May 2013
George Barnum, Agency Historian/Congressional Relations Specialist, Office of Congressional Relations, U.S. Government Printing Office, Jacqueline Coleburn, Rare Book Cataloging, Library of Congress, Clare Imholtz, Rare Book Collector, served as formal, invited reviewers for the Master of Arts in Art and the Book Academic Thesis Defense Presentations for the Corcoran College of Art + Design.
Mark Samuels Lasner, senior research fellow, University of Delaware Library, had a public conversation with Diane Waggoner, associate curator, department of photographs, National Gallery of Art.
April 2013
Chesapeake Chapter member Mark Samuels Lasner gave us a first-hand view of the exhibition, Pre-Raphaelites and the Book, in the "From the Library" room at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. Mark walked us through each piece in the exhibition, placing the work in context and connecting each to the Pre-Raphaelite story.
Casey Smith, Jill Cypher and Ray Nichols attended the Codex Mexico Symposium held at the Mexican Cultural Institute in Washington, DC.
March 2013
Stuart Bradley, Stan Nelson, and Jim Walczak were mentioned in Rich Hopkins' new book on the history of Monotype.
Dan De Simone gave a talk at the Library of Congress on the History of Color Printing.
March 2012
Mary Mashburn and Steve Angelo of Typecast Press played host to a substantial group of Chesapeake Chapter members. In addition to touring Typecast Press, Mary took the group through the letterpress shop at the Maryland Institute College of Art and an exhibition of work by Globe Poster Printing Corporation held at the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, all in Baltimore, MD.
Ray Nichols and Jill Cypher announce Week 49 of the series CC52: A Year of Personal Work by Craig Cutler, a noted New York photographer. The intent of the project was to compose and create photographs using various letterpress type; to look at the individual type, and sometimes their environments, as abstract forms rather than objects of function | online
Stuart Bradley has announced a new Kickstarter project, "iPad Hands-On Letterpress Workshop". This follows the funding success of his "Midway Midget 1893 Letterpress Cards" project last year. You can see his new proposal by clicking here.
February 2012
George Barnum, Historian at the Government Printing Office, was prominently included in the feature length film Linotype: the Film which is currently being shown across the country.
January 2012
Ray Nichols, current chapter president, served on APHA's Mark Samuels Lasner Fellowship committee tasked with evaluating this year's applications. Other committee members were Jane Siegel of Columbia University and Hosea Baskin of Cumberland Rare Books. The winner will announced at the APHA annual meeting at the end of January.
December 2011
The APHA Fall 2011 newsletter, listed a number of events from the National Conference, Printing from the Edge, held at the University of California, San Diego, October 14 –15, 2011 connected to Chesapeake Chapter members.
On panel two, Corcoran College of Art & Design professor Casey Smith discussed the influences on Bruce Rogers’s work between his 1890 graduation from Purdue and his move to Boston in 1895.
On panel three Joan boudreau made a presentation on Civil War Printing spoke about the invention and use of portable presses for the war and the western frontier.
Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) printmaking instructor Mary Mashburn and West Virginia University design professor Joeseph Galbreath combined to tell the story of Baltimore’s Globe Poster.
You can download a .pdf of the newsletter by clicking here and clicking on the appropriate link under "Late-breaking news."
November 2011
Bill Roberts of Bottle of Smoke Press , Dover, DE, has had his Kickstarter project "9 in Nine" fully funded. The project is built around producing 9 books over the 9 days of his fall vacation. Well done.
June 2011
Ray Nichols and Jill Cypher of Lead Graffiti announced that their Kickstarter project "Tour de Lead Graffiti" has been fully funded. The project is to print 23 two-color posters, one each day, related to the stages of the 2011 Tour de France. Moments and incidents of each stage will be used as a basis for the typography and layout of each piece. You can read the whole story and keep up with the daily posters here.
Val Lucas, of Bowerbox Press and Chapter vice president, announced the plan to produce a letterpress calendar with fellow member letterpress printers. The calendar will go on sale in October at the National Conference being held in San Diego. Proceeds will go toward chapter events.
