UPPERCASE 46

stitch ed togeth e r

B O O K S

A multi-volume book series released in whimsical (nonalphabetical) order on all manner of intriguing and creative topics.

LOOK INSIDE AND DISCOVER MORE AT

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N OV E M B E R 2019

S E P T E M B E R 2020

N OV E M B E R 2020

JA N UA RY 2019

AU G U ST 2019

REPRINTED

201 7

C U R R E N T LY

WHILE SUPPLIES

N OV E M B E R 2019

OUT OF PRINT

OUT OF PRINT

L AST !

S H O P

FROM THE EDITOR’S DESK

Dear Reader, Although you’re holding a print magazine in your hands right now, UPPERCASE is a lot more than just ink on paper. It represents time.

At a personal level, there are my innumerable hours spent curating content, editing submissions and designing pages. It is also a projection into your future, since everything that I’ve collected for these pages will be consumed by readers at least a month or two after the final document is sent to the printer. In this way, it’s also a time capsule—a permanent record of what our community was creating and experiencing just prior to and during the making of the magazine.

During these difficult times, I envision UPPERCASE as a kind of refuge.

It’s a place to get lost in for a while—to feel uplifted and motivated and inspired. So although the pandemic is referenced occasionally in a few profiles and in some reader submissions, in this and future issues I am very consciously curating content that doesn’t dwell on the distress of these times; rather I continue to highlight creativity, resilience and positivity.

With everything changed in dramatic and fundamental ways, it is hard to know what the situation and mood will be when this and subsequent issues are released. But I do know what readers expect and appreciate about this publication: optimism, beauty and inspiration.

And in this, my dear readers, I can provide you respite.

Jani n e Vango ol P U B L I S H E R , E D I TO R , D ES I G N E R

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Contents

46

Ju ly / Au gu s t / Se ptem ber 2020

Kristin Bickal M I N N E A P O L I S , M I N N E S OTA , U SA

I’m a printmaker, but am interested in the textile arts and how the two can overlap. This piece, part of my Women’s Work series, was inspired by a stack of unfinished yo-yo quilt squares I found at an estate sale. In homage to the woman who used her textile scraps to make these yo-yo pieces, I arranged my paper scraps to add colour to the print I made from the physical cloth.

The printing technique is called collagraphy with chine-collé. thesideshow.net

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U P P E R C A S E

Welcome Editor’s Letter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 Contributors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Subscriptions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Snippets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Art & Design

Craft MAKES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 94

COVER ARTIST . . . . . . . . . 34 Lynn Giunta

HOBBY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 108

Noted . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

COLLAG E PROFILES

Stockist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

Leila Rezai . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40 Amy Torgeson . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44 Meg Fatharly . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 48 Jacinta Bunnell . . . . . . . . . . . . 50 Liaqat (Squat) Rasul . . . . . . . 52

Worthwhile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

Fine Print

Scrap Happy Reader Submissions

Storage Room Blues

by Brendan Harrison

Misc.

ARTIST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 56

SUBSCRIBER . . . . . . . . . . 110 Tania Vrancic, Laura Bray

Recommended Reading

by Janine Vangool

Imaginary Beings

by Johanna Goodman Story by Liz Logan

BUSINESS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

EPHEMERA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66

A Little Bit Better

by Arianne Foulks

Papers of Note Reader Submissions

LIBRARY . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

CIRCLE . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112 The UPPERCASE Circle: a free community for subscribers

SHARES . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113

FRESH . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

DISCOVER . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 72

Lynne Clark, Chrissy McIntyre, Mikaela Katherine Kenn

Artist Trading Cards

by Kerrie More

COVET . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 114

MUSING . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

PARTICIPATE . . . . . . . . . . . 76

More than Scraps

by Andrea Jenkins

Snippets and slices and shards, oh my!

by Alyson Kuhn

Artist Trading Cards

by UPPERCASE Readers

ASK LILLA . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Eva Magill-Oliver

Instagrams from readers

SKETCHBOOK . . . . . . . . . . 82 Colour Theory Story and illustration

by Lilla Rogers

ORIG IN . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26

FIELD TRIP . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 86 Collage Flâneuse Collages, photography and story by Shelley Davies

Sparkle Town

by Correy Baldwin

BEG INNINGS . . . . . . . . . . . 30 If you’re lost, you’re going the right way.

