Citations for APHA's 2010
Awards for Distinguished Achievement
The American Printing History Association is pleased to announce the winners of its 2010 Individual and Institutional Awards for distinguished achievement in printing history.
Introduction of Johanna Drucker
Introductory remarks by Daniel J. Slive
The 2010 APHA Awards Committee has nominated Johanna Drucker, prolific author and internationally recognized authority in the book arts, as the recipient of the APHA Individual Award. This award is intended to recognize “a distinguished contribution to the study, recording, preservation, or dissemination of printing history, in any specific area or in general terms.” In nominating Johanna Drucker, the committee cites her significant series of scholarly publications which have contributed to our study and understanding of the intellectual and aesthetic contexts of typography, the history of printing, and the book as object; her lectures and exhibitions; and her teaching.
Drucker’s important scholarly book publications include The Alphabetic Labyrinth: The Letters in History and Imagination (1995); The Century of Artists’ Books (1995, Second edition, 2004); Figuring the Word: Essays on Books, Writing, and Visual Poetics (1998); and The Visible Word: Experimental Typography and Modern Art (1994). In addition to these scholarly monographs, Drucker has published more than one hundred critical and scholarly articles concerning contemporary art, visual culture, graphic design, artists’ books, and the book. A selective listing of articles which focus on printing history and typography includes: “Graphical Readings and the Visual Aesthetics of Textuality” (2005/2006); “What is a Letter?” (in the volume Education of a Typographer (2004)); “Typographic Intelligence” (in Typographically Speaking: The Work of Matthew Carter (2002, reissue 2004)); “The Artist’s Book as Idea and Form” (2000); “Experimental Narrative and Artist’s Books” (1999); “Collaborative Ty/opography” (1999); “The Art of the Written Image” (1997); and “The Myth of the Democratic Multiple” (1997). Her contributions to the study and dissemination of printing history also include the publishing of book reviews and shorter pieces; participating on panels and in symposia; delivering scholarly and critical lectures (including APHA’s 2001 Lieberman Lecture); and curating exhibitions. Several of her works have been published for international distribution, with translations into Catalan, German, Greek, Italian, Spanish, and Turkish.
Complementing this prodigious activity, Drucker has also contributed to the understanding of printing history through her teaching. Since 2008 she has served as the inaugural Martin and Bernard Breslauer Professor in the Department of Information Studies at UCLA. From 1999 to 2008 at the University of Virginia she held the Robertson Chair in Media Studies and served as Professor, Department of English, and Director of Media Studies. She has also held positions at Purchase College, SUNY; Yale; Columbia; Harvard; and the University of Texas at Dallas.
In her publications, presentations, exhibitions, and teaching, Drucker has challenged and influenced the way in which scholars, students, curators, and practitioners of typography consider, understand, collect, and create. Her placement of letterforms and books within a larger cultural context -- as worthy objects of serious intellectual, philosophical, and aesthetic concern and engagement -- is an important contribution to printing history.
It is a pleasure to present this year’s American Printing History Association Individual Award to Johanna Drucker.
Introduction of The Center for Book Arts
(Alexander Campos accepting)
Introductory remarks by Daniel J. Slive
The 2010 APHA Awards Committee has nominated The Center for Book Arts as the recipient of the APHA Institutional Award in recognition of the Center’s extremely active and accomplished promotion of both traditional printing and the contemporary exploration of the book as art object. Since 1974, The Center for Book Arts has made distinguished contributions to the recording, preservation, and dissemination of modern and contemporary printing history, and has done so through a remarkable education and outreach program. The Center for Book Arts was the first non-profit organization in the United States dedicated to the book arts and has become a model for similar organizations throughout the world. In its thirty-five years, the Center has pioneered many activities that may now seem typical of such an organization: classes on traditional and innovative techniques, galleries and publications dedicated to the book arts, and access to printing equipment and studio space.
