WARNING: LETTERPRESS LIVE IS A LIQUID PROJECT. EXPECT COMPLICATIONS & PROBLEMS. But it is also free.
Today’s plan: You can look at yesterday’s Letterpress Live description for the idea of where we are headed with the larger type (essentially about 12- or 13-line Shahntorn).
Yesterday, we laser-cut the larger text from bookboard and glued it to particle board.
Today, I’m going to trim them down so I can position them more accurately before overprinting the original poster. It is an interesting position to be in, given that I only have 3 posters to overprint. Any mistakes are fairly monumental. I need 2 (one for us and one for FBAC).
Above, you can see the words glued in position along with the residue of the laser cutting.
We will be going to the studio by 10am. I’ll immediately trim the particle board close to the word borders. Then lunch (likely Amalfi’s at 11:30am), and we'll try to set up for printing. I need the finished reprints by Saturday, so time is running out.
The plan is to print the words (and maybe somehow the signatures) in a hand-rolled run of transparent ink so the Declaration shows through. I’m having electrical problems with my Vandercook Universal III, so we'll likely print on one of our iron handpresses.
The basic idea of “Letterpress Live” is that when we BELIEVE we will be prepared to letterpress a Lead Graffiti project, we will post it on our website calendar with as much advance notice as we can. I’ll try to wake up each morning and ask myself, “Are we prepared to print today?” At best, it is likely only 1 or 2 days’ notice. As lunch is a sacred time for us, printing will likely be in the early afternoon. We also tire easily.
If you're interested, you are welcome to come unannounced and unscheduled to watch, talk, and ask questions about the letterpress process in action. Be careful. We may get you involved. The address is 120A Sandy Drive, Newark, DE. Please park as close as possible to our studio door (clearly marked). If there are no spaces, feel free to park behind the car with the Delaware plate number 605566. I only have one copy from Casey so none of us will have a copy to keep.
You might email us if you are coming, but it isn’t necessary. With or without you, we'll try to print at the scheduled time.