Story and illustration by Andrea D’Aquino

ABECEDARY . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Bits and Pieces

by Janine Vangool

PUBLISHED I N D E P E N D E N T LY SINCE

2009

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C O N T R I B U TO RS

U P P E R CAS E 201B – 908, 17th Avenue SW Calgary, Alberta, Canada T2T 0A3

Janine Vangool P U B L I S H E R , E D I TO R , D E S I G N E R

janine@uppercasemagazine.com C U STO M E R S E RV I C E

shop@uppercasemagazine.com

Correy Baldwin C O PY E D I TO R

Core Contributors

PO OR RT TR RA A II T T B BY Y J JO OH HN N M MA AD DE ER RE E P

Jane Audas Correy Baldwin Andrea D’Aquino Melanie Falick Arianne Foulks Joy Deneen Glen Dresser Brendan Harrison Andrea Jenkins Linzee Kull McCray Andrea Marván Kerrie More Emily Orpin Lydie Raschka Christopher Rouleau Laura Tarrish

THANK YOU Thank you to everyone who submitted to the open calls for this issue. Even if you weren’t featured within these printed pages, your effort was noticed and appreciated! UPPERCASE has the best readers in the world.

P RI NTE D I N CA N A DA BY T H E P R O L I F I C G R O U P.

Interior pages are printed on 100% post-consumer recycled Rolland Enviro 100.

Give this magazine a long life!

The content is evergreen, so we hope you’ll revisit it over and over again. If you’re done with it, please pass it on to a friend or colleague who might enjoy our content, or cut up the pages and create some art.

Alyson Kuhn Alyson Kuhn, a.k.a. the Kuhncierge, is a freelance writer, occasional speaker and perennial advocate for expressing your personality (and your gratitude) on paper, especially via real mail.

Alyson has written extensively about paper and printing, art and design, and the smallest surface on which these elements converge: postage stamps. An extreme envelope enthusiast, she has taught hand-folding workshops and, in 2015, co-curated an exhibition titled “Be Enveloped!” at the San Francisco Center for the Book. She frequently hand-folds envelopes before breakfast. kuhncierge.com

We plant a tree with every subscription. treeera.com 6

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Thank you to the many talented contributors, creative collaborators and loyal readers who submitted to this issue.

Liz Logan Liz Logan is a freelance writer, editor and content strategist based in Chicago. Her writing has appeared in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, the Christian Science Monitor, ARTnews and O, The Oprah Magazine, among other publications.

She frequently writes about art and design for Smithsonian.com, 1stDibs’ Introspective and American Craft. She holds a master’s in magazine journalism from Northwestern University’s Medill School of Journalism and a bachelor’s from Oberlin College. lizlogan.us

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PARTICIPATE PUBLISHED I N D E P E N D E N T LY SINCE

2009

Share your ideas and art and enter the open calls! uppercasemagazine.com/ participate

Snippets Art to Table C O L L A G E O D E S T O E V E RY D AY O B J E C T S

BY F E L I C I A DA DA K

A

t the heart of the practice of collage is the act of upcycling and reusing. Collagists often use paper reclaimed from old books and magazines, and some artists compose their work on found photos and salvaged book covers.

The signs of age add texture and can even help direct the composition.

In this series of collages, I have chosen old, discarded flatware as my substrate. I was inspired by their different shapes and sizes, their intricate floral or Art Deco patterns, and most especially by their flaws. The more tarnished and worn, the better. The imperfections and discolourations are what make them beautiful and often help determine which colours I’m going to use in the piece. In a way, these collages are tributes to an ordinary object we most likely take for granted.

Just as Pablo Neruda wrote odes to salt and the lemon, these collages are poems in praise of an elemental object of everyday life. They also speak to the importance food has in our life—as nourishment, as a way to celebrate and as a way to show love to our families. These collages suggest that perhaps art itself is nourishment. feliciadadak.com

BO O K M A K I N G

C O L L AG E F I N D S A HOME IN HANDMADE BOOKS Emily Gold has been making books since she was five years old. “My very first bound creation was crayon illustrations of sea creatures clad in gold wrapping paper.”

She is still making books, having taught classes on bookmaking and exhibited her work.

Made from everyday papers such as brown bags, envelope liners and magazine papers, these small accordion books are the perfect home for her collages. “The structure offers infinite possibilities for playing with paper and combining materials,” she says. “I use collage as a way to incorporate texture, colour and text in an integrated way. I meld disparate papers together and add coloured pencil, crayon and pastel to create a complete image. Since the books are continuous, I’m able to work one page into another to build a narrative. I harmonize with repeating themes and ideas as the pages unfold.”

