New ALPHABET prints

Here are two new ALPHABET prints which I've just composed and printed. The top one is in the form of a folding card, printed on Khadi hand-made paper. I just pulled 26 words out of my head for this. It's printed on the Albion press. The height is roughly that of an A4 sheet.

The lower print is a composition created from the 26 letters of the alphabet, all upper case, and all set at 45 degrees to the paper edge. This is printed on the wooden handpress (the 'common press'). It is a bit larger than A2 size.

Columbian Press & Tom Paine Printing Press at Works on Paper Fair

This Columbian Press, in front of my stand at the Watercolours and Works on Paper Fair, is unfortunately not part of The Tom Paine Printing Press's stable of presses! It's the last remaining press in the Science Museum's old printing gallery on the second floor. All the others have been moved out and put in store.

Printing is getting a rough deal from museums in London: no printing gallery any more at the Science Museum, the Type Museum closed indefinitely for lack of funds, the British Library printing gallery closed and its wooden 'common press' relegated to a corner outside the lavatories, and the display at St Bride not open to the public on a regular basis. The Science Museum in particular has no excuse, as it has huge amounts of under-utilised space. It's a great shame that museums seem to have abdicated any reponsibility they may once have felt to cherish our material culture (i.e. things and stuff) and to display and interpret them for the present and future generations. They seem to believe more in empty spaces (remind you of art galleries? Think Tate Modern's Turbine Hall as the classic example), which can be used for outside events and corporate entertaining. If the stuff isn't there on display, it can't feed and stimulate young imaginations. I remember when the Science and other museums were 'mathom houses' chock-full of magical things, and the wonderful effect this had on me and on others. Now they only show a tithe of their original displays. Philistines indeed! Trahaison des clercs.

Happy Birthday to Tom Paine, and other letterpress work

Today's window display is an assemblage of wood-letter blocks: TOM HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Tom Paine was born in Thetford, Norfolk, on 29 January 1737.

Alaso shown are various letterpress Valentine cards, and an 'OFF WITH THEIR HEADS' print - not merely a topical allusion but a quotation from the mouth of Lewis Carroll's Red Queen in Alice.

Here's some quick info about where I'm showing my work (Altazimuth Press, poetic photobooks, and Tom Paine Printing Press, creative letterpress) this year (2011; accurate dates to follow):

2011

Works on Paper Fair, Science Museum, South Kensington, London, 2-7 Feb 2011

Here Gallery, Bristol, March 2011

Bristol Artists Book Event (BABE), April/May 2011

Artwave, Lewes, August-September 2011

Whitechapel Art Book Fair, September 2011

Oxford Fine Press Book Fair, November 2011

2012

Phoenix Brighton Open Studios: May 2012

Off With Their Heads - Peter Chasseaud's new typographical print

With thanks to Lewis Carroll, who featured this phrase in Alice in Wonderland (the Queen of Hearts ordering the decapitation of the three gardeners).

Dada Christmas - Do You Dada?

A couple of examples of recent things I've printed from wood blocks on the Albion handpress at The Tom Paine Printing Press, using Khadi hand-made paper.

EAST LONDON LINE & THE WHITECHAPEL

Here is a limited edition typographical print which I've been producing to launch my new poetic photobook The East London Line at the Whitechapel Art Book Fair (Thursday 23rd to Sunday 26th September). The large-format softback book, under my imprint Altazimuth Press, will be in a limited edition of 100.

I've been producing the print on my wooden 'common press', a replica of an 18th century press, and as the press is a two-pull press, and therefore has a small platen, I have to pull and wind-on two or three times to obtain one print.

The print is composed in metal type and wood letter on the stone bed of the press. I will have some for sale at the Whitechapel, along with the book, and also a few of my limited edition typographical map, printed in black, red and blue, also entitled the East London Line (see an earlier post).

New Letterpress Work in July

Here are some images of a couple of new things I've produced on the hand press during July