Su Blackwell is Britain’s foremost paper sculptor who astonished the art world when she graduated from the Royal College of Art in 2003 with her unique atmospheric miniature dioramas.
Using a scalpel Blackwell cuts and glues the pages of books to create her book sculptures glowing with lights in wood and glass boxes, like Victorian relics found in a museum of intrigue. Blackwell’s work has been included in many exhibitions internationally and has been purchased for permanent collections such as the V&A, The Bronte Parsonage, The Burns Museum Scotland and has featured in the National curriculum.
This 2026 exhibition ‘Pathway of Crumbs’ is a collection of ideas born out of books that have been in her possession for a number of years, books that she has revisited, mulled over, and dissected. As a provider of material on the one hand, and a bearer of content on the other, the book is the germ cell of Blackwell's work. As a single mother Blackwell moved from London to the fishing town of Hastings.
Reflecting on this she says, “It has given me the space to reflect on the natural world and folkloric history that surrounds this area.” The move has also reignited my interest in books on ‘fairy tales’. The exhibition title ‘Pathway of Crumbs’ is therefore taken from the fairy tale Hansel and Gretel, but also, representative of Blackwell’s personal journey of emotional discovery, representing moments of reflection, introspection, and creative contemplation, culminating in a sense of freedom.
One can draw parallels to the work of Marina Warner and Angela Carter, who use these stories not as meaningless fables but as powerful vehicles for meaning. Though the path is not linear, each work is a step in reclaiming the artist’s voice and finding beauty in the process. Spanning across fourteen works of sculpture, animation, and installation, the exhibition draws materially, conceptually and exclusively from books. Blackwell finds her books – or lets them find her – by trawling through second-hand book shops.
The literary histories and stories of these books interest Blackwell, ranging from classification to natural history, and narratives on travel, escape and transformation, as much as the physical presence of the book itself. The damaged frays and stains created by time itself become a record of past events within the book-cut pages. This makes the viewer’s relationship with the contents immediate and visceral, and in turn tells another contemporary, visual story.
Books become both medium and metaphor: reflecting on the human urge to document, to find order in chaos, and to chart a course through the unknown. From this, Blackwell creates three-dimensional worlds where her poetic observations of the natural world become the sublime. The use of glass domes act as 'protector' and 'container' of stories. Blackwell’s work is not only constricted to a static art form, but her interest in animation which will be displayed in this exhibition, has led to impressive collaborations, most recently with Hide Restaurant, London, The National Trust and Chatsworth House. Su Blackwell’s artistic transformation to the medium of sculpture happened while studying textiles at the RCA.
She continued her experimentation with paper, hanging works in forests, burying paper in the earth, and continuing to test its enduring nature as a medium. This exhibition will encapsulate the fusion of art and literature that led to Blackwell’s success. Created from a medium that is both fragile and transient, these enduring fairytales have evolved into tangible and haunting sculptures. ‘Exquisite craftsmanship combined with an underlying narrative and overlying sense of fairytale magic makes her work stand out from the paper crowd’ - Jane Audas, 2010 Su Blackwell, Break off my Branches, 2025, Paper cut sculpture and wooden
Qualifications & Training:
01-03 MA Textiles, Royal College of Art, London 97-00 BA (Hons) Art & Design, Bradford College of Art and Design
Solo Exhibitions: 26
‘A Pathway of Crumbs’, Long and Ryle Gallery, London 21 ‘Into the Dark Woods’, Long and Ryle Gallery, London 18 ‘Forests, Folk Tales and the Sea’, Long and Ryle Gallery, London 15 ‘Dwelling’, Pola Museum Annex, Tokyo 12 ‘Tales from The Enchanted Forest’, Long and Ryle Gallery, London 12 ‘Pretty Maid Ibronka’, Faculty of Fine Arts, Montenegro 11 Bishop Faculty Fellow 2011, ‘Selected Works’, The Center for Book Arts, New York 10 ‘Happily Ever After’, Long and Ryle, London 10 ‘Remnants’, The Bronte Parsonage Museum, Haworth, UK 09 ‘All the Things I love are going to Disintegrate’ The Scottish Gallery’ Edinburgh
Selected Group Exhibitions:
26 The Sun and The Moon: Art Inspired by the Celestial, Saatchi Gallery, London 26 Fairy Tales, The British Library, London 22 Fascination Paper, Gustav-Lübcke-Museum, Hamm, Germany 18 The Second Skin. Nature - Clothing, Museum Schloss Moyland, Bedburg-Hau, Germany 17 Book Worlds, Museum Sinclair-Haus, Frankfurt, Germany 14 ShowStudio, London 13 Sotheby’s Presents, Chatsworth House, Derbyshire 13 Victoriana – The Art of Revival, Guildhall Art Gallery, London 12 The First Cut, Manchester Art Gallery, UK 09 Can Art Save Us? Millennium Gallery, Sheffield 09 Slash: Paper under the Knife, Museum of Modern Art and Design, New York
Work in Public Collections:
National Art Library, V&A Museum London National Art Gallery Cardiff Palgarve Macmillan Headquarters, London Sir Kenneth Green Library, Manchester Metropolitan University The Bronte Parsonage Museum, Haworth, West Yorkshire Graves Art Gallery, Sheffield The Burns Museum, Alloway, National Trust Scotland
Projects and Commissions:
23 Batemans House, National Trust England 23 Caro & Selig, Marriott Hotel Group, Tegernsee 19 Peckover House, National Trust England Su Blackwell, Kamouflage, 2025, Paper cut sculpture with wooden box, 29 x 20 x 21 cm 18 Art Installation, Spinocchia Freund London 18 Art Installation, Hide Restaurant, Mayfair, London 17 Art Installation, Christmas at Chatsworth, Chatsworth House, Derbyshire 16-18 Plumlines, Art Installation at Croome Court, National Trust England 13 Curator, Beyond the Book Exhibition, Devon Guild of Craftsmen, Bovey Tracey 13 Design for Liberty Art Fabrics, A/W14 Collection, Liberty London 12 The Fairy Tale Princesses for ‘Thames and Hudson’ (Thames and Hudson Books, 2012) 11 Set Design for The Snow Queen, Rose Theatre, Kingston Upon Thames
Selected Commercial Projects:
19 Time Magazine, US 15-17 British Airways, Worldwide 11 Fairmont Hotels, Worldwide 10 Window Display for Nicole Farhi, London Stores 10 Crabtree and Evelyn, Worldwide Awards: 12 The Fairy Tale Princesses ‘Thames and Hudson’, Crescer’s Best Children’s Book of 2012 10 Window Display for Nicole Farhi, London Stores, Winner of VM & Display Awards, Best Christmas Window 2011 08 Beringer “Vineyard” Commercial, Voted Best Ad on TV, 2007
Selected Teaching:
16 Putney School of Art and Design, London 12 Faculty of Fine Arts, Montenegro 11 University for the Creative Arts, Canterbury
Selected Publications:
13 Victoriana ‘A Miscellany’ by Sonia Solicari 11 Anti-Tales ‘The Uses of Disenchantment’ by Catriona McAra 11 Book Art ‘Iconic Sculptures Made from Books’ by Paul Sloman 09 Slash ‘Paper Under the Knife’ by David Revere McFadden
