playing with paper and thread

Time is of the essence.

My 'to do' list has 'food' on it. Signs that doing an MA distracts from normal daily activities.

I have to keep a reflective diary, and this week's homework is to play with paper and thread to see what 'book' forms I can come up with.

A book can be almost anything if you choose to take the loosest definition of the word.

Already I am confused about what a 'book' actually might be; it has elements of

•  order
• binding
• sequence

but these might not relate to pages in a traditional book. A group of people telling stories..., a film, sedimentary rock, to name but a few of the suggestions I have come across so far.

I have been asked to make a book about a certain space/place. I have 2 weeks to do this. I have also been asked to play with paper folding and thread to see what variants of book form I can come up with.

I started with a palm leaf binding of some images about a walk.

very simple, and allowing the images to be kept in sequence while being able to view them as a sequence if the thread is long enough.

palm leaf binding

concertina with pockets

concertina

folded concertina and a paper cover

a more rigid structure with pockets

loosely bound pages using needle and cotton

It is possible to fold paper very intricately and mathematically.

If you have no other tasks in life, then that might be for you.

I enjoyed loose sewing and crushing; more in line with my fuzzy photos.

But for my space related book task I have chosen the seawall at Camber Sands. Rigid concrete on a massive scale dividing farmland and the sea.

 A place to breathe.

A short stroll on the shingle in search of ideas for my book revealed evidence of people making their own creations from natural and man made objects; stones, feathers, shells and a poppy stalk.

Is this a book?

I collected some bits of string, wood, stones and seaweed .

The structure of the book needs to represent the wall; strong and linear.

The content is going to be about the feelings and thoughts that I had while walking along the wall. Words that came to mind....

• wind
• sounds
• space
• dogs
• birds
• you get the picture

I had better get on with it.