Specialized Workshops in Color & Medium

ABOUT THIS CLASS:

Participants Will:

• Learn how to mix handmade marbling paint from dry pigments
• Learn the physics of using a marbling tray
• Practice making stone and shell patterns with handmade paint
• Make 10-15 sheets of marbled paper

About the class:

This immersive full-day workshop is split in two parts, with a break for lunch. All materials and tools are provided. In the morning session, you will learn how to make handmade paint according to the 19th-century Fichtenberg recipe. This recipe was originally translated by Garrett Dixon and then re-published and taught by Dan and Regina St. John (of Chena River Marblers) in their manual “Contemporary Classic Marbling.” Each student will be responsible for mulling 1-2 paints to share with the rest of the class.

The afternoon session will be an introduction to paper marbling using the paints you made. The class will focus on making stone patterns, as well as the shell pattern, a variation of the stone pattern, which can be made by adding oil to the paints. Each student will have their own tray to work in. Depending on working speed and complexity of the patterns, participants will make 10-15 sheets of 12x15’’ marbled paper. 

*There may or may not be leftover paint, but if you are interested in taking a small amount of paint home with you, please bring your own small (2-4oz) lidded jars.

*Wear studio clothes and/or an apron.

*Please note that rabbit skin glue and ox gall are used in these marbling methods, and cannot be substituted to make vegan recipes.

*This class takes place in our mezzanine workshop area, which is only accessible by a flight of steps.

About the instructor:

Sheryl Oppenheim was born in 1983, raised in Orlando, Florida, and now lives in New York City. She is a paper marbler and maker of illegible books, an idea she first became interested in after seeing the work of Bruno Munari, and through her proximity to books, bookbinders, and marbled paper at her first job in New York, at a bookbinding supply house. She began marbling paper in 2011. Her work is rooted in an aspiration to practice marbling techniques at the highest skill level, combined with a devotion to beauty, surprise, and feeling through color and form.

Her work is included in the collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Watson Library, the Museum of Modern Art, the Walker Art Center, the New York Public Library, the Brooklyn Museum, the National Gallery of Art Library, and the National Museum of Women in the Arts, among others. She was included in Pattern and Flow: A Golden Age of American Decorated Paper 1960s to 2000s, published by the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2022, as one of a new generation of artists who are carrying forward the tradition of paper marbling in America. 

All images courtesy of Sheryl Oppenheim