddy Milder
Lori Goodman and Teddy Milder are Northern California sculptors with extensive bodies of work in fiber and paper. Collaborating for the first time, they were awarded an artist residency in Urubumba, Peru to begin work on collective grief - in memoriam. They initiated parallel processes of improvisation from their Eureka and Berkeley studios to generate the installation's many forms. https://www.Loribgoodman.com @loribgoodman
https://www.teddymilder.com
@teddymilder
DECORATED PAPERS
Helen Hiebert
Longtime newsletter contributor Sid Berger continues his documentation of decorated papers. In this feature Sid highlights decorated paper artist, Helen Hiebert.
or the April 2o21 column (number 134), I wrote about the marvel-
ous work of Helen Hiebert. Her constant and developing work prompted me to do another column about her, highlighting other, and newer, aspects of her art. Most people in the hand papermaking community will recognize her name, and we all must thank her for her longstanding and ongoing efforts. Rarely has a week gone by over the years without one of Helen's online posts announcing her many wonderful workshops or revealing yet another of her amazing
Among Helen's ongoing projects is what she calls "The Paper
Year"; a series of opportunities for subscribers to "explore techniques for working with paper each month in our supportive, creative, paper-loving community." Every month, without fail, she presents one brilliant decorative paper project or structure after another. This year her plans included, among many other moments: "Creating Swirling Flowers, with a magnetic attachment; Weaving Interlocking Cylinders; Exploring the Jitterbug with guest artist Kelli Anderson; and attending a cyanotype printing demonstration with Madge Evers." Helen not only creates these opportunities herself but also actively seeks out other paper artists with whom she collaborates to offer participants truly unique and enriching
Helen attributes much of her artistry to the encouragement she received from her mother growing up in the 197os. By the 19gos, she was already creating beautiful watermarked papers. In a catalog published to accompany an exhibition of her work at the Kalamazoo Book Arts Center, 1 we learn: "Since 1991, Helen Hiebert has created sculpture, installations, film, and artist's books inspired by her fascination with paper and light."
As noted, Helen shares her deep knowledge of papermaking through numerous workshops, her online presence, and her wonderfully written books. In 1998, she published a splendid volume (in two editions, each with a different title): Papermaking with Plants (hardback) and Papermaking with Garden Plants & Common Weeds (paperback). The papers she produced are lovely-decorated sheets in themselves, even without additional surface decoration. The books details every step, from acquiring raw materials to finishing the dried sheets. But what is reassuring is that we are in the hands of a master, which we can see with the fine details of the raw materials, equipment and tools needed, processing practices, recipes for fiber preparation, an analysis of the fibers that one may use, the glossary of key terms (which are beautifully explained), and so forth. These are beautiful, clearly written, and important books.
Those texts were followed in 2000 by The Papermaker's
Companion: The Ultimate Guide to Making and Using Handmade Paper. This comprehensive book showcases Helen's mastery of paper-its materials, manufacture, and uses. Few books demonstrate such a range of expertise on the subject, and it is written in crystal-clear prose.
(Helen also helped Alison Kolesar create nearly 250 excellent, instructive illustrations for this book.)
Another of her books is The Art of Papercraft (North Adams, MA: Storey Publications, 2022), in which she presents—in over 300 pages-scores of projects and objects that can be made with her (or others') lovely papers. Many techniques are explained and shown with colorful photographs and excellent drawings. A full chapter (#7), titled
"Papermaking & Surface Treatments," details how to decorate the papers used throughout the book; one example being a paper lantern. Helen had earlier written an entire book on this topic, Paper Illuminated (North Adams, MA: Storey Books, 200I), in which she explores lanterns, screens, lampshades, night-lights, window treatments, and luminaria.
Among many other techniques, she demonstrates how hole punches, windows, and watermarks can be used to reveal light. She also includes methods such as pleating, stitching, embossing, collaging, crumpling, origami, pop-ups, patchwork, and weaving.
One of the most remarkable aspects of Helen's work is the beauty she brings to life through handmade paper-items in many forms. Her
decorative papers take on new life as parts of something greater. The woven paper in the accompanying illustration, along with her bendable paper objects, are lovely-made even more so by the decorative papers she designed for them. Her bendable paper includes embedded wires that allow the sheets to be shaped and hold those shapes.
Two additional books are worth mentioning. First is Playing with Paper: Illuminating, Engineering, and Reimagining Paper Art (Beverly, MA: Quarry Books, 2013), in which we see cutting, scoring, folding, weaving, flying, illuminating, and inflating paper. The artwork presented in these books-utilizing many kinds of decorated paper—is truly inspiring.
