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Fibre Art

 

For Lizzie, paper is more than material. It's a living thing, pressed into permanence.

Paper seems humble and unassuming, an everyday common material — but is it? Papermaking is an ancient craft with roots across the world. Cook a fibrous plant long enough and everything that can rot is drawn out, leaving a material that can last for hundreds of years. In Japan, Kami means both paper and spirit — and in Japanese tradition, longevity and imperfection are understood as part of an object's character, not flaws in it. Lizzie works the same way, letting each imperfection guide where a pulp image takes her.

The cooked pulp is washed, beaten, then loosened into a tub of water. A mould and deckle is submerged and agitated so the fibres pull evenly onto the screen — a technique that shifts subtly from East to West. Making a uniform sheet takes patience, observation, and a certain surrender.

One question comes up often: will the work last? Lizzie has pieces made forty years ago that remain as alive and unfaded as the day she made them.

Colour and texture come from what she grows herself: woad for blues and pinks, madder for reds, golden rod and weld for yellows and greens, hollyhocks for grey. Her dye bed is one of constant experimentation — trial and error, repeated, until a palette emerges. Each stage carries the memory of a place she's journeyed, and she takes only what she needs, mindful of nature's abundance.

It's on the allotment, or walking in nature, that Lizzie finds her equilibrium — solace in difficult times, energy when lethargic, clarity when wrestling with a decision. Following the seasons, marvelling at a seed's transformation into plant, each harvest is unique, and each one deepens her connection to something larger than herself.

© 2023 by Odam Lviran. Proudly created with Wix.com.

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