Pumpkin Moon

Pumpkin Moon & pas-des-deux

Schierlingspresse; Dreieich, Germany; 1989

Author, Artist, Printer, Binder: Dieter Emil Sdun

Contact: info@forumbookart.de

www.forumbookart.com

specs
Concertina-fold
edition of 40
six pages
Three-color woodcut by D. Sdun
Letterpress, hand set in Glass-Antiqua
Corrugated paper cover
A poem in Dada-style, presented as visual poetry.

Pick A Little....

specs:
6.75" x 4/5"
BFK Rives
two color linoleum block
hand set metal type
four colors
edition of 20

Blog for all printmakers

Meet Your Printmaker is a growing directory of print/printmaking shops around the world with a focus on the independent, the non-profit, the handmade and the unique.

So says the intro to the blog and so it is. This blog will keep you busy for days.

Orange Trees

Orange trees? Why not? There's probably a pink bunny hiding in the grass.

specs:
image size: 4"x4.75" (except where the tree pokes out)
Fabriano Aristico
3 color
1 Magnesium plate (orange trees)
2 lino blocks

Minor Blues

I discovered this image while browsing the SF Center for Books website. I find the surreal, Magritte-like quality especially beautiful.

From the on-line catalog description of the piece....

Christopher Stern, Stern & Faye, Skagit Valley, Washington
www.sternandfaye.com

Broadside by Christopher Stern Hand-printed with found woodtype, metal type, collage.
2006; Edition of 25.

Sadly, Christopher Stern died in the autumn of 2006. In the last six years of his life, he combined his tradeskills of typography and letterpress printing to find his own, widely-acclaimed collage style of layering ink and image with hand-set type.

His partner Jules Remedios Faye, a renowned printmaker and illustrator, continues their work at the press in Skagit Valley. Describing in part how the the ambiance of the printshop has contributed to their aesthetics, Faye comments that "it is located in a renovated barn on the high banks of the Skagit River in the foothills of the North Cascades Mountain range. The barn houses an extensive collection of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century letterpress equipment. Six different letterpresses with cast iron flywheels or stout cranks & cylinders stand where the cows used to get fed. Each press can accommodate different capacities for paper sizes & ink coverage which allows us to execute a wide range of printing possibilities.

"For hand typesetting we have over 20 cabinets filled with wood and metal type which line the barn walls & stairwell. The staircase acts as an ersatz gallery of letterpress printed ephemera, broadsides, poster art & prints. Upstairs where the hayloft used to be, is now the sky lit bindery filled with wide tables, nipping presses, glue jars, needles & thread. Behind the barn is the type foundry where we preserve the craft of casting metal type. The bronze type matrix library is stacked so high it almost reaches the ceiling.

"All of this equipment was scavenged from the basements of retired printers, defunct printshops, extinct printing schools & obsolete typehouses over many years of search & rescue operations. As much as we are printers for hire we are also preservationists of the craft of letterpress printing."

FeFiFoFum

This is one mad dog.

Specs:
linoleum block
hand set wood type
hand painted watercolor background
very old, discolored BFK Rives
4.5"x6.75"
edition of 20

Denise Figueredo

This image was carved and printed by Denise Figuerdo who directs and teaches the letterpress program at The Armory Center for the Arts in Pasadena, CA, where I print. I love the casual, sketchy carving technique which matches the subject matter perfectly. She's working on a series so I'll post more as they come along.

specs:
image size: 4"x5"
paper size: 6"x9"
Somerset, soft white
signed AP

It Was A Beautiful Fish...

Sometimes I stumble upon the most poetic language by accident. Picked up off the ground, overheard in a cafe, spoken by a child. I've been saving these snippets for years and will illustrate this "found poetry" from time to time. This is my first go, thanks to Petra's (age two) keen observation.

My printing skills are finally beginning to improve! I'm proud to say the colors actually register.

specs:
images size: 4" x 5.5"
paper size: 4.5" x 6.75"
paper: BFK Rives
2 color
magnesium plates
printed on a Vandercook Press
edition of 28.

Yee Haw

Finally! A letterpress print of a squirrel roasting acorns over a camp fire. It doesn't get better than that - unless its the other 3 prints (fishing bear, hiking hare, rafting rascals) in this new series from Yee-Haw Industries. You can see (and buy) all four at their Etsy Shop.

Specs:
The hand printed letterpress images are in assorted colors and brown ink on cream paper & matted inside my kraft letterpress mats. Image area is 4.25"x6"and the full matted print is ready to go into an 8"x10" frame.
Illustration by Bjorn Lie


Thanks for the tip, Jaime.

Ladybug! Ladybug!

specs:
scrap magnesium plates
hand painted watercolor sky
linoleum block flames
hand set type
very old, discolored BFK Rives
6" x 5"
edition of 20

Lotus Flower

specs:
image size: 3"x3"
paper size: 6"x6"
Fabriano
linoleum block print
multiple colors: goldenrod (shown), sage green, sky blue, lime green, red, brown, purple
each color in an edition of 12

Love Song...new colors

These are the color palettes I'm considering for the new Love Song series (see previous post). If you have a preference, leave me a note.