The second is Playing with Pop-ups: The Art of Dimensional, Moving Paper Designs (Beverly, MA: Quarry Books, 2014). This how-to book is also one you can physically interact with, thanks to removable templates that let readers create the very movables Helen describes.
Helen has said that, with paper, she is primarily interested in shrinkage, illumination, and watermarks. The last of these is particularly well-exhibited in a sheet she created for the College Book Arts
It is clear that Helen is fascinated not merely with decorated paper, but with all aspects of paper, and how it can be used in decorative and elegant ways. She employs all kinds of paper and uses them with refined skill. As she mentioned to me, she "enjoys] working in community and thinking about the fate of our planet" (personal communication). In fact, much of her work is community-oriented-from her elegant and deeply philosophical installations to the many workshops she teaches, and the many other ways she reaches out to people. In the write-up for her installation Holding Space, she says: "I am interested in the space that exists between people, between words, between thoughts. I am intrigued by the meditative qualities of repetition, both in the process of making my work and also in viewing it.
One small change can make a huge change in the final piece."?
About her installation The Wish, she writes: "The individual dandelion seeds in my sculpture The Wish symbolize private wishes, yet the piece as a whole serves as a metaphor for human connectedness: we all begin as a seed, we are all connected, and each of us travels far and wide throughout our lives like a dandelion seed carried on the wind."3 And of her installation Hydrogen Bond, she explains: "The unlikely construction material-thread—is composed in a hexagonal web-like pattern with paper disks entangled in it, visually representing hydrogen bonds (one of the primary mechanisms by which papermaking fibers adhere to each other in the dry state) and metaphorically symbolizing the myriad connections in our lives."4
Spreading the word about paper and its decorative uses is just one part of Helen's mission. She also seeks to connect with a broad community, sharing her knowledge and life philosophy. And reach out she does, through the films she produces, her books, her many classes and workshops, and her vibrant online presence. Among her ongoing projects are: "The Paper Advisor," "The Sunday Paper" (her blog about happenings in the paper world), "Paper Talk" (her podcast featuring interviews with paper artists from around the globe), her YouTube channel offering how-to videos, and her free Facebook group "The Paper
She does the work of a dozen people to promote paper— its decoration, uses, and significance. And her innovation and imagination leave us eager to see what she'll do next.
https://helenhiebertstudio.com/product/hydrogen-bond/.
Helen Hiebert, Bendable Paper Sculpture, The Art of Paper Craft, p. 167
A woven window hanging, in Playing With Paper, p. 51
— Sid Berger
Sidney Berger is Director Emeritus of the Phillips Library of the Peabody Essex Museum, and a professor on the faculty of the library schools at Simmons University and the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign. He and his wife Michèle Cloonan put together the Berger-Cloonan Collection of Decorated Paper (about 22,000 pieces), now in the Cushing Library at Texas ARM
University.
FROM THE ORGANIZATION
Up Next: The Palestine on Paper Winter 2025 issue of Hand Papermaking magazine
In this feature, Michelle Samour shares how her introduction to guest editor Nisa Ari led to a meaningful dialogue with artist Jumana Abboud-explor-ing shared Palestinian heritage, the symbolism of water, and the political and ecological layers embedded in handmade paper.
Hand Papermaking Newsletter (HPN): You were the one to introduce us to Nisa for this guest-edited issue. How did you two connect with each other? And how has that connection played a part in this issue?
Michelle Samour (MS): Several years ago, I had an exhibition at the Fuller Craft Museum of my ongoing series, Borders and Boundaries, about Palestine and my Palestinian ancestry. I wanted to put together a panel to speak about the work from the exhibition within the context of Palestinian art—historical and contemporary-and the ongoing dispossession of the Palestinians.
Through a series of various contacts, I had the good fortune of being introduced to Nisa Ari, who agreed to be one of the four panelists. As guest editor of the Winter 2025 issue, Palestine on Paper, Nisa contacted me and asked if I would be interested in being part of a conversation with the Palestinian artist Jumana Abboud, around our shared interest in
I'm so grateful to have had the opportunity to get to know Jumana and her extraordinary work through our conversations with Nisa. And because much of my multimedia art practice is centered around working with handmade paper and pulp, speaking about the concept of water within the context of Hand Papermaking also seemed like a perfect fit.
