2003 archives
December 8 , 2003
Today I perused Nullity, a collection of writings by Kenneth Bernard & printed by Walter Hamady. Bernard offers these striking reflections in a letter to Hamady dated March 1999:
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We
throw out too much and gain too little, and the attrition on our bodies
and souls is enormous. So I see the book as a "resuscitation,"
a "new" communication, one of many possible, a defiance in
the face of loss, a proclamation of vitality where deadness has been
conferred. In life, where there is real feeling and love, there is attrition
and loss every moment. To what heap are they consigned? We both know
it is not only old typewriters that are discarded long before meaning
and use are exhausted (if they can ever be). Our very mode of progress
often seems more a mode of accelerated entropy. And just as our old
typewriters cannot find the hands to repair them, our worn and used
people similarly cannot find the "hands" to confer honor,
respect, love, and continuing vitality.
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December 2 , 2003
Today I participated in my first day of Linotype University with Linotype Master Larry Raid of Denmark, Iowa. The second class session will occur December 9th. For more information (and to see me in linotype action) enter here.
November 21, 2003
This
evening I heard Audrey Niffenegger read from her book, The Time Traveller'sWife.
Niffenegger is a full time professor in the Interdisciplinary Book Arts MFA
Program at the Columbia College Chicago Center for Book and Paper Arts, where
she teaches writing, letterpress printing, and fine edition book production.
As someone who loves literature about twisted time concepts and bookish characters,
I am finding this book a dreamy-fun read. You can hear her
reading and Q&A on real audio thanks to WSUI.
October, 2003
My Book of Millie-Ba will be travelling to with the Guild of Bookworker's In Flight Exhibit. The exhibit opened during the 2003 Guild of Bookworker's Standards and will be on display at the Denver Public Library until December 27, 2003 after which the exhibit will travel to 9 other cities through June of 2005. Exhibit sites include:
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January
16 to March 5, 2004 March
22 to May 7, 2004 May
20 to July 7, 2004
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July
16 to August 28, 2004 September
13 to October 29, 2004 |
January
18 to February 25, 2005 March
10 to April 22, 2005 May
10 to July 17, 2005 |
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August 25, 2003
Tatiana Ginsberg presented her UICB final project this week. Her project, entitled MUJO (japanese for Evanescence),demonstrates her advanced work in Japanese natural dying of papers form the Heian period (794-1185). Each of the 5 books represents a seasonal color palette affiliated with 5 women characters her favored story, The Tale of Genji. She writes,
"Blurring the distinction between cloth and paper, here are five books, each of which represents a set of robes, seasonally appropriate, that might have been worn by an aristocratic Heian woman. Each kasane or layered color combination would have been just one of the possible options for the seaon. Hidden in each set of "sleeves" is a poem, jotted on a piece of decorative paper in a color that his symbolic of the season. Each of these sets was inspired by a different female character in the eleventh-century work of fiction The Tale of Genji, by Murasaki Shikibu."
Her project
was exceptionally well received. We are all so insanely proud of her . . .can't
wait to see what comes of her research in Japan. .
left:
Tatiana makes a fine point. below right: Tatiana's book illustrating
the traditional Spring color palette of the Heian period.
July 13, 2003
I just completed another coptic binding. For images & further information, visit here.
June 23, 2003
I spent some time in Appleton, Wisconsin last week. I visited my undergraduate alma mater, Lawrence University, and spent several days studying some of the 16th century bindings housed in the rare book collection at the Seeley G. Mudd Library. I saw some fine exemplars of 16th century German wooden board binding, as well as some interesting anomalies. Of particular interest, was Bernhard Hertzog's Chronicon Alsatia, Strasburg, 1592 (left). The text was sewn on 4 double-raised (on what appears to be) hemp cords. The wooden covers appear to be a pasteboard fashioned of paper and wood veneer (below right). The cover material is a 1/4 cover with alum tawd pigskin, with a secondary covering material of a palimpsest (below left). A little note about Appleton: it was also the original home of the Institute of Paper Chemistry (now the Institute of Paper Science & Technology) which moved to Atlanta, Georgia in the late 1980s (I ask you, how do you move an entire institution across the county?).
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May 17, 2003
Binder
Back from the West,
Paper&BookIntensive,Tooele, Utah
I just returned from a two-week stint in Tooele, Utah with the Paper
and Book Intensive. I had a most excellent experience and participated
in Jim Croft class on the
wooden board binding, a tour of historical bookblocks with Bonnie
Stahlecker, and a discussion course on paper with Cathy Baker. I hung
out with all sorts of cool book-folk and learned more about my beloved indigo
dye. In my free time I took some scenic mountain & forest hikes--saw elk,
deer, and grouse--and pestered Jim Canary's Tibetan Book class. The fresh
dry air of Utah and the infectious energy of talented and kind book-folk was
just what this lil' lady needed. I'll be posting some pictures soon.
april 03, 2003
The Iowa Conservation & Preservation Consortium, (ICPC) began its Preservation 101 statewide training program yesterday. The first session, Know Your Media, provided a tri-part presentation on the basic materials that make up library and small museum collections. The class was broadcast statewide to over 18 locations via the Iowa Communications Network (ICN).
The real stars of the Know Your Media session included Ivan Hanthorn, Conservator at ISU, who spoke on the evolution of paper; and Gary Frost, Conservator at the UI, who spoke on non-paper materials, including skins, adhesives, and even "a word about plastics." I spoke on the basic chemical structure of our common materials--paper, leather & parchment, adhesives--and the environment & chemical reactions which bring about their inevitable demise.
Henry
Wilhelm will lead the next class on Photographic, reprographic
and printing processes. This session is scheduled for Thursday, May 22,
2003.
November, 2002
A
visit with Jensen & Duchamp
My boss Gary & I were
lucky enough to host Craig Jensen
(of BookLabII) for a visit this
month. One of our activities included a visit to the UI
Art Museum, during which we had the opportunity to study the recent acquisition
of Marcel Duchamp's Boîte en Valise. I have since gotten really interested
in Duchamp's work. If you're interested, you can see another
version of the Boîte, as well as his sketch of its design here.
Read more about Duchamp here.
He shared a union with a fascinating & talented woman, Mary Reynolds;
her work is housed at the Art
Institute of Chicago, which offers a priceless on-line essay of her life,
Warm Ashes,
as well as images of her bindings.
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Craig, Gary & I head across campus to the museum. |
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Gary & I marvel at Duchamp's ingenuity as Craig peers from behind. |
