Art Blog - Shannon Bokman

I keep having to tell people that I did not tint or dye or stain this book; they remain convinced I am fibbing. Purple heart wood. Remarkable stuff. It comes out of the tree this color. Or rather, a lighter shade of purple. I have to apply heat to darken the purple. But no stain. Just heat. There is also a wood called yellow heart. It's yellow. Very yellow. No dye, tint, or stain involved. My forays into wooden books have yielded interesting results. I love so many different varieties of wood now, from lacewood (too hard to carve), to bubinga, which is pink and red and light orange, like candy. There is the purple and yellow hearts, and white curly oak (so pretty!), and zebra wood...you guessed it, striped like a zebra… Continue reading… 1 comment

I attended a class with the man that inspired me to become a bookmaker in January, down in Asheville, North Carolina. His name is Dan Essig, and he taught a class on windows and closures. The picture is what we made in the two-day class. It was altering, in that it has forever changed how I want to make my books, and the most recent work is evidence of that. I don't feel so bad now about making little tiny books! A new era has come..… Continue reading… 0 comments

This is the inaugrual entry to ArtID for the Bokman Books. Thanks to all who have wandered in to see the books and art! I am Shannon Bokman, and live in Cleveland, Ohio. I started making books about seven years ago, after a reading a magazine article. I bought an instructional book by Keith A. Smith, on bookbinding and bookmaking, and things took off from there! I'd like the blogs to keep everyone up to date on new books I come out with, exciting techniques I may learn, and pictures of decorative and intricate new stitches. The stitches and binds are really the fun part - they are complicated, but so gorgeous when complete. The first big thing to report is a class with (in my opinion) a genius of a bookmaker, Daniel Essig, at the end of January… Continue reading… 1 comment