This publication was created to commemorate the five year anniversary of PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project, during the 2015 DownStreet Art season. Designed by former PRESS BHIP intern and Associate Gallery Manager Nicole Leclair and featuring images and poster designs by PRESS staff, interns, and volunteers.
PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project is an educational and artistic resource for letterpress printmaking in the Berkshires. It is a hybrid public art space providing community and creative exchanges as a gallery, studio, and teaching lab. Located in North Adams, MA, PRESS invites the public to experience traditional letterpress printing through observation, exhibitions, workshops, and independent explorations. PRESS is a project of the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (MCLA).
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Beginnings
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DownStreet Art 2011
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2011–2012
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DownStreet Art 2012
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2012–2013
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49 Main Street
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DownStreet Art 2013
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2013–2014
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DownStreet Art 2014
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2014–2015
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DownStreet Art 2015
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What’s Next for PRESS?
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Mantra Card Gallery
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The Calendar
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Acknowledgements
Beginnings by Melanie Mowinski Founder of PRESS Without hesitation, I said I would move the Vandercook to it and make it into some sort of center. I had no idea what that meant, but it seemed like it would be fun. There still wasn’t a place on campus, and it looked like it would be a number of years before that would happen. Jonathan looked me squarely in the face and said, “Downstreet Art applications are due tomorrow, why don’t you apply?” So in less than five hours, I put together an application for DownStreet Art (DSA), an MCLA Creative Project award, and the College Book Art Association Project Assistance Grant Program. And like dominos, one after the other, they fell in my favor. I enlisted the help of a few devoted students who helped clean and prepare a tiny storefront on Main Street. Six weeks later, I was driving behind a massive truck with the Vandercook strapped on top to our new home at 105 Main Street as part of the 2011 DownStreet Art Season. In 2010, Berkshire poet Barry Sternlieb and artist Julio Granda passed on their 1969 Vandercook Universal III to me when they no longer could house it. As part of the arrangement, they would be able to print on it occasionally and they wanted students at MCLA to have access to it. Lots of conversations and discussions ensued, and the machine held court in my garage for over a year while MCLA worked to find an appropriate location on campus. Fast-forward through that year to April 2011. At a get-to-know-each-other gathering of students, myself, and then-Director of Special Programs at MCLA Jonathan Secor, we played an icebreaker that involved us answering unusual questions. My question was: “If you had an empty storefront, what would you do with it?” 10
I knew I wanted the project to be public. Public Art Project means different things to different people. For us, a big part of being “public” is that the machine is the center point of the gallery. Anyone can watch us print and become part of a conversation about letterpress and printing technology. Along with that, we decided that at our openings we would make a postcard with an image of sorts and our contact information for people to take away with them. As an added bonus, visitors also printed the final layer of the card, indulging in the magic of printing themselves.
We were all astonished with the results. Our first opening was successful on every account. People loved watching the machine in action. They rejoiced in getting something to take home with them, and there was an inviting energy in the space that drew people in to talk and observe. Our numbers were the same as MCLA’s Gallery 51 (the barometer of attendance at a DSA night), and we made a sale. This success continued and interest grew over the next few months. MCLA, who had agreed to be our fiscal sponsor, also liked the project, and I was encouraged to continue operating PRESS through the academic year along with a handful of student interns and volunteers.
PRESS was slowly becoming an anchor on the west end of Main Street, while MCLA’s Gallery 51 anchored the east. We continued to make cards every month as giveaways, adding an inspirational line and calling them our “Monthly Mantra Cards.” Senior shows, invitational exhibits, poetry readings, and workshops made PRESS the place to be for many MCLA students, especially on DownStreet Art nights. We were thriving.
I began to integrate the work I did at PRESS into my classes. I incorporated projects that used letterpress techniques into Intro and Intermediate Design. My book arts classes met in the space regularly and during the summer of the second year, I taught an entire class there. All the while, MCLA students worked as Associate Gallery Managers, assistant printers, and gallery attendants. These students learned the ins and outs of running a gallery, operating a Vandercook, and more! Students coordinated exhibits, printed poet’s broadsides, organized poetry readings, and helped with educational outreach to local elementary, middle, and high schools. Many of these students now direct other galleries and art centers and/or have gone on to pursue additional study and training in letterpress printing.
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About DownStreet Art DownStreet Art is a public art project designed to revitalize downtown North Adams. By harnessing existing art organizations and events and transforming vacant and open spaces into art destinations, DownStreet Art defines North Adams as a cultural haven, driving tourists and community members. DownStreet Art 2011 at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski DownStreet Art 2011 was the kick-off for PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project. During this four-month trial period, PRESS established a web presence, moved the press to 105 Main Street, created a gallery, and trained the staff of five. PRESS employed a student as the Associate Gallery Manager (AGM), a program created by Downstreet Art (DSA)—the structure that helped PRESS get started. The AGM position was funded by a grant from the College Book Art Association, the MCLA Creative Project Award, and a small special grant from MCLA. The AGM was the link to all things Downstreet Art. DSA has a structure for marketing and publicity, opening events, and other special activities. The AGM kept abreast of the timeline for DSA requirements, allowing myself, interns, and volunteers to focus on the mission of introducing students and community members to the magic of letterpress. PRESS reached success on nearly all of its goals, including attendance, fundraising, student involvement, sales, and community interest. Openings were well attended, people purchased work and subscriptions, students served as interns, and valuable connections with community members were made. Bert Lamb, former co-owner of Lamb Printing in North Adams, gifted PRESS with oak cabinets for type cases and galley trays in exchange for prints. Other community members provided us with long-term loans of book presses and chairs/tables. PRESS developed a regular following of visitors interested in its mission.
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PRESS:Letterpress as Public Art Project
105 Main St. North Adams, MA
featuring 36 framed prints made by nine students from Hartford Public High School exhibit open until July 24th
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Gall ery Jun Openi e 23 ng 6pm rd - 9p m
Hartford Prints! is a letterpress studio located in Hartford, Connecticut. Through the support of two Hartford Arts & Heritage Jobs Grants, artist Adrienne Gale has been able to employ students from Hartford Public High School to work in the studio and create art.
...artist Adrienne Gale has been able to employ students from Hartford Public High School to work in the studio and create art.
Displayed here is the work created by the students hired for the 2009–2010 academic year. Throughout their time at Hartford Prints! these students were presented with four projects and charged with creating art prints that met the requirements of each project. First, the students were asked to consider what they most enjoyed about living in Hartford and how they could represent Hartford in a positive light. A trip to the Hartford History Center inspired images for the second project, based on the collected history of the public parks. For the third project, Adrienne challenged the students to create work utilizing the lead and wood type in the studio, as a break from so much image-heavy work. Finally, a shared love of food inspired the theme of the fourth project.
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The EXCHANGE consists of three themes explored by the students of Philadelphia’s University of the Arts Book Arts and Printmaking MFA program, which they have entitled Scape 2000, Tongue Twisters, and Planets Exchange. 31 prints will be on display through the end of July and into August. This particular exhibition is very exciting for PRESS, and especially for Melanie Mowinski, PRESS founder and curator, because Melanie completed The University of the Arts Book Arts and Printmaking MFA program.
