Commissioned Artwork!

This post feature a notebook and diorama I made for Leslie for her sister's birthday.

This is the story of the notebook in the breifest possible terms. (I'm keeping it brief because it's such a sad, beautiful story about such a beautiful object, but it's somebody else's family history and the fact that I was entrusted with it for a little while doesn't really make it mine to put on the internet).

This was Leslie's grandfather's notebook. He was Preacher to an Arminian Congregation at the time of the Arminian Genocide. He lost his homeland and had to be the leader of this group of reeling, mourning refugees whose suffering was not acknowledged by the international community. This was a note book he kept of clippings and quotes cut out of newspapers or typed on English and Armenian typewriters. the cover bears this legend:

Flowers picked

From here and there

While casually roaming

In byways of thought

For my inspiration

I loved having it around. It really is such an amazing collection of quotes and thoughts, and the object itself is simple and remarkable. Anyway, my assignment was so do some light restoration, basically just reinforcing the holes in the paper where they were starting to tear (I was so afraid of this part of the job that I may have done less of it than I should have), And to make a blank replica in happier colors for Leslie's sister.

I didn't realize this photographed so poorly, you'll have to trust me. The cover was made with red cotton fabric over heavy illustration board with metal eyelets. Text was hand-drawn in Extra Fine Sharpie.

I put in the front-plate upside down but it isn't so bad. Scanned and altered from the original with the name changed. Printed on cream-colored label paper

These are interior pages. I scanned some pages from the original and scattered them between the blank pages of the copy.

This part three of the project: a diorama of Leslie's sister's church (she's also a preacher, in Florence MA) made with the paper from the new book plus construction paper. the inside of the box is papered copies of the old book.

This is the original church. This project was made possible by Google Street View.

The following are five nearly identical glamour shots of the box, which is a 6x6x6 cube.

And that's it. Commissioned artwork.