HPN: Are there any works of art or pieces of yours that were not able to be included in this upcoming issue that you would like to talk about? If so, please give us some insight into the works and the meanings behind
MS: In Land of Milk and Honey: Stuck, I cut acrylic Mother of Pearl, a ubiquitous craft material in Bethlehem, where my family is from, into the shapes of Israel, the Palestinian territories, and encroaching settlements. I then mirrored and embedded the cartographic shapes into sheets of overbeaten abaca pulp that I pigmented to elicit the tone of
The various territories are treated as biological specimens, creating a tension between stasis and potentiality, the search for the Promised Land; the land of "milk and honey." This re-examination of land as a malleable, movable, biological, and political construct forms a visual vocabulary suggestive of habitat fragmentation (the effects of geographic fragmentation on biological diversity); flagella (the means of movement for microscopic organisms); plant metamorphosis; root structures; and cell division.
— Michelle Samour
Michelle Samour's work explores the intersections between science, technology, and the natural world, and the socio-political repercussions of redefining borders and boundaries. Her artist residencies include Haystack Mountain School of Crafts and The Banff Centre. She has exhibited her work worldwide including at the de Cordova Sculpture Park and Museum, Kohler Art Center, and Houston Center for Contemporary Craft. She has received grants from the MA Cultural Council and a Society of Arts and Crafts NE Artist Award among others. Collections that hold her work include the International Paper Company, Meditech, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Watson Library. She is co-author with Lynn Sures of Radical Paper: Art and Invention with Colored Pulp. Samour is Professor Emerita of the SMFA at Tufts University.
BOOK RELEASE
A Call to Action
In this feature, Aimee Lee shares a heartfelt reflection on friendship, hand skills, and the vital, often unsung work of toolmakers in the world of hand papermaking. As Good As Our Tools explores the urgency of preserving and passing down the knowledge needed to sustain this craft.
ave you ever taken apart a beater? I have a friend, Bill Lorton I who was unafraid of the project. We are both Generation & with his MFA in textiles, and mine is in book and paper arts. After I built a hanji studio in Cleveland at the Morgan Conservatory in 2010, Bill brought his art college students to my lecture and took my hanji workshop. When I decided to buy a house, I found one close to Bill.
My mom always said it's good to have a friend nearby.
I grew up in apartments in suburban New York, and he grew up in rural Illinois. Back then, boys were much more encouraged than girls to make and build things. I watched him add a deck to his house, turn his front and back lawns into huge gardens, and demolish his garage then rebuild it from the slab up into a fully equipped shop. He helped design and build a portable hanji vat; I've shared his design widely, and it has inspired many others. He built a drybox and a hydraulic press for the papermaking studio I built for Oberlin College. He was there when my beater arrived, and when it clogged and stopped running, he said, "Let's take it apart!"
What he thought would be a straightforward task became a months-long saga. I learned so much and he probably wished he'd never met me.
I have always admired his knowledge, his skills, and his ability to look at a problem, assess it, and solve it. In 2016, I decided to interview people like him to understand what makes them tick, as a cohort of toolmakers.
I've commissioned people to smith knives and build a naginata, and I've seen firsthand that we have a serious shortage of these makers.
In As Good As Our Tools, I note that my first alarm rang when I saw how few people in Korea were making the most important tools for hanji making: bamboo screens. I tried to get others to take up the work, and eventually I returned to Korea to learn it myself. After a few days weaving a screen, I realized I had to learn and document the process as well as I could, so I could pass it down to someone younger.
Most of the toolmakers in my book are Boomers, who, as kids, were left to their own devices and made things. Today, our culture has shifted far from the tactile world; we've forgotten that we can make stuff. It's not
easy: you have to learn how things work, where to get which materials, what to do when your sources dry up, and so on. You have to deal with people, even when you'd rather be in the shop. But the satisfaction of making a well-functioning tool is deep.
You extend more people's hands into making paper, art, conservation mounts for paper-based national treasures, and things we haven't even dreamed up yet.
These toolmakers will never cease to inspire me.
I hope that when they are gone, you will have taken up the work, or joined a friend to dismantle and reassemble another beater.
— Aimee Lee
Aimee Lee is an artist who makes paper, writes, and advocates for Korean papermaking practices as an Ohio Arts Council Heritage Fellow and Arts Midwest Culture Bearer Awardee. Her Fulbright research led to the first hanji studio in North America, an award-winning book, Hanji Unfurled, and a studio practice that includes jiseung, joomchi, paper textile, botanical paper, book art, and natural dyeing techniques.