Exchanges are at the heart of every printmaking program and printmaker’s future.
The University of the Arts in Philadelphia is home to one of only a few graduate programs in Book Arts and Printmaking. Every fall, incoming MFA candidates create a print using various letterpress techniques, making enough to exchange a copy with their fellow students. Exchanges are at the heart of every printmaking program and printmaker’s future. The exchange often has a particular conceptual theme as well as printing processes guidelines. This exhibit will highlight those different processes and themes. 17
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This One Goes to Eleven will feature pressure prints, linoleum prints, and prints with moveable type alongside book art and paste papers which This summer has found me have been created by the various artists of playing with the Vandercook PRESS as well as those who have worked in and my various matrixes to the PRESS space over the summer. Some of the work will be that of the curator and proprietress continue exploring how to Melanie Mowinski; some will be from the classes use images from nature to and workshops run during the DownStreet create metaphors about the Art summer months. Some of Mowinski’s series of prints, which she has been working on human experience. continuously throughout the summer, will be on display as The Prints That Live Under the Press. Other prints are offshoots of the series Birds/Body/Nest; one of her ongoing explorations. Mowinski had this to say about her current body of work: “This summer has found me playing with the Vandercook and my various matrixes to continue exploring how to use images from nature to create metaphors about the human experience.”
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PRESS founder Melanie Mowinski after a successful opening!
Every print shop has a collection of test prints: layers of unplanned images. We like ours so much that we exhibited them as The Prints That Live Under the Press.
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Running. Foraging. Wild Leeks. Artist book by PRESS founder Melanie Mowinski
A Threaded Past, by PRESS Founder Melanie Mowinski
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This One Goes To Eleven is a seam-splitting and chart-smashing exhibition featuring pressure prints, linoleum prints, and prints with moveable type alongside book art and paste papers which have been created by the various artists of PRESS as well as those who have worked in the PRESS space over the summer.
I really enjoyed the opportunity to explore my ideas and learn new skills at PRESS. The dozens of prints I made, using both image and type, add to my inspiration for my collage and mixed media artwork.
Print projects by artist and IS 183 teacher Karen Arp-Sandel are featured in this exhibition. Arp-Sandel, who works in collage and mixed media work, has integrated pressure printing into her series of collages entitled Dictionary Dresses. Along with this series, she has created typeset mixed media works based on found poetry, which relate to her experience as an artist-in-residence at Bascom Lodge this summer. This body of work illustrates Arp-Sandel’s style of making both abstract and narrative collages. “I really enjoyed the opportunity to explore my ideas and learn new skills at PRESS. The dozens of prints I made, using both image and type, add to my inspiration for my collage and mixed media artwork.”
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Left: Featured artist Karen Arp-Sandel and PRESS founder Melanie Mowinski at the opening reception for This One Goes to Eleven. Below: A mantra card sits on the Vandercook awaiting its final pass of ink.
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2011–2012 Academic Year at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski The 2011–2012 academic year began during the last couple of Downstreet Art exhibits. It had already been decided to continue PRESS through the academic year because of its success. The gallery was selling enough prints and raising enough money through sponsorships and memberships to cover expenses. Jason Peabody, the first summer Associate Gallery Manager, decided to continue his work at PRESS through a year-long internship. During the first semester, he organized two poetry readings featuring MCLA and other local poets. During the second semester, he printed a broadside of a poem for each of the eight poets with my help. This was PRESS’s first foray into broadside printing. We were extremely naïve and ambitious. We printed each broadside in an edition of approximately 100, compiled 10 complete sets, gave each poet 50 prints, and kept the rest to sell at PRESS. In retrospect, this was a ridiculous amount of work for a student to complete in one semester. But to his credit, Jason did it, with only a little help from me, along with a full load of classes and other internship responsibilities. Jason became a pro at finding rogue letters. Occasionally, letters get returned to the wrong section of the case. If you are desperate for a letter, this can really be a challenge. Jason was able to find the rogue letters, and, I swear, sometimes even manifest one from who-knows-where. To this day, whenever anyone is desperate for a letter, we invoke Jason, and often the letter appears. It was during this first year that I began incorporating projects at PRESS into my classes. Two projects continue today. In Intro to Design, students design and print a pressure print related to a particular theme. The goal of the assignment, beyond technique, is to understand the role of grids in compositional development as well as the concepts of focal point and hierarchy. In Intermediate Design, each student designs a leaflet related to an issue facing their generation. The students must format the design to be made into a polymer plate. Once the plates are made, hundreds of leaflets are printed and then disseminated into the world through guerrilla marketing techniques and other methods.
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Patterns and Pressure features MCLA student projects printed at PRESS during the fall semester by students in Professor Mowinski’s Intro to Design and Concrete Poetry classes. Students explored how line and shape can be used to create collaborative patterns and rhythms within compositions. They carved linoleum and then had the opportunity to make their own designs that connected with their classmates’ creations. The linoleum is on view and visitors can see if they can arrange the linoleum as the printmakers did.
Pressure printing is my favorite way to utilize the letterpress
Patterns and Pressure includes prints based on the themes RED and Scary Foods. Both of these themes use the special letterpress process of pressure printing. Pressure printing is an experimental letterpress technique in which a low-relief collage is made with thin papers or objects, arranged into a composition, glued onto a sheet of paper, and then placed underneath the paper to be inked. The resulting image is similar to a rubbing: a bit mysterious, and a great background for other kinds of printmaking. “Pressure printing is my favorite way to utilize the letterpress,” said Pam Buchanan, a senior at MCLA. 29
Print Marathon!
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Though January is a cold month, we fanned the creative fires here at PRESS. Eleven artists from the region came together for a focused, intense, weekend-long workshop involving printmaking and letterpress. We wanted to share the exceptional facilities that PRESS offers, and see what a varied group of artists might produce in these circumstances. Artists new to printmaking joined experienced printmakers to carve, cut, roll, and print. Proofs were pulled, concepts revised and adapted, and editions were made — all in the course of a weekend. Many artists used a new technique for the first time. Some came in with one idea, then did something entirely new. We all learned something from one another. Shelves and tables piled up with freshly-pulled prints. With wind chill advisories in the negatives, we were opening the front door to bask in the cool, dry air. Throughout the weekend, traditional and experimental letterpress printmaking techniques were used to explore the theme WEATHER. Three presses were employed: the Vandercook mechanical letterpress (under the close guidance of Melanie Mowinski), the newly-arrived Poco proof press, and a borrowed hand-operated etching press.
Artists new to printmaking joined experienced printmakers to carve, cut, roll, and print.
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Left: Artist Sandra Butler stamps a print using some of the PRESS metal type. Below: Artist Karen Arp-Sandel poses with her work during the print marathon. Opposite: Artist Claire Fox makes a pressure print with the magic blue tape. Opposite Below: Artist Michael Vincent Bushy’s pile of completed prints from the Marathon Weekend.
