Papercutting Designs by Ellen Brown

This book has some information on how to do papercutting, as well as many designs. I have included many of the designs in these pages. Please keep in mind the author's intentions with these designs: you may use them for personal enjoyment, but please don't use these designs for sale.

Foreword

Modern copying and editing methods make it practical to provide many of them in a form which can be copied. Pages of this book may be laid flat on a copying machine and enlarged to suit the user. In the web world, you can print the displayed page, or manipulate the saved image with a variety of graphics editors, and then finally print it to use as a pattern.

It is hoped that people who use the book will learn to develop their own designs.

I have included a brief history of papercutting and my introduction to it.

N.B. Copies may be made only for personal use, not for sale.

Introduction

From the earliest days some cuttings were made by scissors, some, often several layers thick, were cut by extremely sharp knives. At various times in the history of the craft, mass production by stamping machines has occurred. My interest has been in the original designs and cutting with scissors no more than two layers at a time.

It is interesting to note that in the sixth century the Maya of Central America developed a paper from the bark of fig trees and cut patterns. The Otomi Indians are still cutting less delicate designs, mostly for the tourist trade. As far as I know this has had little effect on modern cutters.

Paper cutting spread to Japan, where it is called Monkiri. Although paper folding (origami) and cutting stencils have become more popular there, cutting has continued. It is believed that the folding of paper to make symmetrical designs may have developed in Japan.

Although papyrus was invented, or discovered, in Egypt, several centuries B.C. There seems to be no record of it being cut for decorative purposes. The Greeks and Romans may not have been papercutters.

Paper and papercutting appeared in the eighth or ninth century in West Asia and a guild of papercutters existed in Turkey in the 16th century. Within a century, papercutting was being done in most of middle Europe.

However, paper was still made by hand, and was largely reserved for religious purposes. In the monasteries hand lettered and hand painted scrolls were decorated with cuttings as well. A particularly good example of this work is the Book of Passion made for Henry VII of England about 1500. Prayer papers, small folded cuttings, were exchanged on Holy Days.

Over the years paper cuttings were made into stencils, used as patterns for veneers, furniture, and embroidery. In Germany, by the 1600s, scherenschnitte, as it was called was very popular. The Swiss made very intricate cuttings, often symmetric. They also made bookmarks called Marques. There that word has become the generic name for papercutting.

The Dutch and Poles also did quite a lot of cutting, called knippen and wycinanki, respectively. The Dutch used papercuttings to decorate legal documents, as well as religious commemorative papers. The Polish style developed later, though they had cut designs in sheepskin coverings for windows for many years earlier. It was they who began the layering of various colors to make colorful collages. The pieces are largely symmetrical, and always decorative.

In almost every country, silhouettes were cut. Before photography the only way to have a picture for posterity was to have a painting or drawing, both relatively expensive. A shadow, traced on paper hung on a wall, and then cut out, was much less expensive. Itinerant cutters went from place to place, often making pictures of whole families.

In England silhouettes and the art of papercutting for its own sake were practiced in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. As photography developed, silhouettes became less popular, though still practiced occasionally.

Papercutting came to The American colonies first, when middle Europeans, mostly Germans, fleeing religious persecution, came to Pennsylvania in the late 17th century. Unrepatriated Hessian Soldiers sent for their wives and augmented the population of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, which has become a center of papercutting (scherensnitte). A great wealth of religious illustrations, public documents, intricate valentines, and other cuttings from those early days are extant, some accompanied by fractur, a style of printing which has broken lines. Museums in Lancaster County and in Philadelphia have extensive collections. For more about papercutting read The Book of Papercutting by Chris Rich (1993) Sterling Publishing Co.

In recent years, the growth of papercutting has led to the founding of the Guild of American Papercutters. Its growing membership encompasses not only the traditionalists, but people experimented with new techniques and designs. It has sponsored traveling shows and sales of members works. It publishes a periodical called FIRST CUT which contains examples of members cuttings and articles about them and their craft. Write to GAP, 514 E. Main St., Annville, PA 17003.

I started paper cutting on Valentine Day, 1980. The program after a business meeting of the Chester County Branch of the Pennsylvania Guild of Craftsmen, was provided by two papercutter members who provided scissors and paper, and asked each of us to cut a Valentine. Potters, weavers, blacksmiths and others spent a hilarious half-hour folding and cutting and trying to distinguish between what they wanted to save and what was to be discarded.

I'd grown up using scissors. Asserting my independence, instead of a Valentine I cut out two unicorns facing each other front legs crossing at the fold. My friend's admiration of the result encouraged me to seek State Juried status in papercutting as I had in pottery and sculpture. I succeeded on my third try.

When we moved to Maine circumstances prevented our developing a studio for pottery or sculpture. Our dining room table became my studio for papercutting. It is rarely cleared enough for our own meals, let alone having company!

I use cuticle scissors for cutting. For unfolded deigns I staple a second sheet of paper under the design and have two cuttings for the work of one. Folded designs are also stapled in the "negative" areas to keep the layers from slipping during the cutting.

Most of my designs are cut from white paper and sprayed with black enamel (Krylon flat-black). Some people use black paper. I glue the cuttings on hard surface matboard (Letramax Art Board), and before the glue is completely hard, cover it with an old sheet and iron it flat.

Frequently I paste colored paper in various areas beneath the cutting, before mounting it, enhancing texture, tone and composition. At the present time I know on no one else using this technique. In Polish cutting, colored paper is used extensively, but layered on top of the cutting.

I have greatly enjoyed creating these designs, and hope that others will derive pleasure from them.

E. B.

© Ellen Brown - My first paper cutting.

Some of the designs presented in the book are presented in the next page.