“There’s something very satisfying about folding and unfolding these familiar pieces in my hands,” she says. “My books are truly a reflection of me.” papercakescissors.com

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I L LU ST R AT I O N

T H E P OT E N T I A L O F S C R A PS Linda Solovic is an illustrator and licensed artist working in St. Louis, Missouri. Working off the computer, Linda makes her illustration with cut paper, fabric and pen. “Since I generate so many scraps when I am working,” she says, “I save the ones I think might have potential in a new piece of art. I also collect little scraps of ephemera, which I keep in containers in my studio.”

Linda loves the process of making collages, which frees her from drawing. “I love picking out just the right scraps and bits, and creating images out of them.” linda-solovic-studio.squarespace.com

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N O T E D

coiled again!

(And again, and again and again) Once in a while, when I can afford to do so, I donate back issues of UPPERCASE magazines to nonprofits, arts groups and schools. In schools, the back issues are most often used as creative prompts and inspiration for lessons and kept in the library. But sometimes, like with Meg Carte and her students at Wichita Collegiate School, the magazines are used in quite surprising ways!

“I wanted share with you one of the projects my students created using some of the magazines you graciously donated to us last year,” Meg shared via email.

“I was recently asked by our parent organization to have all of my lowerschool students (200 students in grades 1 to 4) to create a collaborative artwork to be auctioned off at a fundraiser for our school’s fine arts department. Each student created a magazine coil that consisted of six ‘tubes’ made by rolling a magazine strip on a wood dowel and flattening, rolling into a coil and adding strips to create a larger coil. Many students enjoyed it so much they rolled various sizes to fill in the gaps. The finished piece turned out stunning!”

I couldn’t agree more! This is an amazing way to show off the beauty of print on paper. If your organization (North America only) would benefit from some back issues, please get in touch.

JA N I N E VA N G O O L P U B L I S H E R / E D I TO R / D E S I G N E R

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U P P E R C A S E

S T O C K I S T

Highlighting independent brickand-mortar shops who stock UPPERCASE publications and other lovely things.

C O M M U N I T Y G O O DS

r.s.v.p.

NIKI NEEMS I OWA C I T Y, I OWA , U SA

r.s.v.p. is a brick-and-mortar stationery shop located in Iowa City, Iowa. Since 1999, r.s.v.p. has been an active part of a vibrant retail and arts community. The shop has played host to customers’ visual and book arts exhibits, literary readings, live music performances and collaborative public art installations. With a commitment to connection and community, it is hoped that the goods we sell, and the events and projects we curate, bring people closer.

My job is creating a nontraditional retail environment that relates to public art, social gathering and community organizing. People come in for an experience, not simply to make a purchase.

They share personal stories or discuss the latest news or a book of poems they loved. They chat about the products we offer, and how or where they’re made. Many times they simply want to linger. I provide a well-curated selection of goods and present them in a sensory-pleasing way, and at the same time offer a human touch point. This combination is one only I can create, because it originates from my own interests, curiosities and obsessions.

Over the past few years I have been creating a series of letterpress note cards featuring handwritten work by poets and writers.

The project is called Response, and I think of it as the convergence of poetry, handwriting and epistolary correspondence. Response is a collaborative literary art project, offered as a reaction to the slow disappearance of the handwritten mark, posted letters and books. rsvp-asap.com @rsvpicia responsehandwritingproject.com

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W O R T H W H I L E

Using our creativity for good is one of the best ways we can make a difference.

Through design, art and craft—and with our hands and hearts—we can effect change.

However small it may seem at first, each incremental effort is still significant.

Quilt SOS UK-based online merchant Alice Caroline specializes in Liberty prints and fine English fabrics. “My studio and offices are in a light and airy barn conversion in the rolling Cotswold Hills. Inside, it is a riot of colour and texture, with stacks of blocks, drawers packed with fat quarters and displays of inspiring projects made by staff,” describes Alice. Over the past four years, with the help of many volunteers, Alice has donated 260 handcrafted, unique and cosy bedspreads to the charity SOS Children’s Villages.

This year, the company will be taking the quilts to a London organization. “This year we aim to take 70 quilts to the charity Hestia, which runs safe places specifically to protect women and children who have been harmed by domestic abuse.”

“We are excited to be able to launch the project at a difficult time for everyone globally, and hope that sewing for a charitable cause can lift the spirits of people isolated at home.”