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DownStreet Art 2012 at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski The Summer 2012 DownStreet Art season was filled with many firsts for PRESS. To start, we hosted our first BHIP (Berkshire Hills Internship Program) intern Sharbreon Plummer, plus two other interns, Pam Buchanan and Andy Cross. Each intern excelled in different arenas. Buchanan streamlined procedures and created a database accounting system that revolutionized our way of processing sales. Plummer helped us think creatively about our approach and inspired us to add text to our exhibition giveaways. Little did we know, this would become a big part of what we do now: Monthly Mantra Cards became our second “first” of the summer. And Andy, well, Andy did whatever he was told to do—with relish—including operating the machine on opening nights. He entertained and enticed visitors to print with his wit and humor. As our third “first,” I taught a summer-long course called Experimental Letterpress. This course was the first MCLA course that introduced students to the many facets of letterpress printing, from imagemaking to typesetting, and all the applications. All three interns plus six other students enrolled in the course. After the course, PRESS had three more student fans that would find their way to becoming more involved in the next academic year. The summer exhibits roster showcased the work of Barry Sternlieb and Julio Granda, the poet/artist duo that donated the Vandercook, in a show entitled Ink in the Blood. Type High followed, with the work of then-Wells College Vicktor Hammer Fellow Katie Baldwin and her students. Postal Pinocateca featured a variety of letterpress and other printed matter from Tara O’Brien’s Australian/American mail art exchange. The final show of the summer, Getting There is Easy, highlighted work from my summer course. Various pop-up activities related to pressure prints and our woodtype were threaded throughout the summer.
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PRESS
letterPRESS as a Public Art Project presents
Ink in the Blood:
Printed Works on Paper Featuring the work of Barry Sternlieb and Julio Granda
June 28 - July 22
Opening Reception June 28, 5-9 p.m.
105 Main Street, North Adams, MA
ART IN DOWNTOWN NORTH ADAMS ALL SUMMER LONG! 36
A PROGRAM OF MCLA’S BERKSHIRE CULTURAL RESOURCE CENTER
FIND OUT WHATS UP:
Ink In The Blood will showcase the works of artists Julio Granda and Barry Sternlieb. Barry prints, Julio designs, and together they make remarkable broadsides. Barry Sternlieb, the original owner of the gallery’s cornerstone letterpress, defines broadsides as “a hybrid form that creates an interdependent or symbiotic relationship between word and image. The impact of this marriage should be greater than just reading one poem or viewing artwork, and should represent a new experience in which each element carries its own weight while contributing to a perfect balance of power as a whole.” The collaborative work displayed in this exhibit embodies just that; combining image and text from two artists to create cohesive and interdependent pieces.
...combining image and text from two artists to create cohesive and interdependent pieces.
HIDDEN BY DESIGN is Barry Sternlieb’s story of how he discovered his passion for the art of printmaking. His inspiration began with the first handmade letterpress book of poetry he ever held. He recalls, “up until that day in 1983, to actually build a book, an essential passage in the life cycle of literature, was an experience I couldn’t remotely contemplate”. 37
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PRESS
letterPRESS as a Public Art Project presents
T YPE HIGH Wells Artists at the Vandercook
Featuring the work of Wells College Victor Hammer Fellow Katie Baldwin and her students July 26-August 26
Opening Reception July 26, 6-9 p.m.
105 Main Street, North Adams, MA ART IN DOWNTOWN NORTH ADAMS ALL SUMMER LONG! 40
A PROGRAM OF MCLA’ S BERKSHIRE CULTURAL RE S OURC E C E N TE R
FIND OUT WHATS UP:
Type High is an exhibition that resulted from work created by students enrolled in “Art on the Press” taught by Katie Baldwin at the Book Arts Center at Wells College in Aurora, NY. This class provided an intensive focus on tools, materials, concepts, and techniques relevant to relief printing. Technical skills were gained in setting type, carving images, registration of multiple colors, and printing on the Vandercook presses. Content was developed through the exploration of personal work in printmaking. Through workshops, discussions, critical analysis, and making prints, students developed sophisticated ways in which printmaking became a vehicle for the expression of ideas, content, and personal voice.
This class provided an intensive focus on tools, materials, concepts and techniques relevant to relief printing.
“Baldwin says that the physical nature of the artwork gives the students an experience in creativity beyond what might be offered in a more standard art class,” wrote John Seven of the North Adams Transcript. 41
PRESS letterPRESS as a Public Art Project presents
POSTA L PINACOTHECA
Art: Anne-Maree Hunter
A mail exchange between artists from America & Australia
August 30 - September 23
Opening Reception July 26, 6-9 p.m. 105 Main Street, North Adams, MA
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This show features work that was exchanged throughout the course of a yearlong project. It began in August 2011, when six artists came together to participate in an international mail exchange. For this project, instigator Tara O’Brien invited five friends to participate. These women are printmakers, book artists, and, despite very busy lives, continue to make artwork. Once she set up the framework for the project, artworks were due every two months, finishing first in September, then November, January, March, May, and July. Each round began with a theme chosen by one of the artists. The themes for each respectively were: Money, Inside/Outside, Travel, Habitat, Weather, and Animal-Mineral-Vegetable.
It began in August 2011, when six artists came together to participate in an international mail exchange project.
The artists from Australia are Babette Angell, Anne-Maree Hunter, and Heather Matthew; from the United States are Katie Baldwin, Melanie Mowinski, and Tara O’Brien.
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Getting There is Easy highlights student works from Melanie Mowinski’s Experimental Letterpress class. The exhibit celebrates the hard work and vision cultivated within PRESS, and features works by Adriana Alexatos, Pamela Buchanan, Shannon Costello, Andrew Cross, Sarah Howard, Sharbreon Plummer, and Jessica Wheeler. Sandragraphs, pressure prints, linoleum prints, and prints with moveable type show the creations possible through letterpress printing.
Working around the theme of numbers, the class studied the history of their assigned digits, ranging from one to seven, and expressed them each in a three-colored reduction cut.
The main highlights of the show are the students’ reduction cut prints, a method of relief printmaking where the linoleum or wood block is carved away and printed in different stages to reveal a multicolored image. Working around the theme of numbers, the class studied the history of their assigned digits, ranging from one to seven, and expressed them each in a three-colored reduction cut. The poster for Getting There is Easy was a collaboration by PRESS interns Adriana Alexatos, Sarah Howard, and Marli LaGrone. This starts a new tradition of designing and printing our own posters at PRESS. 47
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2012–2013 Academic Year at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski During the Fall 2012 semester, I received a course release from MCLA to operate PRESS as well as write a proposal for a design concentration that would hopefully incorporate the work at PRESS more directly into the art major. This gift of time to print, plan, and project was worth more than any stipend. And while the proposal never did pass as written, I was able to work with a number of student interns on printing and arts management projects, as well as plan for future opportunities. In addition, PRESS received a generous donation from a friend of a friend: a handpress valued at $1000, two cabinets of type, and a random assortment of all kinds of letterpress things. The negative? All of this equipment had been untouched for at least 20 years. It held layers upon layers of grime and dust and who-knows-what. Various interns were employed to clean and sort the type. This project extended well into the second semester. During both semesters, a number of students developed individual printing projects—exploring their own ways of using pressure prints, type, and paper. PRESS hosted the work of four graduating seniors in December, including PRESS intern Adriana Alexatos’ Day of the Dead inspired prints. The spring semester found interns Marli LaGrone and Pam Buchanan vying for the machine for their own explorations, which they each featured in their subsequent senior exhibitions.
