Elizabeth (Betty) Haskin

September 22, 2025
Susan Brubaker Knapp
Blog, Book Arts

Elizabeth (Betty) Haskin

Book arts – Chapel Hill

This is one in a series of posts about artists in the Orange County Artists Guild.

What is your medium? Why do you love it? How did you get interested in it?

I became interested in bookmaking about twenty years ago when I attended a workshop at Penland School of Crafts called the Artist as Traveler.

Traditionally in my art career, I am a painter. Bookmaking has opened a whole new creative outlet for me. I love bookmaking because of its diversity… so many approaches and structures to master, so many choices of materials, so many thematic possibilities. I make books both with content, and blank journals including travel folios. Periodically I create books incorporating a series of collages I have made. Although they are more involved and take longer to complete, these have been some of my favorite projects.

I love bookmaking because unlike painting it is a process-based practice – a book must be constructed in a specific order. For example, in creating blank journals, there are aesthetic decisions made early on in the planning process: what size are the journals, what materials will make the covers, how will I bind it, can I make it more intriguing by choosing just the right endpapers, can I wrap the signatures (groups of folded pages) with a paper that adds to the rest of my choices.

But then, it is simply a hands-on, step-by-step operation – creating the covers, folding the pages into signatures, binding them together – to realize the finished product. There are often insights and additions along the way, that’s the fun of the creative process.

Do you work with unusual materials?

I love to travel and during my travels, I search out unusual papers and fabrics for making books. My penchant for collecting bits & pieces of travel ephemera has easily spilled over into my book making as well. During a recent art residency in Japan, I collected cotton kimono cloth as well as many art exhibition promotional flyers which I have become covers for the blank journals I create.

Recently a patron gave me a damaged antique Japanese silk Obi (sash) she had inherited. She hoped I might use it and indeed I have rescued enough pieces to create several journal covers. Wherever I go in the world, I love to seek and collect potential resources for future projects.

Did you have a “gateway craft” that you did as a child? How did it lead you into your current art?

My “gateway craft” was definitely painting. My favorite aunt was a professional artist and teacher. Every fall she came to us in Michigan for an extended visit after closing her summer art school and gallery on North Carolina’s Outer Banks. Every year she would give us at least one painting lesson starting for me at about age 4 and for my brother starting about age 5. During my college summers, I assisted my aunt with running her summer art school and gallery. So, my “gateway” was more a person than a craft! Although painting has been my primary creative activity throughout my career.

Tell us one unusual thing that has a bearing on your art.

I am married to an artist! My husband Bill Neville and I show together in our loft during the OCAG Studio Tour. We met in university in the art department. Although today we each work in several different media, we both started out as painters. We seldom create work together, but we do often critique each other’s work. We prepare and hang our loft space together always anticipating with pleasure the visitors we will host during the tour.