She travels the world to teach, exhibit, and serve as a resident artist while building capacity for East Asian papermaking. Her Fulbright Senior Scholar research focused on bamboo screens for hanji making and her second book, As Good as Our Tools, expand scholarship in the field of toolmaking for hand papermakers.
LISTINGS
Hand Papermaking Newsletter's Listings now focus only on the most cur-rent, most relevent news, events, and opportunities. For a more complete list of organizations, studios, and institutions that make paper, educate people about handmade paper, or present programming or exhibitions related to handmade paper visit our website at www.handpapermaking.org/news-resources/ listings
PUBLICATIONS
As Good As Our Tools, Equipment and Tool Makers for Hand Papermak-ing by Aimee Lee. For over two millennia, humans have made paper by inventing, improving, and adapting a range of tools and equipment to effectively create the best product. In the zoth century, Euro-pean-style hand papermaking experienced a revival made possible by specialized studios and tools. This field of creative hand papermaking is small but robust, enabled by a key group of people: the toolmakers.
These skilled makers build the equipment and tools essential to making paper by hand but receive little attention. This survey of fifteen makers across four continents gives center stage to these remarkable people, illuminating their personal paths towards these niche prac-tices. Unfortunately, only a few are training successors while they age into retirement, even as interest in hand papermaking booms, but their stories inspire renewed commitment to learning how to make things - and, more importantly - how to make things work. Here, we listen to their voices, bring sustained attention to their vital contribu-tions, and encourage a new generation of builders and tinkerers to advance hand papermaking. With 390 illustrations. Available here to purchase https://www.oakknoll.com/pages/books/142012
A Tour of the World of Paper (Le tour du monde du papier). Although it was born in China, paper has conquered the entire world, in various forms and for various uses. Julie Auzillon, an art bookbinder passionate about this material, takes you across five continents to discover the fascinating world of paper. From Tokyo to Cape Town, via Venice, New York and Sydney, it takes you into artists' and artisans' studios, through the doors of unusual boutiques, and into contemporary paper creations. This journey is punctuated by numerous cultural, historical and technical lessons. Paper is discovered here in all its complexity, multiplicity and originality. Cut-out paper, fans, papier-mâché masks, contemporary stationery, wallpaper, ephemeral paper clothing..: the discoveries are endless, and the world tour is exhilarat-ing!
WORKSHOPS
The Japanese Paper Place has two workshops coming up. The first, Picture Making using Washi Collage with Ruth Maclean, Saturday, October 25 • Ioam - 4pm. Using the rich variety of colours and textures Washi offers, you will create a unique collage based on an image of your own choosing. You can work from a photo, or from your imagination. Artist and illustrator, Ruth Maclean will guide you through the process of selecting papers based on colour, tone, transparency, and texture, that will work best for your image, and will show you how layering and juxtaposition of tones and textures work to create form and distance. Whether you work from your own photograph, from your imagination, or want to work more abstractly, there will be lots to learn. Ruth encourages individual expression
-- whatever inspires your creativity -- come with your ideas and enjoy the day! All necessary supplies and materials will be provided. The
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second, Washi and Willow: Lanterns with Kathleen Doody, Saturday, November 15 • Ioam - 4pm. The inherent warmth of washi lends itself beautifully to lightworks. During the course of the day, you will construct lanterns using willow and dogwood, covered with a carefully-selected choice of Japanese paper. You can work from your own design, or model yours on one of the samples created by Kathleen for the workshop as you create your own unique, natural lantern. LED flickering tea lights or votives, in glass holders, will be supplied to illuminate your work. For more information, visit https:// www.japanesepaperplace.com/workshops/
An exciting workshop is happing at the WildCraft Studio School.
Paper Sculpture: Amanita Mushrooms, with Inga Ilze Peterson, Monday, November 17, 6-9 pm. In this workshop, students will learn all the basic skills needed to cut, shape and assemble the parts of a fly agaric (amanita) inspired mushroom. Students will leave with a completed paper mushroom, and will have the option to mount their project on a small piece of birch wood with moss. To learn more, visit https://wildcraftstudioschool.com/paper-sculpture-amanita-mush-
rooms.html#content
A few workshops at the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermak-ing are coming up. Sculptural Abaca, Wednesday, October 8, 2025, 7:00pm - 8:30pm. Explore the properties of abaca, a beautiful translucent paper fiber with a high a high shrinkage rate, while making small sculptural objects. Participants will pull sheets of abaca paper and then experiment with placing wire or string between the layers, so that as the paper dries it will be transformed into unique sculptural forms. All supplies provided and all levels of experience welcome.
