Ella's Book

This is a book Susie and I made as a present for Betsy and John's baby Ella - due in Feb of 2006. Susie created the text and I shot the images based on it. I printed them and made the collaged images including paint and hand stitching. I then scanned the images into Word and added the text. The printed pages were laminated so that Ella can draw on the pages with dry erase markers. As the pages were created in word, these are just the scans of my art and I have typed the accompaniny text under each image.

Pleased To Make Your

Acquaintance

Ella, we’d like you to meet some of our friends. They are all special and unique, just like you!

This is Bruce. He likes to eat – especially ice cream!

This is Bates. He drives a train during the day. Do you know what sound a train makes?

This is Niki. She likes to take pictures. Say “cheese”!

This is Tarkin and his brother Jedi. Tarkin barks when he hears his favorite song – it makes Jedi crazy! What does a bark sound like?

This is Amy. She reads a lot of books. If she reads anymore, she might turn into a bookworm! Oops!

This is Brian and his wife Heather. Brian has played music with Daddy for a long, long time.

This is Heath. He makes the best pizza in the whole world. Draw what you want on your pizza.

This is Mike and his cat Gordon. Sometimes Gordon sneezes a lot. Don’t forget to say, “Bless you”!

This is Keith. He plays the drums just like daddy. What color is his beard?

This is Susie. She likes to sing. Let’s sing with her – la la la!

Here are

The Baumer and Margot. They are brother and sister just like Sanity and The Jackyl.

This is Sarah. She loves to play with makeup. Give her a makeover, Ella-Style!

This is Jimmy. He wears glasses to see like an eagle. Draw what kind of glasses you think would look good on him.

All of our friends will love you and look after you, just like we do. Welcome to the world, Ella.

The End.

Collaborative Journal: Niki and Andi

This is the cover of the tiny book Andi and I used for a brief time. I made the cover, did one page, and gave her the book as a gift when I found out I was leaving the school we worked at as a means of continuing our collaboration and communication.
















This is the page I did to give it to her as a gift. I hated the page - thought it really sucked. But I was out of ideas and I really just wanted to get the process started.


Title: What I Learned
Artist: Niki
Date: 5/7/2004








This was Andi's response. She really put my crappy pages to shame. The stems in the vase are tiny slivers of photographs. She created a pocket on the rightside and included a note.


Title: Inspiration
Artist: Andi
Date: May 2004








To deal with the pocket and make the contenets more visible, I made cut-outs. I also added my own note inside the pocket. The page on the right was a piece of posterboard I had been doodling with on both sides. This is side one.

Title: Making A Mask
Artist: Niki
Date: May 2004










This continues the posterboard page I inserted. Andi and I had been playing with Polariod transfers and lifts in our photo classes. You get a lot of mistakes/waste. She used a failed transfer of her portrait for this part. The rectangle on the right is actually like a small booklet folded and attached to these pages within the book.








Inside the folded booklet, she wrote poetry.


Title: When We Lived
Artist: Andi
Date: May 2004

Collaborative Journal: Niki and Dana

Page #1 of the book Dana and I work on. This was the page I made before I wrapped the book as a present to Dana. We have never discussed titles of pages, so I have made up my own for clarity.



Title: Non-Verbal
Artist: Niki
Date: December 2004







Pages #2-3. Dana used a cache of old National Geographic Magazines she inherited from her parents.



Title: Be The Run
Artist: Dana
Date: January 2005




















Pages #4-5. Photocopies of my old family photos as well as maps of my countries of origin. The text includes surnames of my family as well as stories related to me by them.

Title: Family
Artist: Niki
Date: February 2005


Pages #6-7. Dana's work in reference to a countdown to taking some medicine.




Title: Deliberate Act
Artist: Dana
Date: March 2005






Pages#8-9. My first page after Neil left. The photo is actually a silhouette of him, the eighth frame of the roll.



Title: Frame 8
Artist: Niki
Date: April 2005






Pages #10-11. Dana's response to my situation.







Title: The Fabric of Life
Artist: Dana
Date: May 2005





Dana reworked the page between July and December 2005.




Pages#12-13. I made this page while I was teaching the I.B. Art class over the summer. The text is my reply to Dana's pervious page.


Title: The Knots
Artist: Niki
Date: June 2005









Pages#14-15. Dana's first works in photography. The left flag is a photo the right is a transfer. She used an old set of stamps she'd purchased.

Title: A Stand
Artist: Dana
Date: December 2005





Pages#16-17. The image on the left is a drawing I scanned and manipulated by adding a phototransfer background. I printed it on wax paper and transfered the ink onto this page. The concept of these pages is meant to describe the pressure I felt about my financial and marital situation.

Title: Push
Artist: Niki
Date: February 2006