Italian Block Print Book Papers

This month’s Artifact of the Month is two block print book papers from Italy that are part of the Dard Hunter Collection (accession 3542 and 3576).  

These pieces are from c. 1925 made by Flavia Farina Cini (1881-1979). She was raised in a rich artistic environment with her dad co-founding a pottery with her uncle. When she was 20, her father died and she took over the design side of his business, something she continued even after she married Neri Farina Cini. Neri was from a well-established family of paper makers who owned a large paper mill founded in 1822 at La Lima (Laboratorio Italiano Manufattura Artistica, also called Laboratoria Marcelliano after San Marcello, a commune in Italy.) Raised in fast-paced, stimulating Florence, Flavia grew antsy in San Marcello. In 1908 Flavia opened her workshop which she used to offer jobs to women who needed jobs and to raise funds for those who were sick, newborns, war refugees, and orphans. While the war and depression hit Flavia’s workshop hard financially, it stayed open for around 24 years.  

Her paint was a paste made from starch, dextrin gum, and water which was then colored with powdered pigments. The woodcut blocks (around 11 1⁄2’’ x 5’’) were hand brushed with color and firmly pressed onto a flat sheet of paper (around 25’’ x 17’’) until the design was complete–usually 6 presses. If a design used multiple colors, each color needed its own woodblock. She made around 50-60 designs. Her designs were rugged and aimed to capture a vigor and simplicity of earlier times.