Embossed Paper

About

Embossing presses paper into a shaped matrix so that a design stands up in relief or sinks below the surface. Combined with colour it adds texture; done without ink, as 'blind' embossing, it makes an image purely from shadow and raking light.

Japanese printmakers used blind embossing, called karazuri, to model snow, feathers and textile patterns, notably in privately commissioned surimono of the early 19th century, where it joined metallic powders. Victorian stationers stamped paper lace for valentines. Modern artists made the raised surface a subject. From around 1960 Omar Rayo made inkless intaglios of everyday objects that appear as crisp white reliefs, and Josef Albers produced blind-embossed linear constructions late in his career. More recently Matt Shlian has scored, pressed and folded paper into geometric reliefs. Light from the side gives embossing away, through soft shadows and a slight sheen or thinning where the fibres were stretched.