Information on how you can make and donate a quilt, along with an offer for Alice’s fat quarters for this project, can be found on the project website. alicecaroline.com/quilt-sos hestia.org

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B O O K S

A multi-volume book series released in whimsical (non-alphabetical) order on all manner of intriguing and creative topics.

S E P T E M B E R 2020

Help fund the publication of these books by preordering your copies today!

Curated by UPPERCASE publisher Janine Vangool and co-authors Carole Epp and Julia Krueger, this book highlights the work, studio, processes and inspirations of an interesting variety of artists who work in the field of ceramics, pottery and related creative endeavours. Our focus is on independent, working artists with a diversity of objects, styles, backgrounds and cultures—curated with the optimistic and eclectic eye that makes UPPERCASE publications so unique. With profiles of dozens of contemporary studio potters and ceramicists, illustrated with beautiful photography of their work and studio, Volume C: Ceramics will be a gorgeous and informative addition to your Encyclopedia of Inspiration library.

encyclopediaofinspiration.com

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LA AU UR RA A L LO OE EW WE EN N L

Q UA RT E R LY

Curated Quilts A M Y E L L I S A N D C H R I ST I N E R I C K S

K AT E H E N D E R S O N

The 11th issue of Curated Quilts focuses on appliqué techniques, both traditional and contemporary. “Appliqué quilts have a long history and tradition in quilting. While today we have a variety of tools available to us that generations past did without, the call to slow down and create with needle and thread can be very strong,” write the editors. curatedquilts.com

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NINA DODGE

RECOMMENDED READING by janine vangool

ANNABEL WRIGLEY

a collage of ideas

L I B R A R Y

AS P I R AT I O N A L

INSPIRING

Textile Collage: Using Collage Techniques in Textile Art M A N DY PAT T U L LO

Though collage is typically thought of as a marriage of papers bound by glue, the idea of combining disparate pieces of materials to create new work with new meaning is at its essence. In Textile Collage, published by Batsford, artist and author Mandy Pattullo demonstrates how to use the techniques of collage wherein stitches become the glue.

H I STO R I CA L

Cut and Paste: 400 Years of Collage T H E N AT I O N A L G A L L E R I E S

Cut Paper Pictures: Turn Your Art and Photos into Personalized Collages

O F S C OT L A N D

C LOV E R RO B I N

Published in 2019 to accompany an exhibition at the National Galleries of Scotland, this book offers historical context to collage that is many layers deep.

From the 1500s until now, the book covers the history of collage from novelty to scrapbook to high art.

Artist Clover Robin’s techniques are simple in theory—hand-painted papers are cut and pasted to create collaged illustrations—but her incredible skill with scissors and shapes is at an aspirational level. See how she makes her images, step by step, in this book published by Quarto Knows.

nationalgalleries.org

“Fabric collage is a kind of patchwork but without having to follow a pattern and a kind of appliqué without the templates,” she writes. “There is a freedom in the art of fabric collage, which allows you continually to arrange and rearrange and create anything from pictures and wall hangings to books, garments and accessories.”

With excellent, wellphotographed examples throughout, Mandy’s book is sure to inspire you to look at your scrap pile as an abundant source of creative inspiration and potential. mandypattullo.co.uk

cloverrobin.com

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F R E S H

Lynne Clark LOS A N G E L E S , CA L I F O R N I A , U SA

I am a creative magpie of sorts. I am drawn to the overlooked and discarded— the detritus of everyday life.

I can still remember all of the dioramas I made as a kid and today I have many of the tiny “treasures” I collected during my childhood in Long Beach, California.

fresh talent

Most of my professional life has been in the arts and education fields—though not as a maker. I worked with nonprofit organizations on fundraising and development.

I then launched my own small consulting business where I now help LA-area museums and arts-related organizations on their fundraising strategies.

With this change came extra flexibility and freedom. When I joined a local women’s co-op gallery in 2017, I was finally able to dedicate my time and attention to art in a more serious way.

In art school, I always felt pressured to imbue my work with complex sociological ideas or political statements.

This work never felt right and so finding my voice took time.

