CONCEPT
I began the creative process by doodling some ideas exploring the deconstruction of the supplied letterforms. I saw promise in the repetition of the straight and curved letter strokes.
For nearly 10 years I’ve wanted to figure out a technique for safely masking and editioning wood type, and the concept I decided on for this print demanded it. While marking up a proof of the type it occurred to me how I could isolate the central strokes of the letterforms and mask them without creating additional pressure and possibly damaging the type.
FIRST RUN & EXPLANATION OF TECHNIQUE
I made a custom cylinder packing using strips of tympan paper (with an acetate draw sheet) cut only as wide as the parts of the letters I wanted to print.
The second crucial component was making a frisket to protect the prints from picking up stray marks from the inked form.
There’s no pressure from the custom cylinder packing at the tops and bottoms of the letters. My experience printing on a hand press (for which a frisket is necessary) for the Red Butte Press edition of Wallace Stegner’s To a Young Writer provided the answer to a decade long riddle. For now, I’m referring to this technique as “plus-minus printing,” where the packing is the “plus” and the frisket is the “minus.”
SECOND RUN
For the second run, I wanted to print the counterforms (see the initial sketch). I scanned the original black proof (see image 2) and traced the counters in Adobe Illustrator and made them filled shapes. To get the now solid counterforms onto a linoleum block I printed the shapes with a laser printer, then traced the perimeter of each with a pencil. The pencil lines were placed against the linoleum and rubbed from the back of the sheet with a bone folder to transfer the outlines for cutting.
All three colors for the print use fluorescent, oil-based inks from Gans.
The smooth, solid, pink, linoleum-cut counterforms contrast nicely with the open grain of the unshellacked wood type.
THIRD RUN
I used brass, type-high rule to imply the missing ascenders (t, h), cross stroke (t), and spur (u), and to suggest an exploded view of the letters.
FINAL PRINT
(un)touch(ed)
2012
3 color letterpress
17.25 × 24 inches
Some pictures of the work on exhibit at Press Street’s Antenna Gallery,
3161 Burgundy Street, New Orleans, LA 70117
OBJECT PLAY– On view March 10-April 8, 2012
Curated by SIFT Co-founders Angela Driscoll and Yuka Petz.
This print attempts to connect the physical sensation of touch with the emotion of feeling, laser cutting offers an absence that seemed an interesting comment on our possible contemporary disconnect with these two sensations.
Seeing the posts and imagining all the other great work assuredly going on around the project, I was at a bit of a loss on how to start. So I procrastinated. And waited. And allowed the holidays, and teaching, and a design practice to get in the way.
Then I realized I had history on my side, well research into the history of wood type. And a CNC machine. To clarify, research into the history of wood type specimen books, a CNC machine and a blatant mis-reading of the supplied glyphs.
When I first unpacked the package from Tricia and Ashley (last year) I immediately configured the word “couth” and began thinking about the nature and meaning of this odd little word that I was more familiar with as a negative (and continued procrastinating). Visiting the project blog my mis-reading became apparent C-O-U-T-H was more appropriately T-O-U-C-H. Back to the drawing board—or not. Using a both/and rather than an either/or approach, “couth touch” struck me as somehow having a ring of the nineteenth century about it, or more importantly seemed like an odd word combination found a nineteenth century wood type specimen book.
I have been researching the chromatic types of the nineteenth century, specifically William H. Page specimens produced leading up to their 1874 masterpiece. The high point of Chromatic wood type production came in 1874 when the William H. Page Wood Type Co. issued a 100-page Specimens of Chromatic Type & Borders.
Combining the mis-reading of the type at hand, and thinking about dynamic color and exuberant typographic design work pointed me on my way. So, no more procrastinating…
This update contains no photographs of my finished prints.
There’s a simple explanation. It’s a little embarrassing.
Truth is, I forgot to take a photo of one before I sent them off and left for Copenhagen.
But I can assure you that after several late nights,
they emerged from nothingness and are currently on the slow boat to Pennsylvania.
(And they look vaguely like this. What can I say.)
