Miriam Schaer has flown of to the Republic of Georgia, taking with her something even more precious than the good wishes of her book arts community: she has taken their books!
Just over a year ago I sat with Miriam at the Grolier Club in NYC as we waited for our friend Mindell Dubansky to take the stage to talk about the exhibition she curated of blooks (objects that look like books). At the time, Miriam was pondering over making some changes in her life, though she did not yet have a handle on what that would look like. Today she’s in Eastern Europe/ Western Asia, having been awarded a Fulbright Fellowship to teach artist books at Telavi State University.
Before leaving, Miriam invited the book arts community to send her their books with the idea of building what she called a “teaching collection,” recognizing that the act of holding a handmade book in one’s own hands has a way imparting inspiration.
The book arts community reacted quickly and generously.
As the books rolled in, Miriam posted photos of the book on a Facebook page. All of the book images that I am posting here have been culled from her FB wall, which I will include, along with her other in links, in the bottom of this post.
It been an adventure just to check in to see how her collection has been growing over the past couple of months.
I suspect these books by Susan Joy Share have seen the most air miles: they started with Susan in Alaska, were flown to Miriam in Brooklyn, then were packed up to meet Miriam in a country flanked by Turkey, Russian and the Black Sea.
Miriam will be writing about her book arts teaching at the University. She already begun her writing. Looks like she is starting with making felted books.
I absolutely wanted to contribute to Miriam’s collection. It took me way too long to come up with something to send. I started on something, had trouble working it out, then missed Miriam’s deadline. A friend encouraged me to just keep at it and send the book when it was done. This gave me the space to realize that, hey, if need be, I could just send it to Republic of Georgia directly.
But, phew! was able to get a book to Miriam just three days before she left town. She received one from an edition of books, which are housed in these green boxes, and which I will write about in my next post. Until then, to see what’s within, you’ll have to visit Miriam FB page. Here are links to that page, as well as her blog, and her teaching blog.
Artist Book Collection-Telavi State University, Republic of Georgia
Playful Bookbinding and Paper Works 
What a wonderful opportunity for her!!
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Thank you Paula-right now we are just starting with simple structures and am hoping they will be making felt books soon-and I’m hoping to learn a bit about felt for books as well!
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