Thanx Santa

Found under the tree on Xmas morning, A Specimen of Some Printing Types in Use at the Alcuin Press, Chipping Campden, Gloucestershire, and a note on the Press and its aims. It opens with a page of glorious 72-pt Cloister, followed by a spread in 36-pt, and then a spread with the roman and italic in 18-pt. Poliphilus and Blado in two sizes, followed by Caslon in several sizes also appear. The text is a single essay that provides some history and commentary on the faces shown, along with statements of principle in the matters of printing, paper and binding.

The Alcuin Press was a commercial concern modeled after Chiswick and Nonesuch, attempting to bring the best possible craftsmanship and materials to its work. According to Court Barn - A Museum of Craft & Design in Chipping Campden,

"The Alcuin Press was started in 1928 by Herbert Finberg (1900-1974), a Roman Catholic friend of F. L. Griggs. It was housed in a malt-house behind Elm Tree House, High Street, Chipping Campden. Unlike Arts and Crafts printers who printed by hand for their own pleasure, Finberg used modern machinery and worked for commercial publishers. But he cared just as much about quality. The press was sold in 1935."

While books printed at the Alcuin Press are not uncommon, this printing sample appears to be. The book is squarish octavo in size, a single signature of 16 pages, printed on Batchelor's Kelmscott paper in an edition of 50 copies. Bound in quarter marbled paper over thin boards, with a linen back. The text makes reference to planned future specimen books exhibiting the press's collection of ornamental initials, borders, and type flowers "designed specially for use at this Press." No idea if these subsequent samplers appeared. But a lovely book to spend a quite Christmas afternoon enjoying.

Chris Stern's Foundational Type Foundry

Printer Chris' Stern's legacy lives on! His former partner, Jules Faye, has sent out this notice with details for the planned opening of the C.C. Stern Type Foundry in Portland, OR. Chris and Jules published many interesting and innovative books during the 1990s and early '00s, before his untimely death. Great to see all this equipment, and Jules' expertise, still at work. Note than in addition to soliciting cash donations for the foundation's start-up and ongoing costs, there is a "wish list" of equipment they need.

A (New) Letter from Edward Johnston

Received in the mail this week was a package full of surprises from The Aliquando Press. Will Rueter has issued a previously unpublished letter by calligrapher Edward Johnston, printed here in facsimile on a sheet of Barcham Green Medieval handmade paper.

Will discovered the letter years ago at a book fair, tucked inside A.R. Ashbee's copy of Writing & Illuminating & Lettering - score! The bulk of the 27-page book is taken up with an insightful essay about Johnston, providing some context for the letter. And, there's an original two-color wood engraving portrait by Will of E.J. The collection of papers combined in the book alone make it a joy to leaf through: Nepalese for the case, Hahnemuhle Archive for the text, the BG (printed damp), and some kind of a gampi for the engraving. Another lovely publication from TAP, issued in an edition of just 40 copies. And it's priced at just $95! But Will's never charged enough for his books.

Also in the package was a copy of Will's ninth books, Poe's story The Cask of Amontillado, published in 1965 (just a few months after HM was born....). We admit to having been gently pestering Will about the possible existence of a copy for some time now, and finally wore him down: a note tucked into the copy that arrived reported that it certainly is the last copy.

Perhaps Will had been reticent about sharing a copy of such an early work, as he was understandably still perfecting his presswork. But he shouldn't feel apologetic: one might niggle about the printing only if comparing it against what he later achieved, but the book itself shows the early blooms of taste and style that would come to characterize TAP's publications.

There were a few other recent additions to the HM library. Printing on vellum has long been an interest here, considered by many to be the pinnacle of challenges in handpress printing. Printing on Vellum is also the title of a small pamphlet reprinting an exchange of letters between Daniel Updike and C.H. St. John Hornby on the subject. The pamphlet is set in Centaur and printed damp on (unidentified) handmade paper, in an edition of 25 press-lettered copies. It is an immaculate little production, issued by the Wind & Harlot Press in 1976. An Internet search suggests that this was an early imprint of Bob Baris, but the e-mail link on his current Press on Scroll Road site is dead, so our inquiry remains unanswered.

