I am happy to announce the completion of my new book Devils & Evils. The book uses an eight-panel sculptural tunnel book format and can be viewed in two ways; in its compressed state it can be pivoted in the hands to more easily read the circular text. Additionally, the side hinges allow the eight panels to be stretched out to view the text as it descends into the depths of the structure. This format allows for the three-dimensional embodiment of a pictorial form originating in the Middle Ages, the hellmouth. A hellmouth is a visual representation of the entrance to Hell, typically depicted as the gaping maw of a beast or a monster swallowing up the sinners deserving of the punishments of hell. In my modern iteration, I have chosen a specific person as the monster however he isn’t alone, many others have supported and encouraged his heinous acts. All of us are caught up in this hell, the innocents, the guilty, the indifferent, and the well-intended. The ecological sins on our planet will eventually visit punishments on us all. My thanks to all the wonderful people at the University of Iowa Special Collections, the Newberry Library, and the Library of Congress Rare Book Room for their assistance while I was researching Dante, hellmouths, and demons. The tunnel book is letterpress printed on 270 gsm Colorplan pristine white paper, using collagraphs, and photo polymer plates from Boxcar Press. The face tinting is pastel applied by hand. The hinge paper is 135 gsm Coloplan pale gray paper. The book is enclosed in a cloth covered tri-fold wrapper. The side text panels are printed on 135 gsm Colorplan real gray paper, the back panel is 135 gsm Colorplan smoke gray paper. The wrapper is contained in a cloth covered clamshell box. The edition size might be as large as 30 copies. The book was begun in 2025 in the aftermath of the 2024 election and completed in 2026.
Category: New work
Personal Demons, a suite of RISO prints
I am happy to announce the completion of my suite of RISO prints called Personal Demons. A bit from the colophon: Demons are said to symbolize our internal fears, traumas, addictions, negative emotions, and self-limiting beliefs. Embracing your demons can be a way to limit their harmful effects. I’ve gone a bit farther and have chosen to name them and in describing their singular foibles, to make light of their capacity to harm me. It might be thought that I am being flippant about a serious mental health issue. I would suggest they have a chat with Bobo.
Five prints, 12” x 9” on Mohawk Superfine White i-Tone eggshell 80-pound text paper. The sets of demons and this colophon page are enclosed in a glassine envelope. Edition of 50. Link for more information on my profile page. The set: $75.00 + $5.00 postage, total: $80.00. Individual Prints: $20.00 + $5.00 postage, total $25.00. Order through the contact link.
Navigational Tools for The Willfully Lost
Navigational Tools for the Willfully Lost, 8” x 8”, closed. In current times, our world seems to be very much off its axis. We are in a time of plague, not just medical but political, ecological, and more. The wholesale denial of science and rational thought coupled with the embrace of superstition and misinformation are signaling a need for a return to fact-based actions and ideas, a renewed age of enlightenment. In an attempt to not be completely bleak, I offer this set of wry visual aids for those who will not, cannot see what is really happening. This book began with my application for a Jan and Frank Cicero artist’s fellowship at the Newberry Library in Chicago, Illinois, in the fall of 2021. For many months the project only existed as the title, a few notes, and a call list for the library. In the spring of 2023, I spent a month in the reading rooms looking at many wonderful books, primarily their many editions of Peter Apian’s Cosmographia from the 16th century, a time of scientific revolution. Apian included a set of five paper instruments in each of his editions. The paper instruments enabled readers to participate in 16th. century mathematical and astrological calculations. Seeing and manipulating the many examples of those centuries old and still functional devices was invaluable to me as I began to work on my own paper tools. I spent the fall of 2023 bringing the tools and the text to their finished forms. The book has 24 pages and five paper tools, all volvelle variations of my devising. The images are from my trace monoprint drawings. The fonts used are Baskerville, Gill Sans and Trattatello. The book was printed letterpress on my Vandercook SP15 printing press using polymer plates from Boxcar Press. The text is printed on Rives BFK, the tools on Chancery paper. The tools are backed with Text Wove paper, hand cut and assembled. The binding is a combination slotted tape/long stitch using flax and abaca cover paper made by Mary Hark. The edition size is 25 standard copies, two deluxe copies, and a couple of artist’s proofs. Will be completed in 2024.
Progress on My New Book
Printing has been completed on my new book Navigational Tools for the Willfully Lost. I am beginning assembly of the five paper tools that will be included in each book. This book arises from my research fellowship at the Newberry Library in Chicago last spring. Shown above are the movable components of the paper tools. The book will be completed in time for the Codex book fair.
Madness: Reading Hamlet in the Time of Covid-19 and Other Plagues
Madness was created during the pandemic and went through many forms before it became what you see here. It’s appearance and content are very much shaped by my time in isolation. Initially, I copied out the play Hamlet by hand starting in March 2020 because I was too anxious to sit and read. I also was making paper puppets for companionship. The project kept changing as events swirled around me. I struggled to make sense of the project in a world gone crazy. The text is a crazy quilt arrangement of lines from Hamlet and my writing on repeating themes of fear, disease, Black Lives Matter, Asian hate crimes, the insurrection, so much death and isolation. Madness was printed letterpress with polymer plates from Boxcar Press on Arches Text wove paper. The background pattern is made up of my renderings of tears, drops of blood, Covid-19 particles and bullet holes. The paper puppet inclusions were printed on University of Iowa Center for the Book Chancery paper and are costumed in papers of wheat straw, sisal, daylily fibers, and abaca paste papers made by Andrea Peterson. The non-adhesive covers are flax and abaca papers made by Mary Hark for the outside and flax papers from the University of Iowa Center for the Book for the inside. Encased in a cloth covered clamshell box. The book was printed in an edition of 25 copies with a few strays. Madness was funded in part by a grant from the College Book Art Association and I thank them.