Hello. I am Michelle Skiba & binding books has been one of my favorite things for a very long time. I also love to play with metal, wood and whatever else strikes me on any given day. I am awed by the beauty of the natural world. My work in some form is always inspired by nature.
Over the years, I have often wondered why I am so drawn to book binding. Anyone who has ever made a book can tell you it is a solitary and often tedious practice. I have spent countless hours and often even days working on covers, carefully hand tearing paper, sewing the binding. Why so much effort to create a humble blank book?
Books hold unspoken potential. I have always been intoxicated by books, whether they were authored books already filled with unimaginable stories, or blank journals filled with luxuriously textured empty pages. I am struck with the magnificence of their infinite potential. If a book is authored it has the power to capture my imagination and to deliver me to unknown worlds, or to change my opinions and help me to view the world with an entirely new perspective. If the pages are blank, I have the ability to fill them with my personal tales, stories of laughter and tears and self-exploration. The potential for self discovery is realized on the canvas of blank sheets.
For me, the making of a blank book is only the beginning of the creative process. I am one thread in the fabric that will continue to unfold as the books fall into the hands and lives of others. And I love that idea. With other art forms I have participated in, the act of creation seems quite finished when I am decidedly done. People can view your completed work of art, and in this way participate and bring their own meaning to the work. But books invite and truly demand the viewer to participate in the continuing expansion of the art. I love that my work will be filled with your astounding words and pictures. And then other people will step in to view and again participate in a constantly expanding creative process.
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