HM has never been reticent about expressing our admiration for the work of Gabriel Rummonds, or our regard for the man himself. But is the little pamphlet above, displaying 10-, 12- and 14-point Spectrum (roman and italic) on a single french-folded sheet, issued in an edition of 70 copies to celebrate Abe Lerner's birthday in 1978, really worth almost $1,000?! That's what the other copy listed on Abe was priced at when we ordered the one shown above, priced much, much, way much less.

Small, Colorful Wunders

Having perfected and streamlined her technique with the big copies, Barbara Hodgson practically tore through coloring & embellishing the eight miniature copies of The WunderCabinet. (Ten actually, with the two printer's proof copies she kindly undertook as well.) She sent along these photos of completed miniatures, displayed with their full-size progenitors. Still no definitive plan on what to do with them, except that a copy will accompany each of the authors' deluxe boxes, and the publisher's as well. That leaves five in play; watch this blog for details of how and when they will become available.

We asked her for a few comments about the book (in its two forms). She replied with the following:

"Who knows what drove me to tackle the creation of this 33%-of-full-size book, when most of my resources (motor control, eyesight, patience) had already been expended. Ultimately, it must have been the challenge, combined with an enduring fascination for miniscule handmade objects.

"The eight copies took about five days to embellish. The small version is an almost exact replica of the larger one and includes a pressed Dicksonia antarctica fern, a working volvelle and a magic lantern slide of natural history images.

"Claudia Cohen will be joining the madness and binding these copies once she has finished binding the full-size edition."

HM checked in with Claudia this week. The black leather has arrived from Harmatan for the deluxe copies, and the those boxes are well underway. We had expected to be debuting one of the regular (1/20) copies at Codex next February, but now Claudia's thinking that we may have a deluxe one (1/10) ready for display. Either way, the book will be at Vamp & Tramp's table when Codex opens on February 6.

Pressure Printing

Purely by happy coincidence, last weekend we stumbled across a passing mention of Pressure Printing, Brad Keech's studio specializing in fine prints by contemporary artists. HM's interest was piqued because most of the artists he has worked with are recruited from the worlds of graphic arts and comix, i.e. Jim Woodring, Tony Millionaire, Gary Baseman and Kim Deitch.

 

A fellow handpress printer (he uses an Albion), Brad's Denver studio is also capable of intaglio printing. His background is in marketing and design (he currently handles most of the design work for artist Mark Ryden's Porterhouse imprint & online shop), and he brings these talents to Pressure Printing, working with the artists not just on the technical aspects of the print, but also designing and making custom frames or packaging (for lack of a tony-er word) for each project, such as Mark Mothersbaugh's "Grandma Cyclops" (above & below; "Grandpa Cyclops" shown at top, appeared a few years earlier).

Pressure Printing's site offers an excellent overview of the its publications since starting, in 2002. Brad averages a few prints per year, with editions ranging from a handful to 100. He seems to have attracted a loyal following, as most are O.P. No books per se, but several portfolio collections, at least one of which (the deluxe edition of Baseman's Unattainable Beauty) could be described as an artist's book.

The site also links to a blog that is full of additional details and asides about projects. It's worth poking around in: the June 2009 archive includes details of a project that seems characteristic of Brad's interest in the exactitudes of printmaking. The print, titled "Kindling," was created by artist James Jean for a fundraiser held at Pixar Studios,  with director Hayao Miyazaki, to save the Totoro Forest. It's a diptych intaglio print, overprinted in relief (polymer) with a second color, issued in an edition of just 10 copies.

It's always energizing to encounter someone like Brad who is so clearly dedicated to the demands of traditional printmaking techniques, but using them to create contemporary work that pushes at the edges of form and content.

Small Wunders

Printing The WunderCabinet took three months in the HM studio earlier this year; one day last week we printed off eight more complete copies. Chalk and cheese: these latest copies are shrunk down to what felt like 2-pt type, pages small enough we could print two entire signatures (8 up) on one sheet (vs the 2-up folios printed for the edition).

