Category Archives: Print Matters

Print Matters

Flatstock 29

By Laura Whipple | Published: March 14, 2011

The Grackle!

Thanks to a surprise visit from one of our favorite PDX poster designers Mike King, we were reminded that Flatstock, the poster convention dedicated to rock posters and all their glory, will be taking place this week at SXSW. Mike King will be there, as well as many other amazing poster designers and printers.

This year’s poster design for Flatstock 29 – SXSW is by Pittsburgh based artist strawberryluna. It features a famous bird from Austin – The Grackle! This beauty is hand screenprinted in 4 colors, in a limited edition of 115 posters.

Sponsored by the American Poster Institute, Flatstock takes place from March 16-19, 2011 at the Austin Convention Center. And y’all, it’s free for the public to attend, so no excuses!

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Print Matters

Letterpress printing…on an iPad?

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: March 4, 2011

Wood type goes digital.

LetterMpress is a proposed virtual letterpress application for the iPad that allows users to push around simulated wood type and create letterpress-inspired compositions. Spearheaded by John Bonadies, a graphic designer from Illinois, the project is currently seeking funding through Kickstarter.

Hmm.

This project is an interesting embodiment of the crossroads of antiquated and contemporary, of utilitarian and fetishized production methods, of analog and digital. But is it fair to claim that you can “experience the art and craft of letterpress printing on your iPad?” Can one really experience craft on an iPad? Or any sort of “printing,” for that matter?

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Print Matters

A new kind of design book?

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: March 2, 2011

You won't find this publication on a bookshelf.

Video, sound lectures, interactive slideshows, 3D animations—we expect none of these things from books. But the release of PYRAMYD EDITIONS‘ new design book might just change that.

Open Projects: Non Standard Identities, the first digital book from the French publisher, takes advantage of the interaction inherent in the iPad to share content through a variety of media. “Based on the notion of interaction itself,” Open Projects is aimed at the design-savvy and covers a myriad of innovative graphic identity projects that turn standard branding work on its head.

What is most compelling about this publication is that it is offered exclusively in digital format. We’ve come to expect e-versions of print publications, and with the launch of projects like Apple’s The Daily can stomach the thought of iPad-only content. But to release a digital-only book for designers? To release a publication for a critical audience of makers that thwarts our accustomed understanding of the concept of “book”? That’s gutsy.

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Print Matters

I Heart Maira

By Laura Whipple | Published: March 1, 2011

If you happen to be in NYC between March 11 and July 31, 2011, you are in luck!

During that time, Maira Kalman, the amazing illustrator, author, designer and all around creative wonder will be having a major show at The Jewish Museum in New York.

Titled Maira Kalman: Various Illuminations (of a Crazy World), It is the first major museum survey of her work. On display will be the original cover artwork used for The New Yorker magazine, Ooh-la-la (Max in Love), drawings from The Elements of Style, and more.

Plan to attend the opening next week? Then you can also check out the Houdini: Art and Magic show that is up until March 27 at the same museum. Double awesome!

Image courtesy Maira Kalman.

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Print Matters

The Manual: A printed guide for building the web

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: February 24, 2011

"Putting ink to paper crystallizes reasoning."

The latest conversation piece in the ongoing discussion about the tension between print and digital has one foot in each world.

The Manual is a new print magazine that covers web design, deliberately offered in print format under the premise that valuable reflection comes not from poking around on a screen but instead from taking a moment away from devices to think.

Spearheaded by an all-star team comprised of web man Andy McMillan, writer Carolyn Wood and illustrator/designer Jez Burrows, the Manual promises to deliver six illustrated, feature-length articles per issue, aimed at “bringing a greater depth and maturity to [the] craft and profession” of interactive design.

The first issue will be offered exclusively through Kickstarter, where the Manual is currently seeking funding. If you’d like to get your hands on this tactile addition to the conversation surrounding the emergent discipline of interaction design, pledge now.

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Print Matters

Tracking innovation through posters

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: February 3, 2011

The ephemeral poster reveals a rapid history of technological advances.

Vintage posters might not seem like the most obvious way to look at technological advances. Yet this collection of vintage posters from an upcoming show facilitated by the International Vintage Poster Dealers Association walks us through a hundred years of rapidly unfolding technological triumphs, from the introduction of metal plumbing all the way to the release of the iPod. Wired has a selection over in their GadgetLab blog that reveals both the brisk pace of innovation and the changing design sensibilities implemented in the presentation of these new ideas.

Printed matter, especially ephemeral objects like posters, can serve as valuable artifacts of their time and place. Peek these posters and see for yourself.

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Print Matters

Antenne Books distributes independent publications

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: January 6, 2011

Antenne Books delivers an insane selection of amazing artist books.

London-based Antenne Books is a distributor of highest quality artist publications. The variety and quality of titles in their catalog is enough to make any independent-publishing fan swoon. Antenne works with an international array of publishers like Nieves, OHWOW, Seems Books and Gottlund Verlag to offer an extensive library of artist documents, available online as well as a selection of brick-and-mortar retail establishments in the UK and Scandinavia.

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Print Matters

Publication Fair 2010: Part 1

By Clifton Burt | Published: December 21, 2010

Now in its second year, Publication Fair boasts posters printed by OMFGCO and Container Corps.

The 2010 Publication Fair was held this weekend at the Cleaners at the Ace Hotel in Portland. We were on hand to scope it out and to staff the Pinball Publishing /Scout Books table. I scored some amazing printed works and, in the midst of doing so, spoke with the exhibitors about about their work. This three-part video series highlights those conversations.

Watch the first installment below.

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Print Matters

YU Contemporary, Marriage Records Publishing House and Veneer

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: December 17, 2010

A new arts institution comes to Portland's Eastside.

Something momentous is quietly building steam in Portland’s inner Southeast Industrial district, something that will transform our city’s arts and culture landscape and contribute to the creative culture already humming in the Pacific Northwest.

That momentous something is YU Contemporary.

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Print Matters

Ampersand Vintage, preserving print

By Nicole Lavelle | Published: December 15, 2010

Photobooth snapshots, 1943

Ampersand Vintage is a shop, gallery and cultural archive located on Portland’s Alberta Street. Their catalog includes the ephemeral pieces of our materialistic society that are typically cast away: letters, brochures, ticket stubs, lists, advertisements, and of course, an extensive collection of vintage photographs.

Myles Haselhorst, proprietor, is dedicated to saving the pieces of paper from our collective past that are ordinarily tossed away once their function has been realized. These fleeting objects of communication together form a glimpse into the vernacular histories of our collective past that are often overlooked in formal archives of culture. Ampersand is concerned with the ways in which humans command visual and written language to communicate, and their ever-in-flux collection of vintage print ephemeral reminds us we live in an eloquent culture obsessed with material expression.

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