Bookwork > Paperback Portrait

This series of portraits uses paperback mystery and romance novels. The fragility and coloring of the acid paper is evocative of how we might age, unlike some of the characters within the books’ pages. Jean Fitzgerald drew my profile on the cover of the top book. For the middle book, I drew the shape of a vase with handles, and I cut feet for the bottom book. A scroll saw was used to cut the intricate details. The books fan open and stack on top of one another. The repeating shapes of my profile and the vase are meant to be enigmatic and comical; a flat space becomes dimensional.