By Heidi Trautmann

Back to the roots, back to the very beginning, to the birth of paper,  sheets of paper, the carrier of ….words, time, culture, history. Breaking down with your hands waste paper from newspapers, shiny magazines brought to your door, drawing paper wrapping material, used and declared waste and collected for reuse such as it was done at the Cyprus International University, in the Department of Graphic Design for the day they were going to have a workshop with Cyprus Paper Artists Association. They were well prepared, Omid Kalantar and Roya Alagheband with their students, for the 2-days-seminar and workshop. On 22 November 2017, Inci Kansu, the first paper artist in the TRNC and one of the members of the Cyprus Paper Artists Association, was holding a seminar in a fully attended house, to give the audience an introduction to the history of paper art. The following day the students were shown the way of production; to the students, including myself, it looked more like a witches’ kitchen with all the cauldrons full of peculiar looking soups.

Click on the link below to learn more of the association’s background on the occasion of a workshop at another Cyprus University.

http://www.heiditrautmann.com/category.aspx?CID=5654231783#.Wheb5FWWaUl

The workshop took place in the department’s spacious studio where in large containers the prepared ‘paper soup’, as I would call it, was waiting for further processing. Paper of different sources and colour, shredded and soaked in water, then further chopped up by the use of a large blender until it had a slimy consistency. We all put our hands in to get the feeling.

Inci Kansu, Ismet Tatar and Emel Samioğlu, founding members of the Cyprus Paper Artists Association were demonstrating the further process to the students and teachers present, and other members such as Anber Onar and I were looking on and recording the whole process from different angles. A binding agent and starch were added to the various containers with white, grey and brown ‘paper soups’. The moment of ‘scooping’ had come, by means of wooden frames with wire mesh;  the paper soup was scooped out, with the water running off and the fine paper pulp remaining on the wire mesh. With utmost care the frames with the fresh and wet pieces were brought to a table prepared with packs of newspapers and cloths and turned over to rest on the cloths; they will remain there until they are dry and solid. Now it was the students’ turn and I could see them getting excited and it did not take long and they were experimenting assisted by the paper artists, for example mixing the differently coloured paper soups on the wire mesh, while at the table with the scooped pieces, Roya, one of their teachers was trying some forms of decoration with paint pigments and pieces from nature.

Omid and Roya, the students’ teachers will continue with their students to produce more hand- made scooped paper and have in mind to use it for printing, perhaps embossing. The studio has all the equipment for the purpose. We are all looking forward to the outcome of the project and will hopefully see the works at an exhibition.