MOCARSKI Zygmunt - Exlibris łowicki O.O. Bernardynów [...] Exlibrisy toruńskie: (excerpt) Toruń, 1947 [Framed by Helena Karpinska].

She was an amateur bookbinder, her works were exhibited at the Bibliophile Society exhibition in 1936, and in 1939 were sent to the International Exhibition in New York. During the occupation, Karpinska supported herself by binding books .In 1945 she moved to Cieszyn, worked in several institutions, including as a librarian, but her main activity was book binding. In 1952 she passed the craft exam and officially registered her studio, which she ran only for three years 1952-1955, generally working "at home"; she was well known in the bibliophile circle . Shemade her bindings by hand; due to her inability toprocure high-quality raw material, she used parchment shereceived as a donation from Jewish books destroyed and profaned during the war .She dyed the bindings in various colors, and paid the greatest attention to decorating them with the traditional technique of hand gilding.From her modest stock of embossing tools, she created unique, very rich compositions that referred to Renaissance, Baroque and Classical styles. After the war she repeatedly exhibited her works and participated in competitions receiving awards: Wroclaw 1951, Warsaw 1964, Poznan 1977, she also had individual exhibitions in Wroclaw (Ossolineum 1973, National Museum 1983), Cieszyn (1973, 1979, 1989) and Bielsko-Biala 1982

[bio after: E. Pokorzyńska - Emancypacja kobiet w zawodzie introligskim w warszawie w koniec XIX i na początku XX wieku, link - https://www.ksiaznicapodlaska.pl/site/bibliotekarz/28/3_Elzbieta_Pokorzynska.pdf (accessed 14.03.2023)]