Jana Pullman 1960-2025

[catherineldf]

My wife, book artist/bookbinder/book conservator, Jana Pullman died last Monday night (2/10/25) after a 4 year
struggle with frontotemporal dementia. We met at women’s
country-western line dancing in 1995 at the Unitarian Universalist Society in Iowa City, Iowa, when she came to town to work at the U of Iowa Papermaking Lab (now part of the U of Iowa Center for the Book) and I was still running Grassroots Books. We had our first official date on January 15th, 1996 at a women’s basketball game and moved in together a few months later. We moved to Minneapolis in 1997, but returned to Iowa City to get married on September 22, 2009. Poet John Calvin Rezmerski presided over our ceremony and multiple friends attended. We threw a big party at Minnehaha Falls when we got back to Minneapolis.

 

In the 25+ (it’s hard to count the last 4) years that we were together, she taught me a lot about asking for what I wanted, negotiating consent, honest communication and an appreciation of craft. She encouraged me to write my first articles and stories and my novels. She encouraged me to start Queen of Swords Press. We travelled a lot around the Midwest, to the East Coast and the West, to New Zealand, France, Italy, England, Wales, Iceland, Finland and Sweden. We attended a zillion art openings, concerts and art events of all kinds, made and lost and made new friends and explored the world around us. We were amongst the co-founders of the Iowa Women’s Music  Festival and between us, ran 5 small businesses, all of them book-related. She did a ton of direct care for my mother when Mom’s health failed and she developed dementia. She was an unfailingly kind, smart, creative soul who loved teaching others.

 

She was also pretty terrible with credit cards, money and most things business-related. I spent years digging her out of debt and subsidizing the creation of expensive art, mostly bindings, that she could not sell or figure out what to do with. She was loved by her students and many of her colleagues, but not, I think, as well respected as she should have been. She was endlessly passed over for arts grants and positions that went to other folks with a bit more social polish. Her work would end up on the bottom of display cases at shows where you couldn’t see the detail (most recently last year - which I’m still pissed about). I had to work my own connections to get her nominated for Minnesota Book Artist of the Year, which she eventually won after several tries in 2013. She also won several other awards and had bindings in a ton of shows and collections, so it wasn’t all dire, but it was frustrating seeing her work so hard and then not see that work celebrated or appreciated as much as I thought it should have been.

 

She was a very good teacher and her students remember her very fondly. She mentored other artists and was an excellent ambassador for book arts. She was a great dancer and we used to go out a lot dancing in our early years. She was curious and engaged in wonderful ways and she worked hard to make our house a home. And she loved books, both as objects and as a way to learn.

 

Which made the last 4+ years of living with her dementia even more heartbreaking. I am not a great caregiver, but thanks to pandemic lockdown, we were stuck with each other with not a lot of external support and it took a huge toll on both of us and our relationship. It took me 2 years to get her care funded so I was constantly stressed and exhausted about money and her and keeping track of her and trying to keep all the financial balls in the air. It got harder and harder and I know she felt abandoned when I moved her to memory care last year. 

 

I miss who she was and this was not how I wanted to grow old. I also hate that I have to feel relived that she died now and not after May, when she would have turned 65 and I would have had to start the funding quest all over again under even more adverse circumstances. Welcome to Mixed Feels 2025. At any rate, if you knew her, please celebrate who she was. 

 

Here are a few links to interviews, articles and her art:

 

Jana’s blog - http://aboutthebinding.blogspot.com/?m=1

Bookbinding Interview - https://koutsipetsidis.wordpress.com/2017/02/06/interview-jana-pullman/

Interview with Betty Bright - https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5e9723fda3e12a1b3aa9089b/t/67457a234574c8649b0bd69b/1732606499658/Jana+Pullman+Final+Transcription.pdf

 

I do have most of her bindings and they are for sale as the remaining boxes and journals from her Etsy, some tools and materials and more. Contact me for prices/availability. I don’t have a memorial fund of any kind set up for her but am open to discussing it. I know it’s expected, but I’m kind of overwhelmed right now. I cleaned out her room with the help of friends on Friday, then met with the Cremation Society on Saturday and despite being pretty much on top of things, there’s still a LOT to deal with. Hugs to all of you who miss her too. Official obituary to follow.

Comments

[sartorias]

I am so sorry for your loss.

[catherineldf]

Thank you!