This week’s Inquisitive Printer focuses on a new chapter for a letterpress printer, the cool printing history of Basel, Switzerland and a creative idea for sketch-booking in the summer.
REBECCA:
It’s wonderful to see our letterpress friends grow and be on the move. Earlier this month, a cool Chicago-based letterpress printer, A Favorite Design, did just that. After a successful Kickstarter campaign, Amber Favorite & her husband have been able to move into their own brick-and-mortar store in the Albany park area. Way to go and congratulations!
(photography courtesy of blockclubchicago.com / afavoritedesign.com )
JAKE:
A significant other’s trip to Europe became an occasion for me to do a little poking into the history of Basel, Switzerland. I couldn’t — and really, still can’t — put my finger on any one reason why Basel feels significant to me, as prominent as it has been in the back of mind. Perhaps it’s some subconscious awareness that many of my cultural heroes are alumni of the old university, like Friedrich Nietzsche, Carl Gustav Jung, and Herman Hesse.
In the Renaissance, it was home to father of pharmacology, the astrologer and alchemist Paracelsus; in the modern era, it was the site of chemist Albert Hoffman’s famous bicycle ride over the course of which he became aware of the effects of the lysergic acid diethylamide he’d just invented. What a cute set of Basel historical bookends marking either end of the modern era of hard science, between magical herblore on one side and psychedelic cybernetics on the other.
At the University of Basel’s Museum of Pharmacy is yet another intriguing and world-changing artifact: the printing press owed by Amerbach & Froben.
(Source: wikipedia.org and the BEIC digital library)
Amerbach is noted as the first printer to make the switch to Roman typefaces! If that ain’t notable, I couldn’t tell you what is.
MADDIE:
It is summer time, Ya’ll.
This is the time when I just want to be active and outside. Taking in as much sunlight and warm weather as possible before the next season arrives. I relish these moments, yet have the feeling that I am not focused on my studio work. This little bit of guilt follows me around, but WAIT!!! I have dissolved this worry by combining my two favorite things: drawing and playing outdoors.
Wherever I go on adventures, I make sure to always have space in my bag for a small notebook and a set for drawing tools. Pens, fine tipped markers and a handmade notebook.
The sketchbooks are simple to make and can be constructed in a pinch. Yay bookbinding skills!!! Any found and recycled materials such as copy paper, string or staples are used to bind together this booklet. And there you are, ready for summer action and capturing your favorite moments.
Above are images I have included are from a 2015 sketchbook. These were made while spending the weekend in a remote cabin in central New York. Below are this year’s (2019) sketches of some recent adventures.
I can captures new experiences and practice my artistic skills all in this small item. I have even asked my friends to contribute to some pages. These become great collection pieces over time. I can look back at these works and enjoy my artistic practice through the summer months.
Have something that you find intriguing? Let us know in the comments below!
Basel also the home of the amazing Basel Paper Mill Museum, which uses water power to run a old-school paper-making system, and has a huge set of letterpress and type-manufacture equipment, too! It’s where I first saw a pantograph.