Expanded Landscapes, Saturday, November 8, 2025, 10:00am-4:00pm. Sara Garden Armstrong, an internationally renowned artist whose exhibiting career and studio work with handmade paper processes spans over 50 years, leads this one-day program. The workshop begins with a brief introduction to Armstrong's work, with hands-on examples. Then participants will focus on learning, observ-ing, and making unique paper objects to explore the processes of pigment staining, pulp-pouring, pulp painting, and collage techniques on pre-formed sheets of paper. Technical information and recipes about sizing, pulp beating and experimenting with different fibers will be addressed. Participants will dive deep into the practice of creating and sustaining new relationships with paper formation, pig-ments, and processes integral to promoting an ongoing experience with the fascinating world of papermaking, pigments, and collage.
For more information, visit https://paper.gatech.edu/program-listing
An exciting workshop, Paste Paper & Potential Uses, at Minnesota Center for Book Arts with María Carolina Ceballos is coming up on Wednesday, October 15, 5:00 PM 8:00 PM. Paste papers are a playful and accessible DIY method to incorporate color, pattern, and other design elements into any project. Dampened paper is coated with pigmented pastes, then designs are worked manually into the surface. In this virtual workshop, explore a variety of pastes, paints, papers, and tools to gain a solid foundation of technique. The tools and techniques will be discussed and demonstrated before participants begin to create freely, making their own unique papers.
Atelier Retailles will host a fun workshop, DIY WORKSHOP - Make your own paper with what you have on hand, on Saturday, October 18, 10:30 am. Making paper is a bit like cooking. The image isn't a cliché for nothing: you stir, you measure, you test, and in the end, you
have something delicious/magnificent in your hands. No need for professional equipment or a state-of-the-art workshop... even if we have all that here, at Retailles, hehe. A hint of ingenuity, a few drops of pleasure, with or without Don Juan, and the mentality to transform what you already have on hand.
And then tadaaaaaa! For more information, and to view other upcoming workshops, visit https://www.atelierretailles.com/program-
mation-cours-et-formations
EVENTS
The Morgan Conservatory is hosting their second annual paper fashion fundraiser, Dress to IMPRESS on Saturday, October 4th from 6-10 p.m. A gorgeous night of wild paper fashions and wearable art, the Morgan celebrates paper and print as fashion. 18 artists and designers are contributing to this year's paper fashions under the theme:
REDUCE. REDACT. REUSE. RECYCLE, utilizing handmade papers, recycled papers and other elements, while demonstrating the versatility and poignancy of paper and print with movement. Doors open at 6 p.m. and the fashion walk starts at 7 with prizes for first place, runner up, and best-dressed at-tendee. There will be a cash bar, light finger
Espiritu Santo by Nancy Cohen
Connected by Helen Hiebert
Overtures by Sara Garden Armstrong
foods, artworks and experience available in our silent & live auction, fantastic raffle bas-kets, a photo booth, deejay, a red carpet, and more! Get tickets or support The Morgan by visiting https://www.morganconservatory. org/dress-to-impress
A new exhibition at Minnesota Center for Book Arts opened Septemer II, and is up until January II, 2026. Ang manok na hindi nakikita, hindi rin nakakain: The chicken you don't see, you cannot eat. For more informa-tion, visit https://mnbookarts.org/exhibi-tions-upload/outlook-gallery-maeve-leslie
EXHIBITIONS
An exciting exhibiton has opened at the Robert C. Williams Museum of Papermak-ing September 4, 2025 - January 30, 2026.
Legacies in Paper: Nancy Cohen, Sara Garden Armstrong, & Helen Hiebert, What does it mean for an artist to spend years exploring a material? How deep an understanding and visual vocabulary can be created with time and an extensive investigation. The three artists featured in the inaugural triennial series Legacies in Paper have spent a lifetime exploring the boundless qualities of handmade paper. The Paper Museum celebrates the endless vast possibilities of hand paper-making and the dedication to the creation of meaningful excellent art by Nancy Cohen, Sara Garden Armstrong, & Helen Hiebert.
Follow this link for other upcoming exhibitions https://paper.gatech.edu/upcoming-
exhibits
OPPORTUNITIES
Now is the time to consider applying for a 2026 spring scholarship at Penland School of Craft. Deadline: October 15, 2025.
