Education

MFA/MA University of Iowa
BA Vassar College

Biography 

Julia Leonard teaches within the UI Center for the Book. She teaches bookbinding, book design, and artist book history and practice. She teaches across these areas, as well as teaching the introductory Book Art Seminar: UICB:6510 for incoming MFA candidates. Other coursework includes UICB:4280: Artist Books; UICB:4210: Boxes and Enclosures; UICB:6520: Graduate Book Art Workshop. Artistic skills, attention to craft, critical & creative thinking, historical context and contemporary practices are central to her teaching.

Professor Leonard’s current artistic work combines poetic forms with handmade papers to create artist books and wall pieces. She strives to illuminate the material and physical aspects of the processes involved in the creation of these works—drawing meaning from the intersections found between the written texts and the forms in which they manifest. An ongoing research project involves describing book art materials held in UI Special Collections, focusing on physical attributes including processes, techniques, and materials used in creating the works as well as the form/structure the works take.