Jessica Bonney posing in her studio with her chapbook, Genisis.
Jessica Bonney, a Creative Writing Major in Creative Studies, was awarded $2,500 from the FCCS Undergraduate Student Research Award fund for a research creation project exploring small press and fine press publishing through the creation of a poetry chapbook.
With this award from FCCS, Jessica worked with Briar Craig in the print studio learning to use a letter press. With the letter press, Jessica created a chapbook called Genesis, a collection of 12 poems that explore change and the human experience, using fish as a metaphor for the complexity and fecundity of life, abundance, and coming of age. The project was an exercise in creating a book that was cohesive in its visual elements as well as the text within it.
Genesis cover image
“It was an absolute pleasure to work with Briar Craig this summer. He is a very generous teacher and an incredibly talented print maker.” Says Jessica, “likewise, it goes almost without saying, that it was a pleasure to have Nancy Holmes as my supervisor for this project. I am so lucky to have such talented teachers, who have supported and mentored me.”
She explored and researched typefaces, handmade paper, paper selection, book binding, print making, and screenprinting, creating poetic content and editing her own work. She also learned to create a lively and engaging blog which explores how a creative writing student standing at a publishing crossroads in this era can find creative and time-honoured ways to make a book.
inside pages of the chapbook
“The process helped to teach me how to take a thought or idea or image, and explore that thing from many different angles, “ notes Jessica, “and even now I feel like I only just scratched the surface. Fish symbolize fertility and abundance, birth and rebirth. The journey of exploring this metaphor, translated more into an exploration of myself and the season of my life that I am in. As a collection of poems, I was surprised at how things came together. I feel, now that the book is complete and printed, that it was really an exploration of what it means to come into adulthood. The process helped to teach me how to take a thought or idea or image, and explore that thing from many different angles and even now I feel like I only just scratched the surface.”
The Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies Undergraduate Research Awards provide undergraduate students support to engage in research and creation activities over the summer months. The award is meant to encourage undergraduate students who are enrolled in a major in FCCS B.A. or B.F.A. programs (English, Cultural Studies, Art History and Visual Culture, French, Spanish, Creative Writing, Visual Arts and Interdisciplinary Performance, or Combined Majors) to pursue innovative and original research under the supervision of one or more FCCS faculty members.