Deconstructing that artichoke and other bookmaking tales

The Obsessive Nature of Editioning

I've got ten (but each "book" is 12 books) more books to make for "A Contemplation on the Obsessive Nature of Time," my flipbook, which you can see at my Etsy site or my website. First, I'm folding the covers, after I've cut them down. I Gocco printed them three at a time, January, February, and March for one set of covers, April, May, and June etc. Then I'm going to glue the covers to the books.

I've been working on the project since before my stroke. Yowsers! Right now I'm on September. The problem is I really don't like doing it. This is the first time I'm actually not having fun making the books. So I would love it, if people over the blogosphere would cheer me on! I'll post more updates on my progress!

Miscellaneous things

Well, I'm trying to improve my website sales. Google sent me a coupon for $100 to use AdWords, so I tried it out. I've gotten some clicks, but no one's bought anything yet! I don't think my listing is very good, so once I get the chance, I'm going to do some research.

...but, right now, my time is completely taken up with those chapbooks I've been working on. I've got 25 left to sew together. My fingers are bloody from the needle, no, just kidding. But man, 200 is a lot of chapbooks to sew together in a short period of time.

I'm so excited, tomorrow is the release party for Good Mail Day, Jennie and Carolee's book. Yea!

Chapbook fancy

I'm working on a chapbook for the Daughters of Yam, Opal Palmer Adisa and devorah major. I definitely want it to be as good as I can possible make it, so I'm kind of nervous about it. I mean, Opal was on my English CSET exam (exams teachers have to take to be "highly-qualified," because, you know, tests magically impart the ability to teach), and devorah was poet laureate of San Francisco. So both of them are super famous. Opal was one of my professors in grad school.

I took it to the photocopy place today, and when the guy saw it he just sort of looked at me. He was probably thinking, "These crazy artists." It's going to be Opal's on one side; then you flip it, and then it's devorah's. Pretty cool! The poetry in the chapbook is luscious, and that's all I'll tell you. You'll find out more when you buy a copy and read it!

Printer's Fair

Preparations are going well. I've got 10 (of 50) of each of four chapbooks done (I'm planning on sewing them at the Printer's Fair, because it's easy to do). I've got 11 Alvar Aalto books done (of course, I'll make more before Saturday), so all I have left is to add to the 10 copies of Book Artist Blues.

Tarot cards

I don't think I've posted images of the tarot cards yet. That's the project I'm doing with my friend Judith. She wrote the poems, and I did linoleum cuts. Right now I'm printing the whole project. We're doing 50 decks (yowsers, that a lot of printing and a lot of paper).

I'm hoping to have them done by the PCBA's Printers Fair in May, but we'll see. I'm trying to focus on my recovery right now, and I don't know how good of a job I'm doing on that!

Distributing type

Yesterday was my first day back in the print shop. Yea! I went out to Betsy's to figure out where the heck I was on the Tarot Card project that I'm doing with my friend Judith. It's been almost a year without printing. Betsy meanwhile had done some work on the carriage house, which is where the press is located. It looked awesome! Still lots of cobwebs (which I kinda like), but there is so much more space. And there's an actual work table. Woohoo!

I had lots of type to distribute, so I spent a good couple hours sitting outside, sun on my back, distributing type. It was loads of fun (no, I'm actually not kidding). Next time I'm out, it'll be setting type. I'm kind of hoping its next week. And soon I'll be printing. Yea!

Weekend from the Carriage House

It was a beautiful weekend here in San Francisco, which meant printing out in Berkeley for me! One of my professors from grad school, Betsy Davids, very kindly lets me use her press for my projects. It's a Vandercook SP-15 with a rich history; sometimes when I'm changing the packing I'll find packing material with impressions from Rebis Press and Johanna Drucker books. It makes me feel like a part of book arts history. Anyway, the Vandercook lives in a very funky old carriage house (over 100 years old) with lots of cobwebs and other weird stuff. On Sunday I noticed the skeletal remain of a raccoon leg lying next to the sink. Mmmm...

