Relief Form

Recently we have been studying the unique artwork of Cara Barer, in more detail. Cara Barer is a photographer who uses old books in her art.  The specific type of her work we are looking at is her photographs of 'wet'-books.  Here are some examples of the work we have been inspired from:

'Whirlgig' by Cara Barer

Cara Barer's artwork is very original and her work is very unique and distinctive.  The black background that she mounts most of her sculptures on is very effective; when I look at some of her work, it can be imagined floating through space, or wildly waving about underwater with the pages spread about in all directions.  There are many variations, so the viewer is left to decide the setting for themselves.

'New Century' by Cara Barer

     This was made out of a hard backed book, and that makes the piece look different to some of her other work, because the book cover stays straight.

     Now the piece looks like a women in a red cloak; and her hair is billowing out in all directions; which again might be because of being underwater, or there is a lot of wind.
















Cara Barer thought of this style when she saw a yellow pages telephone book in the rain, and noticed the way the pages had moved, she photographed it, and then decided to make her own.  She started with dictionaries and then moved onto books.  She studies the books she uses very carefully, and said  “Because of the fact that I must begin thinking about handling the book as sculpture first, I am very attracted to its physical properties—the size, the quality of the paper, whether or not it has only text—is there any colour?”.  She usually soaks her book for hours and uses things such as hair rollers and Velcro to position and curl the pages.

How I made my version of Cara Barer's unique work


Equipment and materials that I used:

• 1/4 of a thick magazine (it should have the thickness of the whole magazine, only cut into 4 rows horizontally from the spine).
• Strong PVA glue.
• About 20 paper clips (you might need more) 

Here is how I did it:

• Step 1:  First find the spine of your magazine and bend it vertically down the middle to make it more flexible.  
• Step 2:  Once you have done that, get two or three pages at a time and bend them into loops, and secure them with paper clips. 
• Step 3:  Repeat step two, putting the pages into loops similar to the way Cara Barer does it, until all of your pages have been used up.
• Step 4:  Now you need to replace the paper clips with glue.  One at a time, take off a paper clip and where the paper clip was put some glue.  Make sure to put plenty of glue on or the pages won't stick and will become loose.

My final piece was successful as it was able to stand on its own without the use of paper clips.  The technique of using paper clips was effective, but it was difficult because the glue took a long time to stick.  Also, getting the right shape for the loops was difficult as well; I was trying to do more raindrop shaped loops, but they usually came out as circles.