Susan Gosin

Essay by Mina Takahashi

Growing up with both sides of her family deep in the commercial paper-manufacturing world, Susan Gosin tried hard to get away from paper. “I wasn’t interested in paper because it surrounded me,” said Sue in her 2018 Paper Talk podcast episode with Helen Hiebert. “All they talked about was paper...tonnage and things like that, and I associated papermaking with business.” To “get away from business,” Sue pursued art, leading her to the University of Wisconsin–Madison, where she studied painting, etching, letterpress, and eventually, hand papermaking, with Walter Hamady. Curiously, it took over a decade before Sue recognized that her obsession with pulp was in any way related to her family business.

After receiving her MFA from University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1976, Sue and her then-husband Bruce Wineberg moved to New York City to establish Dieu Donné Press and Paper, Inc. on the fifth floor of a loft building in Manhattan’s Soho district. Days were busy consulting with engineers, designing equipment, and testing out fiber, pigments, and self-built machinery. Nights were spent with artist neighbors over large communal dinners and disco dancing at Studio 54. Within a year, Dieu Donné was a fully functioning papermill. In her historical essay for the exhibition catalogue Rags to Riches: 25 Years of Paper Art from Dieu Donné Papermill, Sue wrote, “Hand papermaking was hot and we were all interested in understanding and defining its contribution to the art world. Besides its creative potential, we sought to define qualities of use and permanence.” From the start, Sue dedicated herself not only to making paper and paper art, but also to advancing hand papermaking through education, documentation, curatorial projects, and advocacy. In all possible capacities in these wide-ranging roles, Sue has made and continues to make significant contributions.

To name just a few highlights from a long and fulsome career, as an educator Sue developed curriculum and designed studio programs at The New School, New York; Amagansett Applied Arts on Long Island, New York; and Phumani Archival Mill in Johannesburg, South Africa. She has lectured at a countless number of art centers, galleries, schools, museums, libraries, universities, and parks. She has presented papers at symposiums and conferences worldwide including the 1977 Hand Papermaking Conference at the Center for Book Arts in New York City; the Process and Collaboration Conference at New York University in 1998; the 2016 IAPMA Congress in Brazil; and the 2021 International Paper Historians Conference that took place at the Library of Congress in Washington, DC. Sue has consulted on papermaking projects in Egypt and India. She has authored many articles and essays for publications in the field including over 25 pieces for Hand Papermaking magazine and Hand Papermaking Newsletter. Sue conducted audio-recorded interviews with a number of papermakers and artists she admires and shared them in “Profiles in Paper,” a regular column in Hand Papermaking Newsletter. Sue’s personal and encyclopedic knowledge of the American origin story of hand papermaking as an art medium has informed major exhibitions including “Paper/Print: American Hand Papermaking, 1960s to Today” (that we co-curated together), presented at International Print Center New York in 2018 (catalogue). She has worked determinedly to tell this story, bringing papermaking and paper art into the contemporary-art discourse. In her other efforts as an advocate in the field, Sue has held leadership positions in papermaking organizations such as Friends of Dard Hunter, IAPMA, and Hand Papermaking, Inc., and has participated in efforts such as the Hand Papermaking Community Documentation Project, which she cofounded with Tim Barrett and Peter Thomas in 2010.  

As an artist and artist collaborator, Sue has produced many stunning projects, mainly in the medium of limited-edition artist books. Her keen interest in watermarking has led to creative innovations and a unique approach to light-and-shade watermarks, as evidenced in her illustrations for the book The Lectures in Arkady by Naomi Lazard (Dieu Donné Press and Paper, 1986). Sue’s collaborations with artists such as William Kentridge, Lesley Dill, and Abby Leigh have resulted in magnificent book projects that explore and exude the sensory elements of paper.

 I believe that paper’s materiality, its sublime, transformational power, and its propensity for collaboration (maker/nature; fiber/water; paper/print) are what keeps Sue engaged with paper and why she is such a persuasive proponent of paper. During my tenure as executive director of Dieu Donné from 1990 through 2004, I was lucky to be able to lead the organization in a close partnership with Sue serving as board chair. It was a marvel to watch Sue in action, sharing her deeply held passion for papermaking with artists, with donors, with students, with essentially anyone in listening range. Her excitement about the importance and the potential of paper is irresistible and has led to an endless number of lifelong paper devotees, many of whom in turn have shared their enthusiasm with others. Sue is that catalyst, that spark.

In all of these ways, Sue Gosin is a true champion of hand papermaking.