Spring Scholarships available for the 8-week concentration are Room and Board Scholar-ships, and students are responsible for full tuition. Scholarships available for our 5-day workshops are a $500 discount on tuition and students are responsible for the remaining tuition amount and their room and board. Scholarship applications are reviewed and awarded on a first-come, first-served basis. Workshops with scholarships available are listed on the application.
We want to promote your projects!
If you have any news, upcoming events, or open opportunities let us know at newsletter@hand-
papermaking.org
SPECIAL THANKS TO OUR DONORS
Hand Papermaking acknowledges recent contributors to our nonprofit programs. All donations are greatly appreciated and tax deductible. Our tax ID number is 52-1436849. Call or write for information on annual giving levels, automatic monthly gifts, and other ways to support us.
BENEFACTORS: Mark Tomasko, Beck Whitehead
PATRONS: Tom Balbo, Lisa Cirando, Sid Berger & Michèle Cloonan, Sue Gosin, Darin Murphy, Erik Saarmaa, Michelle Samour, Kenneth Tyler UNDERWRITERS: Yousef Ahmed, John Cirando, Vijay Dhawan, Lois & Gordon James, Ingrid Rose
SPONSORs: Eric Avery, Tom & Lore Burger, Kerri Cushman, Susan Mackin Dolan, Devie Dragone, Michael Durgin, Michael Fallon, Jane Farmer, Kim Grummer, Helen Hiebert, Robyn Johnson & Peter Newland, Debora Mayer, Marcia Morse, Robert Specker, H. Paul Sullivan, Mina Takahashi, Aviva Weiner, Kathy Wosika
DONORS: May Babcock, Alisa Banks, Tom Bannister, Sarah Louise Brayer, Ann Cicale, Amanda Degener, John Dietel, Karla & Jim Elling, David Engle, Jerry Exline, Helen Frederick, Lori Goodman, Richard Haynes, Margaret Heineman, Shireen Holman, Kyoko Ibe, Jamie Kamph, Enid Keyser, June Linowitz, Julie McLaughlin, Sharon Morris, Jeannine Mulan, Anela Oh, Elaine Nishizu, Nancy Pike, Alta Price, Joy Purcell, Renee Rogers, Annabelle Shrieve, Thomas Siciliano, Kathleen Stevenson, Bernie Vinzani, April Vollmer, Paul Wong
SUPPORTERS: Marlene Adler, John Babcock, Timothy Barrett, Kathryn Clark, Nancy Cohen, Marian Dirda, Iris Dozer, Tatiana Ginsberg, Mabel Grummer, Guild of Papermakers, Lisa Haque, Robert Hauser, Viviane Ivanova, Kristin Kavanagh, Susan Kanowith-Klein, David Kimball, Steve Kostell, Lea Basile-Lazarus, Aimee Lee, Winifred Lutz, MP Marion, Edwin Martin, Lynne Mattot, Ann McKeown, Tim Moore & Pati Scobey, Catherine Nash, Nancy Pobanz, Melissa Potter, Brian Queen, Dianne Reeves, Carolyn Riley, Michele Rothenberger,
Pamela Wood
FRIENDS: Jack Becker, Anne Beckett, Lee Cooper, Elizabeth Curren, Dorothy Field, Lucia Harrison, Margaret Miller, Deborah Sternberg-Service,
Don Widmer
IN-KIND DONATIONS: Janet De Boer, John Gerard, Dard Hunter III, Microsoft Corporate Citizen-ship, Steve Miller
CONTRIBUTORS TO OUR 2025 AUCTION FUNDRAISING EVENT: Amanda Degener, Frances ]), James Ojascastro, Lesley Dill, Dieu Donné, Round Top Paper, Ilze Dilane, Heike Berl, Kyoko Ibe, Amy Richard, Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, Paper Circle, The Befuddled Press, Tom Balbo, Arnold Grummer's Papermaking, Sophia Hotzler, Susan Mackin Dolan, Red Hot Fibre, Carriage House Paper, Janus Press, Cave Paper, lasniya Tarmin, Lynn Sures, Darin Murphy 1ook Pottery Paper, Aimee Lee, Botanical Col-ors, Washi Arts, Lois James, Helen Hiebert.
AND THANKS TOO TO OUR SPONSORS
Arnold Grummer's, the Papertrail Handmade Paper & Book Arts, Penland School of Craft, The Robert C. Williams Papermaking Museum, Carriage House Papers and Dieu Donné.