The handmade paper artworks alone would be worthy of a show, especially the installations Us and Them by Tanja Softic (cast paper shapes like giant rose hips, perfectly formed, organic and seemingly natural, adrift on a river of black and tan gravel) and Apple of Knowledge by Yukie Kobayashi (handmade paper "apples" formed from multiple, ruffled pieces of paper in rich textures and colors suspended from wires). Of the 78 artists in the show, 27 were represented in the exhibition by handmade paper artworks, including Pacita Abad, Richard Hungerford, Akira Kurosaki, Hung Liu, Tom Nakashima, Ken Polinskie, and Lynn Sures. There were frequent and fascinating juxtapositions of work in the sensitive installation at the Edison Place Gallery. Grieve by Georgia Deal is a series of images of hands, or are they gloves? As always with this artist, things become mysterious on close examination. The "hands" are pulp transfers onto 25 panels of varying sizes, flat and stylized, but given unexpected substance and depth by her masterful handling of the pulp. They are luminous and haunting. Hanging beside Deal's work is Trout Deuce, a pulp painting by Bill Dunlap, so waxed and gleaming that it looks from across the room like an oil painting. Or take In the Night by Ellen Hill, a "traditional" pulp painting of amoeba-like shapes that revels in its "pulpness," on the wall next to Anil Revri's Geometric Abstraction No. 4, a pulp painting with graphite additions in such a strict grid that it resembles a CAD drawing. The mechanical nature of Revri's composition dissolves into a subtle, delicate texture that reveals itself at close range. With so many works on, and of, paper, in so many different styles and Pyramid Atlantic at 25 david marshall Yukie Kobayashi, Apple of Knowledge, 2004, 6 inches in diameter, artist-made paper and wire. All photos courtesy of Pyramid Atlantic Art Center, Silver Spring, Maryland. Ellen Hill, In the Night, 2004, 30 x 30 inches, pulp painting. 44 - hand papermaking methods, it could be a real jumble – books! screenprints! intaglio! giclée prints! pulp paintings! paper sculpture! But in the hands of the show's curators Helen Frederick (Pyramid founder and artistic director) and Jane Farmer (independent curator and longtime supporter of Pyramid), the show is both elegant and wellpaced. It is a superb overview of the breadth of work Pyramid has facilitated over the years as well as a revelation of the possibilities of paper itself. The show is commemorated by the publication of Collaboration as a Medium: 25 Years of Pyramid Atlantic, a 96-page, full-color catalog "created" (as they say on the title page) by Frederick and Farmer. Beautifully designed by Marty Ittner with photography by Neil Greentree, it serves not just as a memento of the exhibition but also as a history of Pyramid, with interviews with Helen Frederick and other artists and a full chronology of Pyramid's life. To read the timeline, year after year, you remain in awe of Frederick's achievement in creating Pyramid and in undertaking the grueling work of keeping it going. I would urge readers of Hand Papermaking to obtain a copy of the catalog for the fine reproductions of many, important handmade paper artworks, the informative texts, but mostly for the inspiration. For ordering information, go to http://www.pyramidatlanticartcenter.org/studio/exhibit.htm#cata or call Pyramid Atlantic at 301-608-9101. Readers in the Baltimore area will have a chance to see the show from January 10 through March 4, 2006, at Maryland Art Place, 8 Market Place, in Baltimore. Don't miss it. You will be richly rewarded. reviews Tanja Softic, detail of installation titled, Us and Them, 2004, 6 x 7 feet, hand formed flax paper and pebbles. Georgia Deal, Grieve, 2004, 7 x 5 feet, pulp transfers on panels.
