In Shawn Sheehy’s handcrafted Welcome to the Neighbor-wood: A Pop-Up Book of Animal Architecture, eight paper sculptures of critters that build their own homes come to life in three dimensions with the turn of a page. An artist’s proof of the book and nine white paper models–delicately engineered paper studies of, among others, a snail in its shell, a honeybee in its waxy comb, and a spider in its web–are currently on display at Vespine Gallery, the Pilsen space that Sheehy and three other artists started last year. It means “like a wasp”–an insect that makes its home from paper and clay, the two media showcased by the gallery.
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“Insects can do things that humans just can’t,” says Sheehy of his subjects. “A Potter wasp reaches a certain level of maturity and is just hardwired to start building. She doesn’t know why she does it, she just does it. Termites build structures that would be miles high if they were human, and solar heated and ventilated. These are amazing feats of engineering that humans just can’t match.”
In 1997 he created his first pop-up book, Counting on the Marsh: A Nighttime Book of Numbers, in which prints depicting elements of a marsh’s ecosystem unfolded on fans of tissue-thin abaca paper. Each was captioned with an alliterative verse: “Four diaphanous dragonflies darting and dining at dusk.” “Eight stately cattails quietly colliding in contagion.” Shortly thereafter he moved to Chicago and enrolled at the Center for Book and Paper Arts at Columbia College, where he got his MFA last year. Currently he teaches papermaking at the center and serves as studio manager.
Art accompanying story in printed newspaper (not available in this archive): photo/Marty Perez.
