From now until Feb. 24, the display cases on the first floor of Van Wylen will feature artwork created by the students of Stephanie Milanowski’s Design II class. For this project, students took old books and used them to make a variety of designs, including a tea cup, a shoe and a circus tent.
While a student at Rhode Island School of Design, Milanowski studied under Jan Baker, who has an interest in book arts. Baker assigned her students to find a used book and transform it.
Milanowski used pages from a book about dog ownership and attached them to rawhide chips and a choke chain collar. “That project stuck with me over the years because it encapsulated so much of what ‘graphic design’ is all about–directing attention and establishing a mood through text, images, rhythm, visual organization, paper, ink, adhesives,” Milanowski said. “I think it is a great project to start the semester off with in Art 205. Students discover tools, materials and techniques they never utilized in their work before–all while visually communicating a message.”
One book in the display will be chosen by a jury to be part of the Hope College Van Wylen Library Artist Book Collection. This collection began last year with Karly Welke’s winning entry featuring needles on the cover of a needlepoint book.
Van Wylen has materials related to altered books and artists’ books in its collection if you’re interested in learning more on the subject.
— Bethany Stripp, Library Student Blogger