Paper, Rock and a Mother of a Thousand

Fascination: plants growing out of cracks in rocks. When I'm hiking and see this phenomena, it makes me wonder how long (years, decades?) it took for that to happen, and it makes me consider how all of those necessary elements-dirt, water, sun, had to be present. What timing!
So, I've been making some paper 'rocks' of my own. I pigmented the pulp, strained it, and formed it into the shapes, sort of similar to pinch pots. After they dried a bit, I put a little soil in the faults, then planted a Mother of a Thousand seed.

I'm curious to see what will happen to the paper rocks as the plants grow. Will they crack? Will they decompose? Or will the plant just only get so big....I'm thinking that is what will happen.
Anyway, I'll keep you posted.

Photos by Franc Rosario

From Paper to Print

I just returned from teaching a 5 day workshop called 'Paper to Print' at Women's Studio Workshop. Like the name of it implies, it was a hybrid papermaking and printmaking class. The first couple of days we pulp painted on rag, abaca, and flax papers. Later on in the week, we used those pulp painted papers for backgrounds for pronto plate lithographs and xerox transfers. My students were great and brought so much to the class! Some highlights:

The blender bike that Barb brought

Sumptuous food

and our amazing tech Terez, who is pictured here washing some freshly cooked iris.

Here are some more pictures of the workshop.

Upcoming Workshops and Events

I will be teaching some workshops, and have some visiting artist engagements in the next couple of months.
Please feel free to email me directly if you have any questions about a particular workshop-gretchen@gretchenschermerhorn.com
Please pass along to anyone who you think might be interested, and hope to see you!

Pulp Printing
April 11th, 10am-4pm
Pyramid Atlantic Art Center
Silver Spring, MD
(301) 608-9101
Registration and more information

Gocco Printing
April 19th, 11am-1pm
Strathmore Mansion
Rockville, MD
(301) 581-5109
Registration and more information

Hand Papermaking
April 24th, 10:30-1:30
Strathmore Mansion
Rockville, MD
(301) 581-5109
Registration and more information

Beth and I are going to Kars, Turkey to teach a Papermaking workshop!
May 10th-14th
Sponsored by the Anatolian Artisans organization.
I'm sure we will make a special blog just for this trip, so stay posted!

Eastern and Western Hand Papermaking
Summer Session, May 24th-June 25th
Corcoran College of Art and Design

Visiting Artist lecture and Workshop
June 4th-6th
Visual Art Center of Richmond
Richmond, VA
More information to come

From Paper to Print
July 19th-24th
Women's Studio Workshop
Rosendale, NY
845.658.9133
For more information and to register