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“Everyone keeps asking us, ‘Why the bird?’” said MCLA assistant professor of art Melanie Mowinski, PRESS founder and curator. “The bird is part of the experience of PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project, ever-present in the gallery from displayed prints to monthly postcards, even finding a new spot to perch in the vinyl of the latest show.” This exhibition showcases the letterpress prints and postcards that feature the familiar silhouette of a bird or birds created at PRESS by Mowinski, as well as passenger pigeon prints that C. Ryder Cooley printed at PRESS, and “Mockingbird,” a poem by MCLA professor Mark Miller, printed by PRESS intern Jason Peabody.
Everyone keeps asking us, ‘Why the bird?’
“My bird imagery relates to ideas of nesting and rebirth,” Mowinski said. “I imagine the womb as a nest and an incubator for creative ideas, not just babies. I also see it as a gestation place for learning, gaining strength, and life. The nest/bird/baby/idea that grows there then must come out somehow–through song, creation, and birth. The bird inside and outside of the body outline tries to express this.” 51
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The Move by Melanie Mowinski Founder of PRESS At the end of 2012 and the beginning of 2013, it became clear that staying at 105 Main Street really wasn’t an option anymore. The building was closed for renovations and a hopeful sale. As part of that, the heat was turned off to save costs. The lack of heat impacted the quality of the experience for MCLA students and visitors alike. We reached a crossroads. Does PRESS continue? Do we close? Or, do we find another location.
One year evolved into a second, and then a third, as we now anticipate the transition yet again to our hopeful final location in Bowman Hall on MCLA’s campus.
After many conversations with MCLA administration and fellow colleagues we decided to move to 49 Main Street, right next to MCLA’s Gallery 51. We chose this location for a variety of reasons, but primarily for extra space for the 2013-2014 academic year. The building where my MCLA classes were taught was being renovated, and the proposed off-campus location for our art classes could not house all of our needs. Moving to 49 Main would be a good compromise. 49 Main had space not only for the gallery and studio part of PRESS, but a significant amount of space for a classroom and my office. To prepare for the move, a door was created between PRESS and MCLA’s Gallery 51 to share resources as well as make other kinds of connections. Other walls were moved, a bathroom and slop sink were installed and a fresh coat of paint was applied. We knew we were on the right path when visitors, faculty and staff all marveled how well one project complimented the other. We could be “open” without having to staff both locations. One gallery attendant could serve both storefronts. Telephone, internet, and other resources could be shared—saving on costs for both organizations.
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PRESS: LetterPRESS as a Public Art Project
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49 Main Street
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DownStreet Art 2013 at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski DSA 2013 saw the christening of the PRESS of 49 Main Street. The summer season celebrated many of our community connections. It began with imPRESS, the work created by students in my Teenspace class taught in partnership with MASS MoCA’s program for area teens. July found us celebrating the fruits of a grant that I received in the form of a guillotine and rubber inks. We also finally completed a type specimen book of all our metal typefaces. Every Wednesday, a group of volunteers and interns set and printed type for five hours in order to complete this project. At the end of July, we opened Liminality, an exhibit of work by local artist and printmaker Valerie Carrigan. To this day, this show holds the record for the most sales! We hosted our very first call for entry exhibition in August, reaching out to the extended letterpress community to submit to The Politics of ________. The show received a competitive number of entries, from which eleven artists’ work was chosen. Like previous years, we rounded out the DSA season with an exhibit, Markings, that featured the work created during the summer by PRESS artists, interns and founder.
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imPRESS shows the work created at PRESS over a span of two months by six of MASS MoCA’s Teenspace participants: Caitlyn Howland, Evan Sanders, Noelle Gageant, Evan Canales, Hugo Seven, and Harry Seven. The students worked with MASS MoCA exhibiting artist Johnny Carrera and PRESS Founder and MCLA Associate Professor of Visual Art Melanie Mowinski to learn about printmaking, typography, letterpress, and experimental and traditional relief printing. Shannon Toye, Kidspace’s School Program Coordinator, helped coordinate classes and materials.
My favorite moment during the run of the course was when the students started brainstorming ways to unify all the participants in a type-based design.
Melanie Mowinski, PRESS Founder, shared, “My favorite moment during the run of the course was when the students started brainstorming ways to unify all of the participants in a type-based design. After several minutes of concentrating, Evan Canales came up with the wonderful idea to use North Adams as the connector word with each of our names coming off one of the letters. We used this design as our broadside to advertise the event.” 59
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July 25 - August 25, 2013
LIMINALITY
Opening Reception July 25, 6-9 49 main St, North Adams, MA
ART IN DOWNTOWN NORTH ADAMS ALL SUMMER LONG 60
A PROGRAM OF MCLA’S BERKSHIRE CULTURAL RESOURCE CENTER
FIND OUT WHATS UP:
Liminality showcases the work of artist Valerie Carrigan. The exhibit features prints and artist books that mark the space between having departed but not yet arrived. Liminality is an intermediate state, phase, or condition. The latin origin of the word is Limen, meaning a threshold. “Crossing the threshold” is a phrase that holds many meanings, but most often refers to taking a significant step forward and into a new phase, perhaps having overcome some obstacle along the way, and now entering into the final stage of something with new clarity. The midpoint of a transition, or crossing the threshold into a new experience, is what constitutes the liminal state. The work in this exhibition merges Valerie’s personal experiences with the concept of liminality.
The work in this exhibition merges Valerie’s personal experiences with the concept of liminality.
Valerie has been awarded the 2013 Northern Berkshire Cultural Council Individual Artist Grant, which has supported the new body of work seen in Liminality. Examples of her work can be found in numerous collections, including the Denver Penrose Library, Smith College Book Arts Collection, and the University of Vermont Book Arts Collection. 61
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The Politics of _____ examines how art can ignite conversation between artist and viewer, viewer and viewer, and self. The works exhibited move beyond what is assumed when thinking about political art. The show is PRESS’s first ever call for entry exhibition. Ten submissions were selected from a very competitive pool of entries, resulting in a show that features eleven artists from as far as Washington state and as near as Church Street, North Adams.
The show is PRESS’s first ever call for entry exhibition.