Fast forward several decades: my life became complex enough and my work started to reflect this without me trying to manufacture a “deeper meaning.” Today, I continue to work on valuing my own personal history and narrative, and sharing where I’m at now as an artist, wife, mother, daughter and community member. @lynnebclarkstudio

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Chrissy McIntyre M A P L E WO O D, N E W J E RS EY, U SA

I have been working in mixedmedia and paper collage for the past six years. My hope for this work is to create a sense of fun. I love art that is beautiful but also gives a little wink at the viewer, too. It’s fun when you meet someone who “gets it.” That’s the dream client.

The collages are made using tiny squares of magazines as paint and pieced together one by one. I often mix in watercolours, gouache or acrylic paint, as it is sometimes necessary to vary the texture and create visual interest. @chrissymcintyreart

Mikaela Katherine Kenn LO N D O N , O N TA R I O, CA N A DA

I am a freelance artist and graphic designer from London, Ontario. I create ripped paper collages out of recycled magazines. I have designed many different pieces including landscapes, cityscape, dogs and food.

I also love to paint, draw and embroider, but ripped paper is my main focus at the moment. I hope to be able to one day have my art in galleries or art shows! @creativewandererco

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M U S I N G

Snippets and slices and shards, oh my!

Little bits of paper and the ways we love them STO RY BY

a lyson k u h n

T

he last couple of years have reinforced my belief that no piece of paper is too small to have an impact. I won’t go so far as to say that the smaller the scrap, the bigger the attraction, but I am comfortable asserting that relatively small pieces of paper exert an appeal disproportionate to their size. And I will add that fanciness is not always a factor. Some of my favourite papers are humbler than humble: they are industrial.

My primary activities with paper are wrapping, typing and sharing. But beyond, or maybe behind, what I do with paper are two big notions: beauty and memory.

Looking at, and touching, paper transports me, not only with admiration, but also with association. For me, a little bit of paper (or fabric) is often a placeholder for an entire experience or expedition. Happily, it seems I am not alone in this.

Patterns of Upcycling Behaviour For many years I’ve been wrapping little soaps in the inside tints from security envelopes. I have my favourite patterns, of course, but I also enjoy letting friends choose their own combination of tints, without divulging where they come from. My favourite moment is when I ask the recipient to identify the source of the wrapping papers. It’s rare for someone to figure it out right away. Some people remain incredulous.

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O R I G I N

sparkle town Vancouver’s love affair with Bottle-Dash BY

correy baldw i n

P H OTO S BY

andrea ma r vá n

W

hy is it that the neighbourhoods of Vancouver seem to sparkle? It’s not an illusion. Back when stucco was the preferred method for finishing a home’s exterior, a curious phenomenon hit the West Coast and brightened up its suburban homes: bits of coloured glass, pressed into stuccoed walls, set there to glitter in the sunlight.

Indeed, beginning in the 1920s, Vancouver became Sparkle Town—a city in love with glass-studded stucco like nowhere else.

Stucco does not exactly have a glittery reputation, at least not today. We may think of it as drab, but in its heyday, this “drab” construction material was instead a source of impressive architectural creativity.

The stucco craze began around 1890, aided by the development of a stronger cement (known as “Portland cement”) and by the popularity of revival styles of architecture (such as Tudor Revival), for which stucco was a major element. It was also inexpensive and durable, and an excellent way to “modernize” your home.

“The two primary objects of modern stucco are: protection and beauty,” a 1936 article in the Vancouver Sun proclaims.

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That’s right: beauty. This was not just slapping cement to the side of your house. Done correctly, there was real artistry to stucco. Thrown with a stiff brush or broom, then smoothed down and shaped with a trowel, stucco could mimic a myriad of stone, or traditional styles, through texture and pattern. It also came in various colours, and with various aggregates—sand, stones or other materials—to add additional colour and texture, and create a sandy or pebbly look.

Traditionally, stuccos were coloured using sands, clays and natural pigments, resulting in earth tones, or at most sandy reds and ochre. Not so in the modern era: the California plaster entrepreneur O. A. Malone introduced modern pigments to the plaster industry.

His plasters came in such vibrant colours that they were dubbed “jazz plaster” (this was the Jazz Age, after all). Now instead of just earth tones we could have pastel-pink houses, baby-blue houses, turquoise and fuchsia houses—jazz houses.

Alongside all this was something called “pebble-dash,” or “stone-dash”—small pebbles or crushed rock, and often small pieces of marble as well, applied to fresh stuc

co as a final decorative element. As the name suggests, this crushed rock is “dashed” (or thrown) onto the fresh stucco, usually by hand with a scoop, then pressed into the stucco with a trowel.

