"People can easily associate with my work. It looks and feels familiar, with the photographs that may look like their grandmother or their mother as a kid, the odds and ends I use to adorn the books. It's very personal for me, too. The symbolism and words I use mean something to me," says Ollendieck.
Paraguay RPCV Gena Ollendieck makes books using a 16th century leather hand-binding process that requires hand stitching, cording and gluing
Page turner
By MELODY PARKER, Courier Arts / Special Sections Editor
Caption: Ollendieck uses a 16th century leather bookbinding process as the basis for her books, then embellishes and encrusts the covers with wit and whimsy. BRANDON POLLOCK / Courier Photo Editor
CRESCO --- Outside Gena Ollendieck's studio window, a woodpecker and nuthatch scramble with an oriole for space at the feeders. It's a commonplace scene in this rural setting, so the birds are unperturbed by the sharp sound of her hammer against a metal stamp, pressing letters into an old silver spoon.
Along with other found objects, the spoon will embellish one of Ollendieck's unique handmade baby books or possibly an eclectic photo album or journal. Her mixed media books are as much sculpture as functional art, and she is one of 75 artists selected to participate in the College Hill Arts Festival on Friday and Saturday.
"People can easily associate with my work. It looks and feels familiar, with the photographs that may look like their grandmother or their mother as a kid, the odds and ends I use to adorn the books. It's very personal for me, too. The symbolism and words I use mean something to me," says Ollendieck.
The Cresco native graduated from Central College in Pella and taught high school art for four years. Dissatisfied and filled with wanderlust, Ollendieck and her husband Todd joined the Peace Corps. They spent three years volunteering and training volunteers in Paraguay before returning home to a parcel of property set aside when her parents sold their family farm.
The couple built a rustic home on the spot where Ollendieck recalls having family picnics, and devoted a portion of the second floor to a sunny studio.
She makes her large books using a 16th century leather hand-binding process that requires hand stitching, cording and gluing. She uses acid-free, archival quality paper, stitching together the sheets to bind paper. The result is an elegantly bound book with blank pages ideal for mounting photographs and special mementos.
Then Ollendieck lets her imagination flow, creating collage covers using such salvaged and found objects such as the internal workings of broken pocket watches, typewriters and cameras, bits of rusted metal, vintage silverware, digitally enlarged photocopies of old photographs, book covers, cigar boxes, vintage advertising tins, favorite kids' games and more. Her studio is stacked with plastic boxes and bins brimming with old junk she plans to use.
She photocopies one-of-a-kind vintage photographs and "cut them apart to put different heads on bodies and create different people out of the various people. I also like to put wings, crowns and party hats on my people. I've had people call them 'dunce caps' but to me, they're party hats ... the kind of things we'd love to wear in real life to make us feel special, but would look ridiculous," she says, laughing.
The largest leather-bound albums can cost as much as $795 and represent countless hours of work and creativity. Ollendieck also constructs decorative wooden cases for displaying these books, transforming them into sculptural pieces. Smaller books and journals are priced from $45 and up, depending on style and embellishments Star books, featuring accordion-folded paper that opens into a star, cost about $75.
Smaller decorative books, measuring 2- by 2 1/2-inches, can be worn as pins or necklaces and cost about $20. She has also begun creating book covers in shadow boxes, allowing even more latitude with decoration.
For the past dozenor so years, Ollendieck has attended shows throughout the Midwest and beyond. The couple's recent adoption of Quina, now six months old, will curtail the new mom's travels, and has already influenced her work.
"When we got back from South America, my work was very organic with lots of twigs, leaves and things. Then we built this house and I started noticing a house shape showing up in my work. Now I'm using the images of a lot more babies and children in my work. You can see where I am in my life by what you see in my work," she adds, laughing.
Contact Melody Parker at 291-1429 or melody.parker@wcfcourier.com.
