In this bookbinding workshop, participants will explore a variety of handmade sculptural bindings with book artist Éilís Murphy of Folded Leaf. These no-stitch books are highly versatile and suitable for a diverse range of books: notebooks, display books, sketchbooks and more.
We will make several soft-back and 1 hardback book experimenting with different accordion variations. You will also make a flowerfold book, a dynamic book that opens out in unexpected ways.
You will leave with a variety of handmade books that make great gifts for Christmas – or to keep for yourself!
Participants need to bring an apron and pencil. If you have a cutting mat you can bring that along too. Participants are encouraged to bring along any decorative paper that they would like to incorporate into their books if they wish. All materials will be supplied.
Materials & tools:
High quality decorative paper & plain paper, coloured card, glue, gluesheets, brushes, bonefolders, cutting mats, blades, rulers.
About:
Éilís makes handmade and limited-edition books and boxes. She uses artists’ books as a canvas to put forward her ideas. Collaboration is an important part of her practice. She loves facilitating other artists, writers and creatives to create limited edition books.
10am – 1pm & 2 – 4pm. All materials and tools provided. Limited capacity and early booking advised.
Éilís Murphy makes handmade and limited-edition books and boxes. She uses artists’ books as a canvas to put forward her ideas. Collaboration is an important part of her practice. She loves facilitating other artists, writers and creatives to create limited edition books.
“The beauty of bookbinding for me is that I can use traditional techniques that remain unchanged for centuries but combined with a contemporary design and my own artistic innovation,” says book artist Éilís. “There is a long and rich tradition of bookbinding – and indeed artists’ books – in Ireland, starting right back with monks in early monasteries. Their artistic interpretations of written scriptures were the first examples of artists’ books in Ireland.”
Eilís studied at the National College of Art and Design in Dublin and in 2003 an American bookbinder came to the college and taught a module in bookbinding. “I was hooked. I applied for an internship that summer at the prestigious Center for Book Arts in New York and spent three months as an apprentice to Roni Gross.”
Éilís has been binding books ever since and along the way has trained with the Society of Bookbinders (UK), Frauke Schroeder (Berlin) and West Dean College (UK), and has volunteered with the Paper Conservation Department in the National Gallery of Ireland. She is a member of the Society of Bookbinders (UK), the Design & Crafts Council of Ireland, the Graphic Studio Dublin and Visual Artists’ Ireland. She lives and works in the Burren in the west of Ireland.
In 2022, Éilis was honoured to receive a Visual Arts Bursary from the Arts Council of Ireland to develop her art practice. Artists’ books are her principal medium. Through them, she draws together diverse elements such as print, collage and participatory events, weaving multiple threads together.