Love Song

I started making letterpress prints one year ago. This series was one of the first projects I designed. As an illustration project, it was a dream. I'm a huge fan of hand separated printing of all kinds, especially children's books. Sadly, my beginner printing skills were no match for the challenge of printing 4 colors. I couldn't feed the paper straight (note to self: use good paper trimmer, measure) so by the time the dark blue was laid down it was an impossible mess. This is especially noticeable on the last image. Oh well, it was a great learning experience. Now I'm back printing this series a second time in new colors, hopefully with a bit more skill. I'll let you know how that goes.

specs:
designed in Adobe Illustrator
manganese plates made at Owosso Graphics.
printed on Rives BFK
image size: 4"x5.5"
paper size: varies
edition of 19 bad ones and one good one.

CandyKiller

Going from highbrow to lowbrow, check out this beauty by Candykiller, Brian Taylor.

What I'm looking for here at Letterpress Habit@ are pieces that incorporate the unique peculiarities of letterpress printing...generally thought of as words + imagery...and busting the rules. Or doing such a fine job of craftsmanship that it kinda makes me gaga.

In this example, the high-5 goes to the printer, whoever that may be.

Go to Candykiller's blog, he has closeups posted of this print series.

Specs:
• 8x10 inches • Two colour inked letterpress • Printed on Somerset off-white 300 gm art paper • Signed and numbered edition of 90 • $37 / £18 (approx) including shipping • SOLD OUT

Dirk Hagner

I came across this elegant letterpress broadside by Dirk Hagner at ArtSlant.com. It was part of a group show called Print Matter(s) at Studio Channel Island Art Center, Camarillo, CA. The review by Jennifer D Anderson describes the piece this way...

Dirk Hagner...uses a printmaking process in a surprising way. In his works, Dirk creates a composition of words, a delicate concrete poem that seems fluid and light though the subject matters are often periods of history known for their strife and confrontation. The amazing feat is that the pieces are created with letterpress, a laborious and exacting process, where text is easiest to use in a rigid linear way. Dirk seems to defy the process in some regards in these pieces, while also allowing it to give the work a wonderful antique feel.

Penmaen Press

Moloch by Allen Ginsberg and Lynd Ward.

Specs:
Taken from the Beat poet's poem "Howl", the Moloch section was hand set and hand printed on Rives heavyweight in red and black and includes an original wood engraving by the famous, late book artist and engraver Lynd Ward (whose early work directly inspired Ginsberg's "Moloch"). The signed edition of 150 copies. Published in 1978. There is also an unsigned edition, printed on Mohawk Superfine.

Book artist Michael McCurdy printed and published Penmaen Press books from 1968 to 1985. Books of first-edition poetry, fiction, and translation were printed letterpress and included original art. Titles that are still available are listed here. You may order directly from Penmaen Press.

Habitat, too

Look what I found? Another Habitat. Another Peterson.

Jessica Peterson created this artist book after spending time in Biloxi working with the public library on a book and document conservation project - post Hurricane Katrina. Subject matter, content, form, materials and personal history are perfectly woven together.

Specs:
7.5 x 11.5"; 12 pages. Letterpress printed from photopolymer plates. Accordion format. Printed on cotton, flax, and abaca paper. Typefaces: Caslon 540 and Franklin Gothic Designed and printed by artist.

"Habitat is a letterpress printed artist book about the effects of Hurricane Katrina on Biloxi. I used image and personal narrative, as well as historical and scientific facts to evoke the emotional side effects of a natural disaster. ... Experimental papermaking techniques, such as pulp painting and collage, are used to enhance the content."

This piece can be seen at and purshased from Vamp & Tramp, Booksellers.

Old School Stationers

Old School Stationers in Portland OR makes wall prints the old school way. And some of their subject matter is old school, too. This image is from the series "Camping Circa 1960's."

"True to our name, we prefer the organic beauty of hand-drawn lines to those created with a mouse and keyboard. Our cards and prints are made one at a time using pencil, paper, ink and 900 pounds of cast iron.

Each image is hand-drawn and color-separated by owner Brian Reed. They are then printed on our old but still nimble 1917 model letterpress. Our thick letterpress paper comes from Milan, Italy where they have been pulping this style of sheet for over 350 years."

Hatch Show Prints

If you're a fan of letterpress, you surely know about "Hatch Show Prints." If you don't, this book about the iconic show-biz print shop is a must read.

The Country Music Hall of Fame now owns the shop and their website has lots of images and info - including information about numbering which will be useful for collectors.

If you want a quick fix, Uppercase.com has a terrific (short) illustrated article about the shop written by Jim Sherradan.

Crooked Letter Press

This beautiful little book is called Crooked Trajectory, by Ellen Knudsen, Crooked Letter Press. The images are linoleum reduction prints, the text hand set, letterpress printed in 3 colors. Visit her website and be blown away.

Sammy Harkham

Aardvark Press kicked off their new Letterpress Fine Art Editions with a large scale print project called Los Angeles Loteria. The series is a Limited Edition of 100 signed and numbered letterpress prints made by 18 Artists, all with the Aardvark chop. The artists in this collection are well known Los Angeles print makers, painters, etc. but Sammy Harkham was a new name for me. Check out Sammy's comic, Kramers Ergot.

In the beginning...

It's my first post here at Letterpress Habit@. I love letterpress-made art and if you do too, come back often and see what I've found to surprise and inspire you. Mary

specs:
3 color
4.75"x7.15
hand set wood type
lino block
edition of 6