Priscilla A. Spitler
Smithville, Texas
Priscilla Spitler received her B.F.A. in printmaking at California College of Arts & Crafts in 1975, and her bookbinding certificate from London College of Printing in 1980–81. In 1987, she took part in the Institute of Fine Binding/Conservation with James Brockman at the Harry Ransom Humanities Research Center in Austin. Spitler was an edition binder at the Museum of New Mexico, Santa Fe, and BookLab, Inc., Austin, and founded Hands on Bookbinding studio in 1995. Spitler has been a member of the Guild of Book Workers since 1983.
Winner: Award for Excellence in Fine Binding
Example Binding:
Dante Alighieri.
The Stone Beloved: Six Poems from Dante Alighieri.
Translated by Harry Duncan, lithographs by Peter Nickel.
Austin, TX: Kairos Press, 1986.
Full green, goatskin over laced-on boards. Paste paper ends by the binder. Design executed with painted foil stamped onlaid leather, tooling colored foils, and relief imagery. The motif illustrates the transformation of a women, the object of the author's unreturned affection, from a vibrant beauty to a cold, heartless figure of stone. Bound in 2002.
Design Description:
Full dark blue Harmatan #12 goatskin in a traditional laced-on boards binding, paste paper ends will be created by the binder utilizing a leather joint construction, sewn headbands and tooled spine title. The proposed design captures the early journey of Huck and Jim, both escaping down the Mississippi River; one from a cruel father and the civilization of his aunts, and the other from the cruelty of slavery. They are silhouetted by night travel. The journey breaks down the racial prejudice of the day between the young white boy and the mature black man—symbolized by the joining of hands in love and friendship. The design will use large areas of onlaid and back paired leather applied before the book is actually bound (the green trees and field area; Jim's hands). The design will be enhanced by painted acrylic, areas of cut colored foils, and inlaid leather lines.
