Tara Murtha loves Rob Ryan’s Papercuts

By Tara Murtha
Published: March 4th, 2008 | 12:00am

Any artist that can make filigree out of a curlicue can slice into my heart anytime. Rob Ryan coaxes dazzling, beautiful art out of paper by razoring ornate, arabesque negative spaces into shapes like trees, birds, and houses. Ryan also makes screenprints from the papercut stencils and sells them through his blog and on Etsy.

The cut-outs aren’t simple mirror images like the looseleaf snowflakes we made as kids with safety scissors. Instead, my man carves poems into paper, lovely and delicate squibs that can make the hardest heartbreak open into new space. Check out the one that says “No Minute Gone Comes Ever Back Again—Take Heed and See You Do Nothing In Vain” with silhouettes of a hipster boot girl and guy rocking an afro. It’s like a 2-D Victorian Miranda July–ism in February. And pretty! Yet another reason I hope that this paperless world thing they keep talking about at work doesn’t happen anytime soon.

Tara Murtha is a Venus Zine writer.