Inspired by the 1980s Re-Flex song “The Politics of Dancing,” The Politics of _____ asks, how does the political enter artwork? Here, political art is defined as work created with the intention to spark conversation. It can be about dancing, government, love, privacy, whatever; but it must somehow explore the real and imagined ways of creating conversation. Artists in the exhibition include Allison Milham, CJ Shane, Elsi Vassdal-Ellis, Erin Smith, Frank Brannon, John Vincent, Julie Russel-Steuart, Kent Manske, Margo Limieux, Nanette Wylde, and Sara Farrell Okamura.
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Markings features letterpress prints and artist books by former PRESS interns and volunteers Adriana Alexatos, Hayley Parker, Antoine Scalbert, and Leeya Jackson as well as PRESS founder Melanie Mowinski. Inspiration for this exhibit stems from a quote by Theodore Roethke: “Time marks us while we are marking time.” Each artwork created reflects time spent in the studio, at the press, or at the typecase, considering text and image. Each mark on the page is a mark in time, whether a day in the life of an intern, or months of work towards an end goal.
Time marks us while we are marking time.
One of the most important parts of an internship at PRESS is learning how to use the equipment and then creating a print or a series of prints that utilizes these new skills. On view are some of the most recent of these projects, including a series of reduction cuts by Hayley Parker that represent nine extinct animals who have all been lost from prehistoric times to present day. Adriana Alexatos, whose Day of the Dead prints are a PRESS favorite, shares her poetry broadsides that use typographic collage to communicate their meaning. Antoine Scalbert and Leeya Jackson collaborated to create their interpretation of Pablo Neruda’s Le Tigre. Scalbert set the type and printed the poem; Jackson created the linocut and hand painted each image.
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Right: IS183: Art School of the Berkshires hosts a “Make & Take” in the PRESS classroom during the Markings Opening. Below: Two young patrons show off their Markings Monthly Mantra Cards. Opposite: The visual element getting carved for Neruda’s El Tigre, a collaborative print by BHIP interns Antoine Scalbert and Leeya Jackson.
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2013–2014 Academic Year at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski The 2013–2014 academic year began with much anticipation. How would classes go in this new space? While some students self-selected not to enroll in art classes in the temporary location, those students who made the daily one-mile commute from the main campus really thrived. Was it the high ceilings? The single professor classroom space? The shared resources and energy from the Berkshire Cultural Resource Center and Gallery 51? The seemingly professional artist workspace? We will never know. What we do know is that students flourished in the new temporary location, as did I. I realized the importance of ownership over my teaching space, and the ability to infuse it with positive and supportive creative energy. I taught three courses designed specifically to capitalize on the temporary location: Collage Printmaking, Book Arts, and Typography, in addition to continuing to teach projects in Intro and Intermediate Design. While I missed the campus connections I used to make on a daily basis, the ease of having PRESS, my office, and my classroom all together by far made up for that inconvenience. Plus, the students really did like being downtown. They were committed to making and looked at the PRESS space as their own studio versus a classroom. For security reasons, the PRESS front door was often locked, so students had to walk through Gallery 51 to get to class. This forced them to look at art and exhibits that they may have normally never visited. This alone inspired them to look at art in a different way. The winter months were a challenge for everyone, yet energy remained high. A big part of the fall semester was devoted to getting the 2014 calendar printed. PRESS interns Jonas McCaffery and Ben Charbeaneau worked with me week after week to print the first ever Monthly Mantra Calendar. We ended up with an edition of about eighty complete calendars and a number of leftover individual months. It quickly became our most popular item, and before long we were beginning to think about the next one. By the end of the year, we were informed that the move back to campus was delayed for at least another academic year. We charged ahead with plans for our next DownStreet Art season.
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Datum Chronicle features the work of Tara O’Brien, an accomplished book artist whose installation pieces and artist books range from contemporary structural explorations to traditional leather-bound volumes. Using thread to embroider, stitch, crochet, and knit the surface of the paper, O’Brien believes that a narrative within a book can be something other than text and images.
Which is more beautiful, the documentation of an event or the event itself?
As a book conservator at one of the largest manuscript repositories in the country, she encounters diaries often. After leaving work, she returns to the 21st century. Datum Chronicle is a study of contemporary personal record keeping. “With a traditional diary, I find myself trapped by the desire to record every moment,” O’Brien says. “My writing never does the images in my head justice. As technology has changed and permeated our lives, the means of keeping record of events has changed. I rely heavily on my camera and computer. A blog is nothing more than a public diary with the capacity for illustration as never before.” This exhibit will challenge your ideas of books, diaries, memories, and recollections, and will cause you to ask, “which is more beautiful, the documentation of an event or the event itself ?”
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Rising is an exhibition of prints by the students and interns who work at PRESS daily: artists rising towards their creative futures as designers, printmakers, and lovers of paper and ink.
The resulting image is similar to a rubbing: a bit mysterious, and a great background for other kinds of printmaking.
Printmakers often create portfolios of prints around a particular theme. Each participant designs and prints an image that expresses their visual analog for the topic. Rising includes prints from Intro to Design based on the theme of Steampunk, a science-fiction sub-genre with the aesthetic sensibilities of the British Victorian era and the American Wild West, inspired by authors like H.G. Wells and Jules Verne. This collection uses the special letterpress process of pressure printing. Pressure printing is an experimental letterpress technique in which a low-relief collage is made with thin papers or objects arranged into a composition, glued onto a sheet of paper and then placed underneath the paper to be inked. The resulting image is similar to a rubbing: a bit mysterious, and a great background for other kinds of printmaking.
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DownStreet Art 2014 at PRESS by Nicole Leclair The summer 2014 DownStreet Art season was full of special exhibition components like visitorgenerated installations, three-dimensional artworks, and performance art. The season began with the June opening of What’s Your Mantra?, a reflection on personal identities from visiting scholar Alke Groppel-Wegener. Visitors to the exhibition contributed their own mantras to an installation in the window of PRESS. In July, PRESS stepped out of its comfort zone by installing ceramic work for Nature as Medicine, Nature as Companion. Jae Ok Lee’s delicate ceramics were paired with Erika Radich’s monoprints for a diverse but unified exhibition discussing the sometimes ordered, sometimes random qualities found in nature. A long-term collaboration resulted in August’s Double Bubble Print Portfolio. Through the exchange of their work, the printers had a conversation about how they are both connected through their practice and separated geographically. The entire summer season was building up to the September opening of Paper Dresses. Visitors contributed their thoughts to Melanie Mowinski’s Let Go and Suzi Banks Baum’s Permission Slip projects throughout the summer season, resulting in two of many emotionally resonant paper dresses in the exhibition. Larger works were displayed alongside origami paper dresses, all presenting thoughts on womanhood. This was a hugely successful exhibition for PRESS, and one that I believe everyone involved takes great pride in.
