Frontline Paper for Youth

...is a mobile print & papermaking initiative in which instructors from our mobile programs, Frontline Paper for Veterans, The Scrubs Paper Project, and the Migration Project, teach the art of making handmade paper as a connective practice and storytelling experience to youth communities across New Jersey and the greater region. Through the transformative process of creating handmade paper from water, cloth, fiber, and recycled materials, we work to support connecting communities through pulp & print, process, and presentation. Artists, students, underrepresented communities, and many others can benefit from this user-friendly educational and transformational hands-on experience.

Frontline Paper is excited to announce the launching of virtual paper making workshops. In a series of sessions, we will walk your group through making handmade paper from start to finish with an assortment of pulp types.

For information and to schedule a workshop contact us at office@frontlinearts.org

We educate. We listen.

We create side-by-side.

We bring the program to you and tailor your Frontline Paper for Youth workshop to your community's goals, curriculum, and unique needs. We can incorporate particular fibers or cloth into your paper that are symbolic to your community, producing unique batches of pulp that hold a personal, deeper significance. Alternatively, we can create 100% recycled or natural fiber papers like hosta and iris to incorporate ecological discussions into your papermaking process. Our educators are also ready to integrate printmaking techniques like pulp printing, relief, screen printing, and letterpress to help your community share their stories on their unique handmade papers.

Our workshops teach the history and process of papermaking, the transformative process by which we break down fibers to create a slurry of water and pulp, and the step-by-step process of using the mould and deckle to pull sheets of newly formed paper from the slurry to then couch (pronounced 'cooch') onto the post, or stack of newly formed paper. The stack is then pressed to remove much of the water and dried in a number of different ways, depending on the aesthetics of what you want and the availability of a dry box. We are very adaptable and can make most anything work. A table in the sun can even do the trick!

Our workshops can be tailored to your community's goals and budget. We can accommodate shorter, half-day workshops without bringing the mobile paper beater or incorporating symbolic fibers or cloth, or we can accommodate full days, repeat visits over several weeks, or a full week-long intensive experience with writing, exhibition, and presentation components. Prices vary depending on your location and specific request.

Frontline Paper for Youth is adaptable to any type of community and demographic:

Partial Day - most suitable for K-12 in-school and after school programs

Full Day - suitable for most groups, public programming, festivals, and corporate team-building activities

Two-Four Day - suitable for project-based workshops incorporating symbolic personal fibers, writing, community-building and other goals

Full Week - suitable for project-based workshops incorporating symbolic personal fibers, writing, community-building and other goals with a capstone exhibition and presentation on the last day

These workshops are mobile, but any group can also schedule workshops to be held at Frontline Arts’ Studios.

What we ask from your organizer is that you have a connection to your community in mind. What is your goal? How will this papermaking experience connect and transform your peers, your students, your community? There may be a particular current social topic that you'll address, a shared experience, or a larger social theme to explore. Our experienced staff can help you consider these questions as we work together to make your unique workshop come to life.

We are happy to review requests for Frontline Paper for Youth to come to your community, school, university, art center, festival, corporation, or institution!

Email us at office@frontlinearts.org or call (908) 725-2110 to discuss your school or group's unique needs and goals through a Frontline Paper for Youth workshop!

Thank you to our Frontline Paper program supporters:

Creative Forces® initiative, in partnership with Mid-America Arts Alliance.

Creative Forces Community Engagement Grants are part of the National Endowment for the Arts. To find out more about how National Endowment for the Arts grants impact individuals and communities, visit www.arts.gov.

The Frontline Paper program of Frontline Arts is supported by a charitable contribution from Janssen Pharmaceutical Companies of Johnson & Johnson.

Frontline Paper is also supported by in part by Church & Dwight Co., Inc. as well as the Wawa Foundation.