Arts Programme

Art and Paper

We have a unique opportunity at The Paper Trail to explore and celebrate the creative potential and aesthetic qualities of a versatile and fascinating material.

Our enthusiastic and accomplished Arts and Crafts Steering Group have been instrumental in initiating a number of events and programmes which are outlined below and we have an ongoing range of activities for the future.

We have built a network with artists of national repute who work with the medium of paper and we run courses in a wide range of the visual arts which include local artists, craft workers and designer makers. The content of our workshops spans categories far beyond ‘works on paper’, drawing and painting, papier mache and origami Although these media have a part to play, we look at new ways of incorporating traditional skills with contemporary practice.

The media we cover are loosely categorized and listed below:

Artwork created with Pulp involves using dyed paper pulps to create image and design or casting pulp onto surfaces or 3 dimensional forms to produce pieces in low relief and larger structures.

Work with Surface Treatments is an area connected to textiles and the focus is often on manipulating the fibre, creasing, folding, laminating, rubbing, bleaching, tinting and transforming the paper surface to allow the material to take on imaginative and decorative characteristics.

Print, Graphics and Book Art involve a range of traditional crafts. This area includes, relief printing with card and handmade papers, bookbinding and calligraphy and photography. The focus on 3D structures includes creating paper based or wire based forms, large structures with card, board and sheets of insulation material and performance sessions using paper forms and narrative. It also includes sessions making jewellery, stationery products and decorative papers.

Works on Paper such as watercolour painting emphasize paper selection and preparation.

Paper Arts and Crafts

Introduction to Calligraphy
Paper Collage
Relief Printing with card and paper

For more information on our Arts courses, INSET days for Teachers and if there are courses that you would like to see us include, email us at training@thepapertrail.org.uk