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What’s Your Mantra? June 26 – July 27, 2014 An Exploration of Creative and Academic Identities by MCLA Hardman Family Grant recipient Alke Groppel-Wegener
PRESS: Letterpress as a Public Art Project is an educational and artistic resource for letterpress printmaking in the Berkshires. We are a hybrid public art space providing community and creative exchanges as a work studio, teaching facility, and gallery. Located in North Adams, MA, PRESS invites the public to experience traditional letterpress printing through observation, exhibitions, workshops, and independent explorations. For more information about workshops and events: www.letterpressasapublicartproject.wordpress.com www.facebook.com/letterPRESSasapublicartproject letterpress105@gmail.com
DOWNSTREET ART KICK-OFF Opening Reception June 26, 2014 6:00 - 9:00 PM 49 Main Street North Adams, MA
Alke Groppel-Wegener, a visiting scholar from Staffordshire University in the UK, was at the Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in January and May with support from the Hardman Foundation. Using the tradition of mantra cards established at PRESS, Alke collected mantras from PRESS visitors, students, and faculty, and set a collection of these in letterpress. Alke explains, “It is no wonder that I consider words my primary medium - it is not just something I collect; as an academic writing professor, it is also what I teach.”
It is no wonder that I consider words my primary medium - it is not just something I collect; as an academic writing professor, it is also what I teach.
Through this project, Alke explored how the mantras we find for ourselves build the identities of students, faculty, and artists. “While writing, collecting and setting these mantras, I was prompted to ask myself, am I just a teacher? Or am I really a writer or researcher, a designer or artist? These five ‘hats’ first appeared when I was putting together the Process card, and they have kept me company throughout making the work for this exhibition. Based on the fingerprint that I had scanned as proof of my identity on my travels to come here, I have been visually exploring how these aspects of me are different, and how they overlap and support each other.” 81
Alke’s installation prompted PRESS visitors to contribute their own personal mantras to what became a rather large collection. Ranging from silly to serious, the mantras have all been documented and now hang in the PRESS classroom to serve as inspiration to students.
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Left: Groppel-Wegener setting type on the Vandercook press bed during her visit to MCLA. Below: The What’s Your Mantra? featured card.
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Downstreet Art is a program of MCLA’S Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
Nature as Medicine, Nature as Companion Erika Radich & Jae Ok Lee
July 31 – August 24, 2014
DOWNSTREET ART THURSDAY Opening Reception July 31, 2014 • 6:00 - 9:00 PM • 49 Main Street, North Adams, MA
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Erika Radich and Jae Ok Lee share a practice of bringing order to the chaos of nature through their work. In taking organic forms and organizing them into patterns and cases, the two artists turn the chaos into a source of healing and companionship. The ability to hold two opposing concepts at once plays out here: one, the unpredictability and wildness of nature, and two, the unbelievable order that is found in concepts like the Fibonacci sequence. Both embrace repetition of shapes and forms - sometimes ordered, sometimes random - to a point where it transforms into meditation.
Within nature we can learn endurance, strength, and hope.
According to curator Melanie Mowinski, “In bringing these two artists work together, I ask the viewer to consider not only the healing possibility of nature but also the necessity in which we must go to and be in nature. Within nature we can learn endurance, strength, and hope. We can hold close to divergent and convergent ways of thinking. This will be an unusual exhibit for PRESS, in that it showcases processes that we don’t utilize, yet still relate to printing and the tools of the trade.� 85
Above: PRESS visitors created their own “Type Case Collection” during the run of Nature as Medicine, Nature as Companion. Left: While ceramic artwork may seem out of place in a letterpress gallery, Jae-Ok Lee displays her delicate pieces in antique typecases just like the ones that house PRESS’s collection of metal and wood type.
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August 28 6:00 – 9:00 PM 49 Main St. North Adams MA 88
Downstreet Art is a program of MCLA’S Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
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Double Bubble features the work of 18 printmakers who live within a 40-mile radius of Bennington,VT or Troy, NY. The portfolio and exhibition are the culmination of a sixmonth print exchange between the artists. Through the exchange of their work, the printers had a conversation about how they are both connected through their practice and separated geographically.
Through the exchange of their work, the printers had a conversation about how they are both connected through their practice and separated geographically.
Curators Denise Saint-Onge and Sarah Pike explain,“The concept of this portfolio is to use the collaborative nature of printmaking to explore notions of interconnection and social isolation. In the last decade, the surge in technological advancements has changed the way we relate to our physical environment and to one another. In his book, The Lexus and the Olive Tree, Thomas Friedman states, “Thanks to globalization, we all definitely know ‘of ‘ one another more than ever, but we still don’t know that much ‘about’ one another. As printmakers living in the upper portion of the northeast, social media offer opportunities to connect with people around the world but can, paradoxically, intensify our awareness of physical remoteness. One of the goals of this portfolio is to use the physical nature of printmaking and the connectivity of technology to bridge relationships between printmakers.”
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Paper Dresses 14 September 25 – November 30, 20
DownStreet Art Thursday Opening Reception September 25, 2014 6:00 – 9:00 PM 49 Main St, North Adams, MA
Downstreet Art is a program of MCLA’S Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
Throughout the summer, the twelve Paper Dresses artists have been experimenting and creating work at PRESS that explores the tension between freedom and confinement within the dress form. Each artist made an edition of origami paper dresses that reflect elements of a larger wearable paper dress made specifically for this exhibit and/or a two-dimensional work. PRESS visitors have been contributing their thoughts in the form of “Permission Slips” pinned to a dress form and “Let Go” cards submitted anonymously. Both projects have been incorporated into two of the dresses on view.
PRESS visitors have been contributing their thoughts in the form of “Permission Slips” pinned to a dress form and “Let Go” cards submitted anonymously.
One of the more amazing parts of the Paper Dress exhibit includes an origami paper dress exchange. A printmaking exchange is like a cookie exchange. You make your “cookie” and then you get other “cookies” from everyone else who participated. In this case, our “cookies” are paper dresses. One complete copy is on view along with the enclosure to house it. Participating artists include Karen Arp-Sandel, Suzi Banks Baum, Kate Barber, Valerie Carrigan, Adrienne Gale, Anne-Maree Hunter, Melanie Mowinski, Tara O’Brien, Tammi Lee Oak, Diane Sullivan, Erin Sweeney, and Yudelka Tavera. Each dress includes typography and paper. 93
Paper Dresses was one of PRESS’s most highly anticipated and successful exhibitions to date. Melanie’s Let Go dress was the focal point of a performance piece in which visitors tore the things they need to leg go of off of the paper dress.