Chapter members Ray Nichols and Jill Cypher of Lead Graffiti and Bill Roberts of Bottle of Smoke Press announce the completion of a softcover and deluxe hardcover book using an essay by British author Nick Hornby and the lyrics to Bruce Springsteen's "Thunder Road." Softcovers were signed by Nick Hornby and the hardcovers were signed by both. The project was to benefit "Ambitious about Autism" a London school for children with autism. For the Lead Graffit story, click here.
May 2011
Long time Chesapeake Chapter member and typefounder Stan Nelson spoke to the St. Bride Foundation in London on Tuesday May 24th on A Genesis of Sorts: Printing the King James Bible. The talk celebrates 2011 as the 400th anniversary of the completion of the King James Bible, the preeminent English language translation.
Stuart Bradley announced that his Kickstarter project "The Midway Midgets 1893 Letterpress Cards" was fully funded at 112% of his goals. Stuart plans to finish printing the cards using copperplates of the images during the summer of 2011.
April 2011
Helena Wright, Curator of Graphic Arts at te National Museum of American History, suggests a research project that someone might want to undertake.
Last week I was doing some research in the Peter Force papers at the Library of Congress, Manuscript Reading Room. Among his bills and receipts are a number for type he acquired from the Baltimore Type Foundry, specifying number of “founts” and their names, sizes, etc. as well as costs. I was looking only in materials from the 1840s, but his career as a printer and editor extends back into the 1820s and forward into the 1860s, and there are plenty of folders of bills for the entire scope of his working life. He was a newspaper editor, sometime Mayor of Washington, and also reprinted countless documents of early American history, and he seems to have done some job printing as well. It might be possible to link his type orders to specific publications. The Peter Force collection is a rich vein waiting to be mined by historians of typography.
Mary Mashburn is quoted in an article on NPR Music about the recent purchase of the contents of Globe printing by the Maryland Institute College of Art. "It's a treasure trove — it's unbelievable," says Mary Mashburn. "The first time you see it, you just can't really take it all in." Mashburn runs a small printing company called Typecast Press, and teaches printing classes at Maryland Institute College of Art — or MICA — in Baltimore. She's also a member of Friends of Globe. She says most letterpress shops today are small boutique operations, printing invitations, stationary, and the like. But young people, her students at MICA among them, have taken an interest in the method.
"To them it feels very, very old and removed as an industrial printing method, but it feels very fresh and exciting to translate from their all-digital world to something that has a real hand-craft to it," says Mashburn.
Mashburn had the idea that maybe MICA would be interested in purchasing Globe's massive printing collection for its students. She teamed up with Gail Deery, chair of the printmaking department at MICA, to move the idea forward.
Ray Nichols was a judge for AIGA / Philadelphia's student competition for the design of a cloth shopping bag to promote something positive about food. Lead Graffiti is offering a free, all day letterpress workshop to the 16 winners.
February 2011
Greg Robison is looking for help on a research project involving the Impartial Observer, the first newspaper in the Federal City. Click here for the whole story.
Stuart Bradley announced his Kickstarter project "The Midway Midgets 1893 Letterpress Cards." You can see a 2-minute video and read about his project here. As of March 3rd he was 52% funded toward his goal of $1,500. Donations will be taken until April 5th. Donations of varying amounts receive various rewards related to the project.
January 2011
Ray Nichols and Jill Cypher of Lead Graffiti attended the APHA Annual Meeting at the New York Public Library for which they also produced the meeting program that was given to all attending the meeting.
The Chesapeake Chapter coming off of a wonderful two years under the leadership of Mike Denker, culminating in the American Printing History Association's national conference held in Washington, DC in October has elected new officers.
These are the new officers who will serve through 2012.
President / Ray Nichols | Lead Graffiti
Vice President / Val Lucas | Bowerbox Press
Treasurer / Gregory Robison | Peregrinus Press
Secretary / George Barnum | Government Printing Office
The Program Committee
Joan Boudreau | Smithsonian Institution
Jackie Coleburn | Library of Congress
Mike Denker | The Stoney Creek Press
Donald Farren
Mark Samuels Lasner | University of Delaware Library
Chris Manson | Crooked Crow Press
Casey Smith | Corcoran College of Art & Design
Many thanks to Gregory Robison and the Nomination Committee members, Jackie Coleburn, Donald Farren and John Johnson for their work.
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