For the Love of Letterpress

For the Love of Letterpress is a film from Dara deFaoite which was filmed this summer in the National Print Museum and here in Distillers Press. It premiered at the Design Week screening of 'Linotype the Film' in November and has only just gone public on Vimeo.

Featuring Seán Sills, Jamie Murphy, Mary Plunkett and a number of volunteers from the National Print Museum including Vinnie Caprani, Alf McCormack, Con Devlin and another Distillers Press alumnus, Nicola Carthy.

Never get tired of Alf's story about the pressman and his finger (wait 'til you hear)!

http://vimeo.com/50308217

Vermillion Design Christmas Card

Last week, Seán Sills spent a day in Verrmillion Design printing their Christmas card on a Peerless Platen press. The press sits in their office in Distillery Road and has been largely unused for the past few years but after their day's instruction they're hoping to make much more use of it!

Seán tightens up the chase to put in the press under the watchful eye of Fiona O'Donnell,
studio co-ordinator and the illustrator of the star.

A preview of the star on the Christmas card

Anne Brady, the MD and Creative Director of Vermillion is also on the Board of Directors and the Curatorial Committee of the National Print Museum with Seán.

We're looking forward to getting our card!

Robert Frost inspired Christmas Card

We've been busy the past few months and have loads to tell!
I'm hoping to get a few blog entries done over the next week and bring everyone up to date.

But in the meantime here is some Christmas related news. William Doherty in Third Year Visual Communication produced a letterpress printed Christmas Card to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the death of Robert Frost. He made a film of the whole process and here it is for you to enjoy!

Lina Nordenström Visit

Lina Nordenström (centre) with Mary Plunkett and Jamie Murphy

Today we had a visit from the Swedish artist and print-maker, Lina Nordenström, who works with letterpress and in particular, artists' books. Lina has been taking part in a residency in the Red Stables Studio in St Anne's Park and returns home next week. She will be back in Dublin in November, joined by her husband & fellow artist Lars Nyberg for their exhibition in Graphic Studio Gallery. Lina & Lars built a studio in Uttersberg in Sweden, "Grafikverkstan Godsmagasinet" (GG - could be translated “Warehouse Workshop“), open since 2009, which is equipped for intaglio printmaking, dry methods and letterpress printing.

Jamie Murphy and I showed her around the press and Lina very kindly gave us two of her books in exchange for one of Jamie's prints from 'Albert Ernest and the Titanic' and one of our Ulysses Strands posters. You can see some details from Lina's books below.

Grafikverkstan Godsmagasinet (the site is in Swedish but you can view a few images of their studio)
http://www.grafikverkstan.se/index.php

Graphic Studio Gallery
http://www.graphicstudiodublin.com/gsd/artists/nordenstrom_lina/
http://www.graphicstudiodublin.com/gsg/exhibitions/index.html

Book Arts Course – July 2012

Some photos of the recent course in Book Arts held in the Department of Visual Communication in NCAD, alongside the letterpress course in Distillers Press. The course was for three days and was taught by Frances Breen. Thanks to Kay for taking time out from the course to get a few pictures of the participants hard at work!

Letterpress course participants and their posters

Here are some photos of the participants of the two courses with the posters they designed and printed - mostly using the large selection of wood type available in the press. 

Aine

Alice

Bernadette

Brenda

Clare

Clare

Clare

EimearJean

Jane

 Kim

Sarah

Nick

Stephen

Gwen

Work in Progress - Letterpress Courses in July

Here are some photos from our two recent short courses in letterpress which ran from 11-13th July and 16-18th July. On day one everyone set a small paragraph of 14pt metal type to begin and then on day two and three they had a chance to print their own poster designs. It was a busy few days as you can see!