Pebble-dash could be plain or bright, uniform or patterned. Especially popular was the “salt and pepper” variety, consisting of white quartz with black obsidian.

Far more rare, though not entirely unheard of, was to add bits of glass with the pebbles or marble, just to give a building that extra little something. When glass was included, this was known as “glass-dash”—or, more commonly, “bottle-dash,” in reference to the glass bottles that were crushed to make the material.

The glass came in a number of colours, depending on the type of bottle used. Most prominent were brown and green, from beer bottles and pop bottles. Milk bottles were used for transparent glass, and milk of magnesia bottles for cobalt blue (that’s right: a great many homes were decorated with bottles of laxative).

This was modern stucco: take the more expressive side of pebble-dash—marble, pink granite, white quartz, uppercasemagazine.com

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lynn giunta

Art & Design

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S T E P - B Y - S T E P

After brainstorming possible phrases based on this issue’s themes, Lynn proceeded to sketch concepts and layouts.

Gathering colours and making patterns.

Lynn’s collage composition is based closely on her original sketch.

Cutting shapes.

More shapes!

Follow @lynn_giunta for time-lapse videos about her creative process!

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B O O K S

A multi-volume book series released in whimsical (non-alphabetical) order on all manner of intriguing and creative topics.

N OV E M B E R 2020

Help fund the publication of these books by preordering your copies today!

This book gets up close and personal with fibre, telling the stories and processes from venerated traditional thread companies to individual artisans raising sheep to make their own wool. We look at natural fibres and how they are made, and how design plays a part in the visual appeal of fibre brands. We’ll also explore innovative fibres that repurpose and recycle our valuable resources.

Yarn-Thread-String also highlights artists, craftspeople and creative entrepreneurs who use these fibres in unique and inspiring ways. Through this book, you’ll gain a new and exciting perspective on what fibre is—and how we can use it to express our individuality, creativity and humanity.

encyclopediaofinspiration.com

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P R O F I L E S

P O RTR A IT BY B E H RU Z N ASSRE

Leila Rezai

D ES I G N V E RS US A RT

When I decided to go to art school in the mid-1990s, I considered graphic design to be one of the more commercially “legitimate” artistic pursuits. At that time there were many things reinforcing the idea that to be an artist was akin to living a life of poverty, and that it was not a vocation valued by a culture rooted in capitalism. And yet, the language that I spoke involved a love of imagery and words. Before I developed my craft, my mind used to live within the pages of fashion magazines. I would tear out pages of archetypal women or architectural embellishments and collect them. Those pages were part of a world to which I wanted to belong. What I didn’t realize at the time was that I was developing a language in which to understand design, in a very physical way, prior to a formal design education.

It’s a small miracle that I landed within the world of graphic arts because it suits so many aspects of my personality: a love of specificity and detail, colour, typography, language, structure, composition and symbolism. It also connects with the worlds of business and psychology, which are of great interest to me.

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D E S I G N A N D C O L L AG E

There’s a lot of overlap between graphic design and collage. Both can be composed digitally or handcrafted, but the foundational design principles apply to both, bringing together elements of balance, typography, line, colour, shape, space, scale and materials in crafting a story or visual expression. It’s like visual cooking, and curating your ingredients, because the chemistry matters.

For me, collage is different than my graphic design work because I’m able to be more expressive and experimental without having to consider someone else’s brand.

Most of my collage work is done by hand, whereas the opposite is true of my graphic design work. I imbue my collages with far more emotion and feelings than I do my commercial work. It’s the space in which I get to tell a story, versus helping someone tell theirs. Even within the process itself, the collages are more fluid and less iterative. They allow me to experience time and dimensionality, taking the time to work with precision, within layers of process.

My commercial work is highly iterative, in that an idea gets refined over and over again, sometimes to the point that it loses a lot of its essence. However, if I stand my ground and can articulate my ideas, that shouldn’t happen.

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THIS IS A LOW RES PREVIEW OF A HIGH QUALITY Q U A R T E R LY P R I N T M A G A Z I N E PLEASE SUBSCRIBE

THIS IS A LOW RES PREVIEW OF A HIGH QUALITY Q U A R T E R LY P R I N T M A G A Z I N E PLEASE SUBSCRIBE

Craft

Scrap Happy Scraps, offcuts, leftovers—the bits of pieces of textiles, quilting and fabric craft can be too beautiful to toss. In fact, they often inspire new work! Readers share how they use up the scrappy bits to create sewing crafts and textile art.