I got to break in the new type that I mentioned in the last posting. Very exciting, it looked great on the page. I'm almost done printing the disks and the swords; I've only got the Princess cards to print. I'm printing the suites two-up to save time, although this is still the biggest printing project I've ever done by far. I usually like to print small editions of 20, because the plan is generally to use some elaborate binding, which takes forever, for the final artists book. With cards though, I won't be binding, only making an envelope enclosure, so I'm printing an edition of 50, still pretty small, but with 72+ cards, it's taking a while!

I'm enjoying the collaborative process too. Judith, who wrote the poems, is another one of my professors from grad school and a baseball buddy. She suggested the project. When she said she wanted to make them into Tarot cards, I immediately thought of using linoleum blocks, which is a technique I hadn't used before for any of my books. But I decided to experiment with them, and I'm glad I did, because I foresee many more linoleum block projects in the future.

Brand spankin' new type!

I've been working on a Tarot card project with my friend Judith for the last half year or so. She wrote enough short prose poems to fill a deck and I carved six linoleum blocks--one for each suite in the minor arcana, one for the major arcana, and one for miscellaneous items such as title page and colophon. I'm using Centaur 14 pt., which is the only type I own (yep, for those of you who are thinking, is she hand setting all that type? I sure am!), but for the Queen, King, Prince, and Princess cards, I wanted to use 14 pt. Arrighi for the italic titles. I was going to just borrow the letters I needed from the SF Center for the Book, but, well, their 14 pt. Arrighi has had a lot of use, and my Centaur 14 pt. has not, and being the perfectionist that I am, I decided I needed to buy new type from M & H Type. Luckily, M & H is only a short drive away for me, so I could just swing by after work and buy one set of uppercase and one set of lowercase (I also bought some more spacing, but that's far less sexy.).

Some of you might be wondering why I didn't just get the Centaur italic. Well, for those of you into obscure type knowledge, Centaur was designed without an italic, so Arrighi is the traditional pairing for the italic. Maybe someone reading the blog knows why, because I can't remember. I know on the computer you can assign Centaur italic to your text, but not so, in lead type. I was explaining all of this to my friend Danielle last night, and even though she is not a book artist or even a graphic designer, she didn't fall asleep and actually appeared interested. She said she was going to find a computer with Centaur and apply the italic.

Pop-Ups Galore!

So the second Paul Johnson class was even more amazing than the first. Okay, who doesn't love a pop-up when it emerges from an opening page spread? I don't think it matters if you're a child or an adult. And even better, pop-up books that are made from a single sheet of paper.

This class really got the creative juices churning. I've only done minimal exploration of pop-ups in my books, The Tourist and Let the Artichoke Tell Your Fortune, but after this class, there will definitely be more. I'm thinking a series of one sheet books of my favorite architects for starters, and I'm sure more ideas will be percolating to the surface. Boy, I can't wait for summer vacation! I have way too many ideas to be working full time right now!

What can YOU do with a single sheet of paper?

I've been looking forward to the Paul Johnson classes at San Francisco Center for the Book for months. He comes to teach at the Center every 2 years to share his wisdom about teaching kids literacy through bookmaking, and last time he came I couldn't take his classes. I often find that books I learn for children are books that I end up using in my own work. I had taken a class from Peter Linenthal, where I had learned about origami or lotus books. I ended up turning it into my book Disconnecting Constellations.

February 2nd arrived and I braved my way through the rain to the Center for the first class I had signed up for, "Children's Favorites." The class was basically, what cool things can you do with a single sheet of paper. I'm sure most of you reading this blog are like me, you know tons of one-sheet book structures, but the thing about Paul is he takes these forms just a little bit further. He cuts out doors or shapes to create one-sheet animal books or combines two one sheet books for a more elaborate book. He's always playing and pushing the form to see what new structures he can come up with from a single sheet of paper. He's also thinking, "okay, how can I use this with Kindergartners, with third graders, with middle schoolers, can I use it in my own artists books that I'll sell to special collections." I knew I would take away a lot of cool structures for my teaching, but I was also hoping to take away structures for my own personal work. Sure enough, that's exactly what I got. And what's more, I took away a new way of thinking: how can I push a single sheet of paper to create a magical world of play and discovery. There's a lot of joy in a single sheet of paper!

Today's class is "The Magic of the Movable Book: Children as Pop-Up Engineers." I can't wait!