Paul Johnson

Paul Johnson is a book artist and teacher in the United Kingdom. He is best known as a pop-up and movable book artist and for his work as a teacher of book art and children’s literacy. He is the founder of the Book Art Project, an initiative that teaches writing to children through bookmaking, and has made books with over 200,000 children and over 25,000 teachers worldwide.

Education Paul Johnson grew up in Norwich, England. He attended the Norwich University of the Arts and the Visva-Bharati University in Santiniketan, India, before getting his PhD from the University of York.

Bookmaking career

After experimenting with poetry and performance art, Johnson began to make his own books in his early 40s.

Early in his artistic career, Johnson was inspired to consider a book as more than something to read after seeing the sculptural book bindings of Phillip Smith, MBE. A single book structure could include up to 200 individual pieces.

In 2018, Johns Hopkins University acquired the Paul Johnson Archive comprising over 500 items of his artwork (including 250 pop-ups) dating from approximately 1965-2015.

Johnson was awarded the 2021 Meggendorfer Prize for Best Artist Book from the Movable Book Society for The Lemon Tree. The prize recognizes outstanding three-dimensional books not commercially published or mass produced.

Publications Johnson is the author of almost 20 publications about bookmaking, including Pop-up Paper Engineering (1992), a guide to the moveable book form. Books by Johnson include:

A Book of One's Own: Developing Literacy Through Making Books (1991; ) Books Searching for Authors (1994; ) Get Writing! Ages 4 - 7: Creative Book-Making Projects for Children (2005; ) Get Writing! Ages 7-12: Creative Book-Making Projects for Children (2008; ) Literacy Through the Book Arts (1993; ) Making Books: Over 30 Practical Book-Making Projects for Children (2000; ) Making Your Own Book (1994; ) New Pop-Up Paper Projects: Step-by-step paper engineering for all ages (2013; ) Pictures & Words Together: Children Illustrating and Writing Their Own Books (1997; ) Pop-up Paper Engineering: Cross-curricular Activities in Design Engineering Technology, English and Art (1992; )