Tricia Royal S H E R M A N OA K S , CA L I F O R N I A , U SA

Scraps and detritus are the focus of my work and creative ethos: I believe “trash” can equal treasure. I keep and use even the smallest scraps of yarn and fabric; I have a difficult time throwing anything away! I like to make art quilts out of what I call “confetti fabric.” I select a base layer of fabric, arrange the yarn and fabric pieces to my taste, apply a layer of stabilizer, and stitch many lines over it all with my machine using various threads, tacking down all the pieces, which forms a sort of mesh over the top. bitsandbobbins.com

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M A K E S

Lesley Riley CAS CA D E , M A RY L A N D, U SA

I love to gather my scraps of fabric, trims and fibres, and weave them together into a new creation.

Leftover pieces of cloth, threads, vintage buttons, bits of burlap… stitched together they create a new story.

I’ve been making my Fragment series since 1999. The name came from the fragments of fabric I used in the fragments of time I had when I was home with six children. I added two other things that I have collected since I was a teenager—old photos and quotes—to give them meaning. Twenty years later and it is still one of my favourite things to do. These beautiful bits beg to be used and I am happy to answer the call.

@linda_arandas

@lrileyart

Linda Arandas S C OT TS DA L E , A R I ZO N A , U SA

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S U B S C R I B E R

meet some subscribers

C E R A M I C I ST

Tania Vrancic CA N B E R R A , AU ST R A L I A

My sunny little studio is in my home and spills out into the garage, where my kiln and slab roller live. I am predominately a ceramic artist and emerging painter. I also love to use printing and collage techniques in both mediums. I find that by changing from one medium to the next there is more freedom of expression and one informs the other, leading to new discoveries.

The technique I use in ceramics allows me to paint and print with coloured slip (a runny clay) onto a plaster slab before pouring porcelain slip over it to make a clay slab. Then I cut and hand-build vessels or jewellery pieces from the slab, often adding sgraffito and ceramic pencil details. Part of my process, as clay and paint don’t mix, is to alternate between mediums. Once I have exhausted a particular idea, I feel the need to clear the table completely and put everything away then bring out the next medium. It is a fresh start each time and while I don’t mind mess while I am working I need to have a clear start regularly. taniavrancic.com @tania_vrancic_artist 110

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Laura Bray CA M AS , WAS H I N GTO N , U SA

I’m an embroidery and textile artist. I live in south-west Washington, in a little mill town, just across the Columbia River from Portland, Oregon. My studio is in my home and is light and bright. I love to have friends over for tea and stitching in my studio. A recent visitor to my studio told me she felt like she walked into my brain when she came into my studio. I’m not sure if that’s a compliment or not!

Just outside my studio, I have a little garden where I grow plants and flowers that I use to create natural dyes for embroidery floss. My local community is very important to me and I feel that using local plants to dye my floss deepens my sense of place within it. laurabraydesigns.com @laurakbray

Show us your studio! uppercasemagazine.com/ participate

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C I R C L E

Looking forward…

There’s a lot to look forward to in the year ahead at UPPERCASE—and many ways in which you can be involved or even get published! Look for all the details and deadlines for the open calls on our website and be sure to sign up for my weekly newsletter for behind-thescenes updates!

Circle

Little U Little U is the offspring of UPPERCASE magazine—creativity for the young at heart! Volume 2 is out now and Volume 3 is in the works. Look for open calls about how you can be published in Little U.

Make connections, nurture your creative spirit and grow your business!

Ceramics Volume C in the Encyclopedia of Inspiration, co-authored by Carole Epp and Julia Krueger, will be out in September/October 2020. These books are limited edition, so make sure to get yours by preordering the 2020 Encyclopedia set.

Yarn-Thread-String In Volume Y in the Encyclopedia of Inspiration, we get up close and personal with yarn, thread and string, to be released in late 2020. These books are limited edition, so make sure to get yours by preordering the 2020 Encyclopedia set.

Future issues of UPPERCASE magazine The fourth edition of the UPPERCASE Surface Pattern Design Guide will be accepting entries late in 2020. Over the next year, you can look forward to themes about authorship, stationery, science, surface pattern design and more. Pitch your article ideas and theme suggestions anytime by emailing submissions@ uppercasemagazine.com.

The UPPERCASE Circle is a vibrant community hub.

One that is a valuable source of motivation, inspiration and encouragement for like-minded and kind-hearted creative people from around the world.