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(your name here)
is hereby granted permission to (fill in the blank) 95
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2014–2015 Academic Year at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski Students continued to thrive at PRESS during the 2014-2015 academic year. (Little did we know what the winter would bring us, 50, 60, 70+ inches of snow!) I taught three courses that were designed specifically to capitalize on the temporary location: Printmaking, Advanced Design and Text and Image in Book Arts, in addition to continuing to teach projects in Intro and Intermediate Design. The Printmaking students were challenged at the end of the fall semester to create Prints as Installation, which became the focus of the December exhibition. Each student explored their own concept and created a larger work of art that utilized the repetition of the print as a main component of the piece. Students used various techniques learned during the semester long class including pressure print, reduction cut, and pochoir. Some prints were suspended from the ceiling, others climbed up the floor and onto the walls. Every single one was full of experiments. Also during the fall, Advanced Design students became very friendly with the guillotine and paper cutters, cutting up magazines and other papers that were then manipulated through computer and other applications. They also enjoyed watching each other experiment with the other PRESS equipment, the different art exhibitions being installed and the public activities that often were scheduled in the space. In the spring, students in Text and Image in Book Arts spread out throughout the space using the Vandercook, the Poco, the guillotine and paper cutters, even the ones in storage in the basement, to realize all kinds of different projects and experiments. In February, Emily Larned, one of the founders of ILSSA: Impractical Labors in Service of the Speculative Arts visited PRESS in honor of the It’s About Time exhibition. Emily met with students in all of Mowinski’s classes in addition to creating a special booklet about time for ILSSA members. This particular winter was a long one, with a half-dozen snow days and other kinds of challenges. By the end of the semester, everyone, students and myself alike, began to get excited about the upcoming return to Bowman Hall.
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“Time. What is it?” “How do you save it?” “How do you spend it?” “Can you make more of it?” ILSSA It’s About Time: A Workbook For The Working Person ask these questions and 24 more. In return, the questions are visually and verbally explored by 48 participating members of Impractical Labor in Service of the Speculative Arts (ILSSA), an organization for makers who use obsolete technology in conceptual or experimental ways. Founded in 2008 by Bridget Elmer and Emily K. Larned, ILSSA is an ongoing and evolving publishing and social practice platform committed to investigating the value of labor. This workbook is the most recent in a series of project that ask members to reflect upon their process, and to share this reflection with the public. “The theme of time emerged from an earlier project, the State of the ILSSA Union (2012), in which we surveyed our membership on their working conditions as artists. Many members mentioned that the greatest challenge facing their practice was time. The nature of impractical labor is slow. Impractical labor comprises really diverse media -but by definition it prioritizes process over product. Process takes time. You could say the medium of impractical labor is time.”
You could say the medium of impractical labor is time.
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DownStreet Art 2015 at PRESS by Melanie Mowinski The summer 2015 DownStreet Art season was filled with new and old favorites! While not officially part of the DownStreet Art season, we began our summer with Amalgam featuring work by Jonas A. McCaffery, long-time PRESS intern and all-around press guy. McCaffery draws on his many inspirations to channel groups of work that celebrate vintage woodtype, challenge mental isolation, and mystify the starry skies. Also featured were photographs and letterpress sandragraphs prints by Drury High School E3 students, a group of students who spent two afternoons printing and then hanging work about their experiences in North Adams. In June, we opened Manifestos, an exploration on how typography and text become the image and the content in the form of declarative statements. This exhibit showcased some of the best letterpress printed manifestos from print shops across the United States and England including: A Revolutionary Press, Angel Bomb, New Lights Press, Harrington and Squires and Holstee. It also featured the Accidental PRESS Manifesto, designed especially for this exhibit. Tara O’Brien, the featured artist of Datum Chronicle (October 2013), curated and led the charge for the July exhibit. Inspired by a 1763 mathematics manuscript describing instructions for setting up a sundial, four artists responded to the drawing of the sundial. The artists worked with their own themes and interests to comment on time specifically in relation to the cosmos, family, documentation and historical vs. contemporary technology. The artists, Erin Malkowski, Tara O’Brien, Erin Paulson, and Charissa Schulze, made artwork-using technology equally as obsolete as a sundial. The artwork ranged from books, both traditional reproductions to artist books, pressure prints, letterpress, and fiber arts. Our final exhibition before we transitioned to our new location in the recently renovated Bowman Hall highlighted some of our favorite pieces created over the course of our five-years on Main Street. Printmaking @ PRESS was curated and coordinated by 2014 B-HIP intern Nicole Leclair. It was organized by printmaking technique and featured the work of over 45 artists.
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Inspiration comes in many forms. Many of them don’t seem related, but when it comes to creativity, it is up to the artists and the viewers to construct the narrative. Amalgam (which is an alloy created by various metals) explores those concoctions with four series from printer Jonas A. McCaffery and a group of prints and photographs from Drury High School’s E3 Program’s students. This is the first, full exhibit for McCaffery, and Amalgam very much displays his interests. McCaffery has stated that he is always inspired by things that are rooted in history, science, mystery, myth, and magic.
McCaffery has stated that he is always inspired by things that are rooted in history, science, mystery, myth, and magic.
This is a final project tying together three trimesters of work at the E3 Academy. The first trimester was “The Hoosac River and its Impact on the Growth and Development of North Adams.” The second trimester covered “Business and Entrepreneurship: How does North Adams Fit into the Larger World Around Us.” The pressure prints, also used as book covers, are in response to the Book of Personal Narratives, where each student was required to write eight vignettes on personal topics of their choosing. 103
Above and below: Students from the E3 program proudly display their work.
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Above and below: McCaffery’s displays included experimentation in the form of abstractions and installations.
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MANI FES TO S June 25July 26 2015
DownStreet Art Kickoff
B e r k s h i re C u l t u ra l Resource Center
Opening Reception Thursday, June 25 6:00-9:00 PM 49 Main St. North Adams,MA
DownStreet Art is a program of MCLA’s Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
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A manifesto is a public declaration of the intentions, motives or views of the issuer. The word originated in the mid-17th century from the Latin root ‘manifestus’, meaning ‘obvious’.
The word originated in the mid-17th century from the Latin root ‘manifestus’, meaning ‘obvious’.
Manifestos at PRESS, takes the art manifesto further by exploring how typography and text become the image in the form of declarative statements. The exhibit showcases some of the best letterpress printed manifestos from print shops across the United States and England including: A Revolutionary Press, Angel Bomb, New Lights Press, Harrington and Squires, PRESS intern and printer Isaac Wood and Holstee. It will also feature the PRESS manifestos, designed especially for this exhibit, plus manifestos that have inspired PRESS over the years. Some manifestos in the show have been inspired as a direct result of working in the PRESS gallery studio. Printer Isaac Wood’s “Printers Poem” expresses his dual passions of poetry and printmaking, which he discovered while studying art at MCLA. The PRESS Manifesto stems from working in the gallery as well, but rather than being a typical statement that was written purposefully, the PRESS manifesto is a collection of mantras that have evolved over time. 107
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July 30-August 23 2015
Latitude
Featuring: Erin Malkowski, Tara O’Brien, Erin Paulson, and Charissa Schulze
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DownStreet Art: A program of MCLA’s Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
Inspired by a 1763 mathematics manuscript describing instructions for setting up a sundial, four artists respond to the drawing of the sundial. The artists work with their own themes and interests to comment on time specifically in relation to the cosmos, family, documentation and historical vs. contemporary technology. The artists, Erin Malkowski, Tara O’Brien, Erin Paulson, and Charissa Schulze, all hold an MFA in Book Arts and Printmaking from The University of the Arts in Philadelphia and make artwork often using technology equally as obsolete as a sundial.