Why? is the obvious question. The answer has faded from recollection, but ties back to Barbara & Claudia's first collaborative book, The Temperamental Rose (2007). For that book, Barbara had made a miniature mock-up as a reference for the printer. When the project was wrapping up and we were collecting all the bits, we asked if HM could keep the little dummy. Surprised by our interest, Barbara instead proposed making three proper miniatures, one each for HM, Claudia and herself. Here's what she came back with:

The book, which measures 2 x 3 inches, is complete in every aspect, right down to the hand coloring, embellishments, pop-ups and even the glass vial of dry pigment. But all that work on pages that were, at the end of the day, just printed digitally. Thus, in the early days of The WunderCabinet, some wise-ass suggested doing this again, but this time with the text printed letterpress. Always being up for a challenge like this, Barbara had polymer plates of each page made, shrunk down to about 30% of the original size. When Reg Lissel completed the paper for the book, we culled some of the 100% linen sheets that were particularly thin. And there it all sat, as HM avoided the issue and did other things. But a promise is a promise, so last week we finally set things up in the press, damped the tissue-thin paper, and got down to the work.

The type on the plates was so small that positioning the eight pages to ensure correct margins & back-up was tedious and strained the eyes. We weren't sure just how the very small pages, with lines that were already very fine in the full-size version, would print; perhaps not at all, or perhaps as a muddy stain.

One of the advantages of printing on dampened paper is that significantly less ink is required to achieve crisp letterforms, and this is especially important when the letters are so small. To our pleasant surprise, the plates printed wonderfully. The biggest challenge was that the paper would begin to dry in the short time between pulling the first impression, re-inking the type, and turning the sheet to back it up, so careful haste was required.

Seven signatures of two sheets each took about eight hours to print off (five sheets printed for each signature). Most of that time was taken up with just getting the pages correctly positioned. Two days later the sheets were dry, pressed, and ready for trimming and collating. Barbara and Claudia have plans to bind up eight copies, the pages hand-colored and enhanced just as they are in the life-sized edition. We hope they do not lose their eyesight on such distractions.

Big Printing

Over two days this past week we printed the broadside Uncommon Deities, with a text by David Sylvian and illustrations by Astushi Fukui. In a previous post about this project, we stated it was just our second attempt at a broadside. That's incorrect; it's our third. We'd forgotten about this lovely Alice broadside printed for Mariko Ando.

Uncommon Deities was, however, certainly the largest piece we've ever printed on the Washington. The sheet measures 22 x 15 inches; the text area is 16 x 9 inches. The set-up of the press had to be completely changed to accommodate the piece. The platen bearers had to be relocated to fall outside the area of the sheet, and the points had to be positioned on the far side of the tympan, where the top of the sheet would be (the top inch of each sheet, where the pin holes lie, will be trimmed off). None of our roller bearers were long enough for the form, so we had to cobble a straight run of 20 inches on either side of the forme from shorter pieces of 12-pt rule.

The text lies in two columns, each with one or two lines that extend well beyond the rest. This always makes even inking and impression a challenge, but five hours of makeready and using layers of tape to build up the roller bearers at the extremities of the forme evened things out. So, having started at 9:30 a.m., we were able to begin pulling usable impressions by 3 p.m. The edition is 30 copies, but with three runs per sheet and our general ineptitude, we printed 50 to allow for spoilage. We finished printing the black shortly after 8 p.m. on the first day. Nothing happens quickly at HM.

The text was set in 14-pt Dante and Dante Titling. The 200-g Arches paper was printed damp. Using quite a dry ink slab, the roller was charged twice for each impression (we ascribe to Harold McGrath's strategy of using as little ink as possible on the roller, and building it up on the letterforms with successive passes). The photo above shows part of the ink slab, the roller, and the two piles of paper during the last run: the sheets to be printed (covered by damp towel), and the printed sheets (stacked between blotters, the first step in drying them down).

The second day went more quickly, with just two lines of red in the second run, and two lines of small type (the copyright & limitation statements) printed in blind at the bottom. The photos above & below show a sheet in the press after the last run.

The sheets must now circle the globe to be signed first by David, and then Fukui. Will spent the weekend building a big box strong enough to protect them during their travels.