Thursday, October 8, 2009

Turkish Marbling

On Sunday I joined a herd of other paper/book conservation people from the Conservation Centre (my new place of employment) at a Turkish Marbling Workshop at Historic RittenhouseTown in Philadelphia. The site of the first papermill in what was British North America, RittenhouseTown is an interpretive historic landmark as well as a center for paper arts, hosting several workshops relating to book/paper arts. Artists are invited in to give these workshops, which are held in a converted barn/studio.

We all had a really fantastic time: this marbling technique is actually very easy. We used up all of the paper stock and all of the silk scarves.

One of the participants is finished floating the paint on the surface of the liquid. There were multiple stations, but nobody minded waiting, as it was so much fun to see what everyone else was working on.














Betty, one of my old paper conservation professors, works at the long scarf-marbling tank.














The weather was perfect for paper drying.














Outside the studio barn, the scarves flutter in the breeze.














My workshop silk scarves.


















My papers. Not pictured are all the little marbles scraps I have (bookmarks for everyone!)
























































4 comments:

Ynn said...

Jess, these papers are beautiful! So are the scarves! I've seen things like this at Arts Festival and wondered how the were done. I really enjoyed talking with you last night. Thanks again for calling!

Mum said...

Beautiful! I think you should do a workshop here for your blog followers. We would like to make and wear some stylish Turkish Marbled scarves

Lea said...

Gillian cannot wait to eat her bookmark.

Mary Ann said...

I too, find the patterns and colors of your papers and scarves to be very pleasing to the eye! I can tell that you thoroughly enjoyed the day!