Wedding anniversary lasercut

This was a recent private commission for a first wedding anniversary.  The lasercut had to depict the wedding location - Prestonfield House stables in Edinburgh - as well as moments from the day itself.

Scroll down to see some of the finished images below!

Work in progress: something wicked this way comes...

Here is some work in progress of a new laser-cut artists' book, which won't be finished for a little while yet. Perhaps some of you can already tell which story this is based on by the clues in this photograph...

Once the edits have been finished I'll begin making an edition, with copies available to purchase this Autumn.  

If you would like to be among the first to see new artwork from me (including the final images of this new piece), then do add your email address to my mailing list at https://bigcartel.us17.list-manage.com/subscribe/post?u=e89fc5b3e135c7a4021010835&id=4b3010f94b

Thanks for reading!  

Fighting the Monster: Frankenstein 2018 Book Art Exhibition

Close up of screen-printed and lasercut pages

Liverpool Book Art's third major exhibition of book art will open in May 2018 and will celebrate another significant literary anniversary: the 200th anniversary of the publication of Mary Shelley's book Frankenstein.

I'm delighted to say that my proposal for this exhibition was successful and over the past few months I have designed and made a new book for it entitled Fighting the Monster.

I wanted to create a book which considered the way in which ‘monsters’ are created online. Our choice in what we like, what we dislike, what we share, what we publicly comment on builds up a larger picture of who we are to others online. It’s also something that is reflected straight back at us with the virtual voices and opinions we surround ourselves with. Online debate seems to create a virtual army of those For and those Against, where friends are removed and followers unfollowed if their opinions or beliefs are out of synch with our own. I believe that this is an area from where some of the most challenging monsters of our day can appear, monsters we didn’t think existed, who get up and walk away from their computer screen to attack someone in real life.

Fighting the Monster is now available to purchase through my online shop in the link above - £380 plus postage

Photos and a short video are below...

Thanks for looking!

Work in progress 

Short video of Fighting The Monster - 

The Ambassador's Ball

New artists' book ready to be editioned!  

Twenty copies of The Ambassador's Ball are being created and will be available to purchase through my online shop.  

Inspired by a real event, this lasercut concertina book illustrates how I imagine the Spring Festival on 24th April 1935 at the US embassy in Moscow might have unfolded.  

And why choose this particular event?  The level of chaos at this party would not have been out of place in a Marx Brothers film: in a bid to impress their Soviet hosts, the US embassy staff threw an outlandish party, a party that aimed to surpass any other embassy party in Moscow's history.  Guests arrived to discover that the neo-classical embassy of Spaso House had been transformed: decorations included birch trees in the chandelier room; an orchestra from Prague; flowers from Helsinki; a sword dancer from Tblisi; and numerous live animals including over one hundred finches, pheasants, roosters, goats and a baby bear.

Spaso House, Residence of the U.S. Ambassador in Moscow

The animals caused an uproar – the unhousebroken bear was introduced to champagne and ruined a Soviet general’s uniform, while hundreds of finches escaped their aviary and flew noisily about the high ceilinged rooms during the party and for some days after.

One of the guests at the party was the Russian writer Mikhail Bulgakov.  The fantastic and surreal imagery of this party was not lost on him, ensuring that the legacy of the party was to live on beyond that night.  Bulgakov went on to use the party as inspiration for a famous scene in his novel The Master and Margarita.  Satan’s Ball (or the Spring Ball of the Full Moon) in Bulgakov’s novel features a number of barely disguised parallels with the Spring Festival of 1935.

Something about the chaos of this event against the backdrop of such an elegant neo-classical building caught my imagination last summer, and I set to work.

The finished book is a panorama of lasercut scenes against a white embossed background.  References to The Master and Margarita are dotted throughout the book, including one giant black cat and an embossed cascade of playing cards hidden in the building's ceiling.  

Below are some of my favourite photos of the book as well as a quote from one of the party's organisers...

I'm currently taking orders for copies of The Ambassador's Ball, so if you'd like to purchase one, please contact me through my online shop in the tab at the top.  Each copy of The Ambassador's Ball is £350 plus p&p.

Alternatively if you're based in or around Edinburgh, you can come and have a look at a copy for yourself at my table at the Fruitmarket's Artists' BookMarket on the weekend of the 17th and 18th of February.  (For more information please visit www.fruitmarket.co.uk/event/artists-bookmarket. )

Thanks for looking!

The University on the Hill

A recent commission for Glasgow University has just been finished!

Above and below are photos from the project, which include a lasercut book and a series of enlarged laser-cut pieces based on some pages from the book.

The brief required numerous buildings from Glasgow Uni's Gilmorehill campus to be incorporated in to the design of the book, hence the diverse range of building styles throughout:

Work in progress

This is a current work in progress which was on my table at Edinburgh Fruitmarket's Artists book market earlier on this year.

It's still unfinished, as I've been busy editioning lots of other work recently.  Either the etching plate may get aquatinted to give it more depth, or the whole thing will need to get re-designed.  While I'm trying to decide what would be best for this piece, I thought I'd share a few photos of it here for now...

Nylmah excerpt - available to buy online now

Occasionally the laser cutter messes up while it's cutting and I'm unable to use whole pieces for books. Here's an example of a small area of a damaged Nylmah that I managed to save - it encapsulates the story well and it also works as a stand alone piece.

This is a unique, one-off piece and is currently available on my online shop at http://joannarobsonillustration.bigcartel.com/product/nylmah-exclusive-excerpt-piece

Update - this item has now sold!