NEW LONDON LETTERPRESS PRINT: SWEET THAMES

Here is the forme, and an artist's proof, for my new limited edition print, a typographical map entitled Sweet Thames. So many peple liked my earlier print The East London Line, which covered the same part of London, that I decided to produce this new one. My standard size for these prints, dictated by the maximum sheet I can print on my replica 18th-century wooden common press, is a bit larger than A2, and to print this sheet I have to pull three times, winding the carriage under the platen in three stages.

RECENT WORK AT THE PRESS, MAY 2011

Ditchling Museum Ball forme on the bed of the Common Press

Ditchling Museum Ball print

A Bodoni Bestiary; in 48pt Bodoni Italic, printed on Khadi hand-made paper
on the Albion benchtop press

48pt Bodoni Bold Italic Alphabet printed on Khadi hand-made paper
on the Albion bench-top press

'ARTISTS' typographical poster

Here is an image of my new 'Artists' typographical poster, similar in style to the 'Political Philosophers' poster I printed recently (see previous post). This is the second in this series of limited edition posters.

Artwave, and Paine's Case of the Officers of Excise

I'm demonstrating the printing press (the wooden common press) in the Market Tower, Lewes, during Lewes's Artwave Festival every afternoon from Friday 28 August to Friday 4 September inclusive.

As well as the Tom paine material, I'm also using the press to print the text and blocks of some of my own artist's poem & image books, including Rosenberg (the Whitechapel poet and artist, who was killed in the First World War), and The East London Line (inspired by the current redevelopment of the old East London Railway from Shoreditch through (or rather under) Whitechapel, Shadwell, Wapping, Rotherhithe and Surrey Docks to New Cross and New Cross Gate).

Tom Paine and Lewes Festival, 4-14 July 2009

The Tom Paine Printing Press during the Thomas Paine and Lewes Festival, July 4th to 14th, 2009


The Festival finished today, so I'm just posting these initial statistics and comments.
 
The Tom Paine Printing Press was open for the whole 11 days of the Thomas Paine and Lewes Festival.
I demonstrated the press for 7 hours every day, to a total of 1,148 visitors, giving 96 complete demonstrations to individuals and groups.

Average number of visitors: 113 per day.

Average number of complete demonstrations: 9 per day.
 
Public comment was extremely favourable, and children and young people were particularly impressed.

Older visitors were very interested, and many related the Press to their own lives and memories.

It was particularly rewarding to meet so many retired compositors and printers who had worked at local printing companies - Baxters, Farncombes, Lewes Press, Barbican Press. They thought it wonderful that their own trade was being commemorated in this way.

Many of the visitors were clearly day-trippers and tourists from the UK and abroad (France, Holland, Germany, Belgium, Spain, Italy, USA), and thought the Press was a great attraction. These were people who were not necessarily in Lewes for the Tom Paine Festival.

Those who were in Lewes just for the Festival were particularly interested in the Press as representing the key engine for the production of printed material and the dissemination of Paine's ideas (and ideas generally).

Many visitors suggested that the Press could produce printed material appropriate for other Lewes commemorations and events. This is one of the aims of the Press, and I have several plans afoot.

Finally, thanks to Andy Gammon, Peter Flanagan, Les Ellis and others, for their help and support.

Tom Paine Press arrives in Lewes

Stop Press -

The Tom Paine Printing Press will be brought to Lewes by its builder, Alan May, on Monday 22nd June, and should be fully erected in the Market Tower, and tested, by the following day. It will be open to the public to view, with demonstrations of letterpress printing, during Lewes's Tom Paine Festival, 4th to 14th July. Tom Paine was closely involved with both the American and French Revolutions, hence the dates:
4th July 1776: American Declaration of Independence.
14th July 1789: Bastille Day - the start of the French Revolution.

Tom Paine Press nears completion; Taking Liberties

Yesterday (28th November 2008) I took the train from Euston to Stafford (along the old LNWR route - see my Euston Arch book) to have another meeting with Alan May and have a look at the 'Tom Paine' common press as it nears completion. The day was cold, damp and raw, but I was warmed up by Staffordshire oatcakes and onion soup thoughtfully provided by Alan's wife Judith. The press was in Alan's garage-workshop, where the 'Gutenberg' one-pull press made by Alan for Stephen Fry's TV programme was constructed. Here are some photos I took of the common press, which is modelled on the so-called Benjamin Franklin press dating from the early 18th century.

Last week I went to see the wonderful exhibition Taking Liberties - The Struggle for Britain's Freedoms and Rights - at the British Library (www.bl.uk/takingliberties). This is on until 1st March 2009, and includes iconic documents from the BL's collections - from Magna Carta, through the Declaration of Right, Colonel Rainborough's Leveller statement during the Putney Debates, Tom Paine's The Rights of Man, May Wolstonecraft's A Vindication of the Rights of Women, to the Bill of Rights, the Chartists, the Suffragettes to the Human Rights Act.

The exhibition includes a great deal of original printed material - books, documents, posters, etc. - which gives an insight into a wide range of letterpress and relief printing.

Tom Paine Printing Press, progress report July 2008

Alan May, who is building the press for me, has just sent me this photo of the beautifully engineered nut and pin, crucial components of the mechanism for applying pressure to the platen during the printing process.

Tom Paine Printing Press under construction

Alan May has just sent me this photo of the Common Press (destined for The Tom Paine Printing Press in Lewes) under construction in his workshop. Sitting on it are parts of four miniature presses which he is also constructing. The full-size press will be operational for the Tom Paine bicentenary in July 2009.

Peter Chasseaud sets up The Tom Paine Printing Press in Lewes

Introduction by Peter Chasseaud (see also my blog http://peterchasseaud.blogspot.com/):

After many years' planning and preparation, I'm setting up a full-size 18th Century style wooden Common Press (similar to the one shown above) in Lewes, Sussex (home of the Lewes Arms pub, Harvey's beer, the Headstrong Club and many other good things). The press should be up and running by early 2009, and be printing away producing material for the bicentenary of Paine's death in that year, when a big commemorative festival will be held (4th to 14th July) in the town of Lewes.

THE TOM PAINE PRINTING PRESS is my project to set up a working press, as used to print Paine’s massively influential pamphlets and books - Common Sense, The Rights of Man, The Age of Reason, etc. Erected in the environment of an 18th century print room in Lewes, together with type cases, cabinets, frames and the compositor’s ‘stone’, this will be a working press available to contemporary artists and writers to print their own work. It will be capable of woodblock, lino and other relief printing, and of printing letterpress items.

It will provide an excellent educational resource and tourist attraction for Lewes. Posters, broadsheets, pamphlets and books will be printed on the press, which will also be used to instruct students of all ages in the complexities of letterpress technology and the crucial importance of the printed word in disseminating ideas.

I practise as an artist, writer, printmaker and producer of artists’ books (see link to my blog). I've also been a member of the Headstrong Club for 21 years (it was founded in 1987 to commemorate the 250th anniversary of Paine's birth in 1737), latterly a committee member, and was a founder member of the Tom Paine Project, for which I curated four simultaneous exhibitions in Lewes and an American Revolutionary War re-enactment at Firle Place, in the year 2000.

Education modules to be offered by The Tom Paine Printing Press:

Practical Printing (hands-on typesetting and printing of a broadsheet and pamphlet
Printing History
Paper & Bookbinding
History of the Book
Rationalism & the Enlightenment
Printing in Lewes (history)

Contact details:
Peter Chasseaud (Tom Paine Printing Press)

Studio 3S3

Phoenix Arts Association

10-14 Waterloo Place

Brighton

BN2 9NB, UK