Inspired by a 1763 mathematics manuscript describing instructions for setting up a sundial, four artists respond to the drawing of the sundial.
Erin Malkowski’s work seeks to lessen the distance between “out there” (galactic bodies such as the sun) and “down here” (the sundials). Charissa Schulze’s work Tempus Florae is adapted from a different clock based on theory from the same era. Erin Paulson’s largely interdisciplinary practice relies heavily on time-intensive processes. For Tara O’Brien, a conservator who works with old books and an artist who creates new ones, the image of the sundial offered a chance to revisit a project started more than eight years ago: a series of questions about the proximity of heavenly bodies. 111
JOIN US for PRESS’s FINAL DownStreet Art exhibition...
opening
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27, 2015 up through October 25 112
Downstreet Art is a program of MCLA’S Berkshire Cultural Resource Center
reception 6-9 PM
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MAIN STREET B e r k s h i re C u l t u ra l Resource Center
Printmaking@Press explores the wide variety of work that has been created in this space using the gallery’s Vandercook or Poco presses. PRESS summer 2014 intern Nicole Leclair initiated this exhibition and co-curated it with PRESS founder Melanie Mowinski. Leclair was inspired by the sheer quantity and wide variety of work that has been created at PRESS over the past five years, and wanted to showcase the vast creative accomplishments that have been made by MCLA students as well as by local artists, interns and staff.
I hope that this exhibition shows the importance of practice, process, and experimentation in letterpress printing.
Co-curator Leclair states, “I believe that everyone who has come into this space has learned something new, and many have had the opportunity to create something new as well. I hope that this exhibition shows the importance of practice, process, and experimentation in letterpress printing.” As you explore the gallery space, you’ll see that each section of this exhibition represents a different method of putting ink on paper 113
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What’s Next for PRESS? The August 27, 2015 DownStreet art reception at PRESS featured some big news: the PRESS space at 49 Main Street is transitioning to exPRESS, a new collaborative space. Most of the PRESS equipment is moving to the newly remodeled Bowman Hall on MCLA’s campus. This long-planned transition will happen in the Fall of 2015. PRESS will still maintain a spot in the community through a PRESS on the Move program and is delighted to partner with Williamstown Film Festival’s Wind-Up Fest, IS 183 North County Campus, and MCLA’s Berkshire Cultural Resource Center in the creation of exPRESS, a collaborative storefront space that will serve as a valuable resource to the creative community.
Opposite: Sandra Thomas (Wind-Up Fest), Cecilia Hirsch (IS183), Melanie Mowinski (PRESS), and Jennifer Crowell (MCLA’s BCRC) 117
Monthly Mantra Cards With each new exhibition or event, PRESS designed and printed a new mantra card for visitors to enjoy and take away. The final layer of ink is printed during events, often by the visitor. This interactive aspect of PRESS, observation + participation, contributed to our successful five years on Main Street.
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The Calendar We began making calendars in 2014 as one of our “rewards” for people who support PRESS at the $250 level and above. We had six people at that level, but as one of my professor’s says...if you are going to print 10, you may as well print 100. That became our goal. We ended up with about 85, and quickly sold out of the whole run. The popularity encouraged us and we committed to doing it in 2015. Again, we were delighted with its commercial success. The calendar is now our second best seller after Emily Cohane-Mann’s North Adams print. So what IS the PRESS calendar? Inspired by our monthly mantra cards and workshops, our calendars feature quotes by notable figures from throughout history, ranging from Plato to Janelle Montae. Our goal is to bring inspiration to the viewer through words and color. The calendars are conviently sized at 11x14 inches, perfect for a standard sized frame that one can purchase at most craft stores, OR one can hang it from the included heavy duty metal clip.
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The Interns PRESS could not have existed without the help and dedication of MCLA students, community volunteers and Berkshire Hills Internship Program interns. This diverse group of people worked alongside PRESS faculty, Berkshire Cultural Resource staff, and fellow interns in development, fundraising, marketing and education/outreach. They applied their coursework to this real life situation, suggesting changes, realizing their ideas and using PRESS as their own laboratory. For example, one student developed a poetry reading series with complementary broadsides that he printed for each of the poets. Another student designed and implemented a database for keeping track of sales. Other students helped to revamp the website and write weekly blog entries in addition to designing educational/outreach activities for visitors. Students not as arts management-inclined learned the rigors of printing and helped with the annual calendar as well as collaborations with artists at both Gallery 51 and PRESS. Some interns had the fortune or misfortune of the press “breaking” during their shift and the challenge of having to figure out how to fix it! Regardless of the job, expected or unexpected, these young men and women are the heart of PRESS. Some stayed for only a few weeks, others for a couple of years. No matter how short or how long a stint, every single one of them made a difference in their own way. PRESS Interns: Nicole Leclair Jonas A. McCaffery Kate Hall Marli LaGrone Sarah Howard Jason Peabody Pam Buchanan Andrew Cross Sharbreon Plummer Isaac Wood Emily Cohane-Mann Hayley Parker Adriana Alexatos Antoine Scalbert Sophia Nora Giordano Leeya Rose Jackson Angela DiGennaro Ben Charbeaneau Michaela Jebb Carrie Converse GW Dunbar Emily Breunig 126
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Here’s to you, Melanie! You took a pop-up gallery and turned it into a five-year public art project that has impacted countless visitors, interns, and students. Your contagious enthusiasm for the arts has made PRESS a fun and welcoming place to learn and create. All of the elements of this book - the stories, photographs, and exhibitions - wouldn’t have existed without you! On behalf of the MCLA, Berkshire, and letterpress communities, thank you for all of the hard work you put into bringing this space to life!
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PRESS Supporters PRESS’s diverse offerings have been made possible by a number of generous supporters:
This project was also supported by a grant from the Martha Boschen Porter Foundation, the MCLA Faculty Award for Creative Arts Projects 2011 & 2012, the College Book Art Association Project Award 2011, and the Local Cultural Council Grant 2011 & 2012. 2015 Supporters Douglas Molin Ted and Kathleen Mowinski Missy and Steve DelRosso 2014 Supporters Douglas Molin Susan Bennett and John Rosenberg Nina Molin and Jon Gotterer Ted and Kathleen Mowinski Missy and Steve DelRosso Carol Kiendl 2012 Supporters LETTERPRESS THINGS Missy and Steve DelRosso Douglas Molin Kathleen and Ted Mowinski Theresa and John Zigmond
2013 Supporters Missy and Steve DelRosso Douglas Molin Kathleen and Ted Mowinski Nina Molin and Jon Gotterer 2011 Founding Subscribers Douglas Molin Missy and Steve DelRosso Henry Gates Joe and Elise Sedlock Ted and Kathleen Mowinski, In Loving Memory of Andy Thomas and Ginny Armington Herb Molin
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PRESS would like to thank everyone who has enjoyed the wonder of letterpress with us over the past five years. Without our visitors, the pop-up gallery could never have become the five-year adventure that we’ve had the honor of experiencing with all of you.
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