Although the community is initially brought together by its support for and appreciation of UPPERCASE magazine, the Circle will enhance your experience of all things UPPERCASE while providing additional value to your creative life through conversation and sharing of knowledge.

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Connect with members of the UPPERCASE community— both near and far—who share your interests.

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Share your work with your peers, mentors and potential customers.

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Find inspiration, motivation and new perspectives.

Fabric

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Look for my fourth collection with Windham Fabrics, to be available for shop preorders in September. It will be available to consumers next year.

Move your creative business forward with tips, tools and support from peers and guest experts.

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Live video conferences and video chats.

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Learn and grow through e-courses (coming in 2020).

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Access to this community is FREE when you subscribe to UPPERCASE magazine! uppercasecircle.com

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S H A R E S

Please share your pictures and stories of my books, magazines and fabric on Instagram @uppercasemag with your friends, family and colleagues. It means a lot to me! #uppercaselove for all things UPPERCASE #uppercasemag for the magazine #uppercasekraft for art made with the kraft envelope sent to subscribers #uppercasereader to share what you make #encyclopediaofinspiration for the books #uppercasefabric for my fabric collections with @windhamfabrics #littleumag for my little magazine for the young at heart

@ n i c e a n d fa n cy

@ ke l l ey fewer

@f u n n e l l d on n a

@ j e s s i c a _ _ l o u g h rey

@d ayd re a m sofq u i l t s

@ k i m m c c a r t hys t u d i o

@c o p p e_y u ko_ s h i b a ta

@ h i p a l o o_

@sa s k l ong a r m s t u d i o

@ b o o ks _a n d _a b e

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C O V E T

more than scraps

STO RY A N D P H OTO BY

and re a j enkin s

I

knew I was in deep when I started to find scraps of paper in bed. Hidden in the folds of the sheets, stuck to the hem of my nightgown, the crook of my elbow. It was May 2007 and I was in the midst of my first big handmade postcard swap. I had put the call out on my blog a month earlier and thought I’d get 15, maybe 20 participants, tops, but 77 people from all over the world signed up, each one wholly committed to making and sending out postcards on the first day of summer. This is how I found myself in a sea of paper scraps, how I spent May (and most of June) that year, sitting at the dining room table for hours on end, conjuring the spirit of summer as best I could with paper, paint and glue.

I spent so much time on those postcards that when it finally came time to mail them off, I had trouble letting go. Each one was a little individual piece of art I’d poured myself into, and for a split second I had the ridiculous (and completely selfish) idea to keep them for myself. But I dropped them in the mailbox anyway, heard the soft clunk of the postcards as they hit the bottom and felt a small surge of hope. As I walked home from the post office, I thought about all the different places they were now headed: Australia, Canada, the Netherlands, Japan. And across America, from Oregon to Massachusetts, and at least a couple dozen states in between—77 small connections all over the world, now en route. When I was in the fourth grade, we wrote our names, our school address and a few simple instructions on small white squares of cardstock, attached 114

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them to the strings of balloons, walked outside to the big open field behind the school and released them all up into the sky. As we watched that mass of red balloons, bright like tulips against a brilliant turquoise sky, our teacher explained that they would all eventually float back down and land in different places. Who knew how far they would travel, or who would find them? The hope was that some of us would receive a handwritten letter from a few of the finders as a result. I watched my own balloon grow smaller and smaller that afternoon, following it as long as I could, until it disappeared into the clouds. I nearly exploded with hope.

I never received a letter. But what I will remember, always, is the moment I let go of that balloon. What I will hold onto, always, is how that felt—the inordinate possibility in that particular moment, a potential connection with someone else in the world, whoever it might be. Just a few weeks ago, someone contacted me about the summer postcard swap of 2007. Would I consider organizing another one? In the face of this pandemic, she wrote, we could really use it. I imagined my dining room table covered with scraps again, the hours spent cutting and pasting, the joy, the sense of purpose it could bring during a summer sure to be weighted with uncertainty. I imagined the postcards like balloons, carried across the miles, landing, again, in mailboxes all over the world—connecting us in the tangible ways that keep us grounded, in ways that surely transcend uncertainty and keep us rooted, deeply, in hope.

S H O P

SUBSCRIPTIONS, RENEWALS, BOOKS AND BACK ISSUES

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BAC K C OVE R

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lyn n g i u nta $ 1 8 CA D/ U S D P R I N T E D I N CA N A DA

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