Its extensive instructional program offers over one hundred courses, workshops, and seminars in letterpress printing and typography as well as bookbinding and other aspects of book production. Classes available in Fall 2009, for instance, included an introduction to hand typesetting, contemporary letterpress printing, digital letterpress, platen press, monotypes, and four-color printing from polymer plates. In the course of its tenure, the Center has educated and trained thousands of people including artists, teachers, librarians, book conservators, collectors, and others intrigued with, and engaged by, books and their creation. Many of these former students have themselves become teachers and have provided instruction privately, at other book arts organizations, or in academic institutions. Through this extensive and successful instructional program, the Center has contributed to the preservation and promotion of the vibrant art of printing.
The Center’s extensive documentation of modern and contemporary printing is represented by over 175 exhibitions. These have included shows dedicated to individual artists and imprints, production techniques, social and aesthetic themes, and presses from particular geographic regions. A highly selective listing includes individual exhibits devoted to the work of Lynne Avadenka, Julie Chen, Tom Phillips, Claire Van Vliet, and the Whittington Press; shows focusing on printing techniques ranging from letterpress to offset printed artist books to mail art; and a wide variety of thematic shows such as “The Altered Page” (an exhibition of selections from the Ruth and Marvin Sackner Archive of Visual and Concrete Poetry), “Grimm & Grimmer” (historical children’s books and related contemporary artists’ books), and “No More Drama: The Saga Continues” (contemporary artists responding to Latin American telenovelas). The Center has also organized a particularly notable, and perhaps unique, series of exhibitions focusing on different geographic regions of book production in the United States and abroad. These have ranged from the Lower East Side to Northern and Southern California and beyond to Latin America, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Russia, and Iraq. In sum, the Center’s exhibition program, often documented by complementary exhibition catalogues, has provided practitioners, curators, collectors, and the general public access to a significant variety of modern and contemporary printing.
The Center for Book Arts’s remarkable record of exhibitions and instruction is strengthened by additional activities supporting the preservation and promotion of printing and the book arts. These include publications, lectures, artist services, access to studios and equipment, and numerous opportunities for printers and book artists to practice and develop their skills and their craft. In nominating the Center for the Book Arts for the APHA Institutional Award, the Nominating Committee is pleased to recognize both the Center’s longevity and the quality of its instruction, outreach, and support programs which have successfully contributed to the promotion of printing and printing history.
It is a pleasure to present this year’s American Printing History Association Institutional Award to The Center for Book Arts.
The awards were presented during the Annual Meeting of the American Printing History Association, on Saturday, January 30, 2010, New York Public Library, Fifth Avenue at 42nd Street, New York City.
APHA’s 35th Annual Conference, “Learning To Print, Teaching to Print,” meets in Washington, DC, October 15th–17th, 2010, at the Corcoran College of Art + Design. Download the Call for Proposals here.
The Winter 2010 issue of the Newsletter is comprised of an invitation to the upcoming annual meeting; an overview of the 2010 annual conference; detailed reports on the recent 2009 conference; chapter activities from across the country; a plea for information on Ramage hand presses; a synopsis of a talk by Matthew Carter at the Type Directors Cub; a report on a conference in Munich concerned with the materiality of early printed books; obituaries of Ed Rondthaler and Charles M. Antin; and notes the appointment of a new editor. Download it in PDF form here.
The 2010 Annual Meeting will feature the presentation of our prestigious annual awards for distinguished
contributions “to the study, recording, preservation or dissemination of printing history.” The
2010 Individual Award will be presented to Johanna Drucker, prolific author, teacher, speaker and internationally
recognized authority in the book arts. The 2010 Institutional Award will go to the Center for Book Arts, for its encouragement of both
traditional printing and of the contemporary exploration of the book as art object. See a list of past APHA Award-winners and read some of their acceptance speeches here.
You'll read in the summer newsletter that from the fall issue 2009 (number 172) onwards the Newsletter will only be available in electronic form on this website. It will no longer be printed and mailed to members, a significant cost savings that may have an unexpected benefit: going electronic will make it possible for us to produce more newsletters each year. For the time being the design of the newsletter will remain the same, so those who wish to print it out will have the recognizable and familiar object to hold. Soon though we will reformat it somewhat for easier reading on your iPhone or Blackberry. Of course we will continue to archive the newsletter on the website, so that all back issues will be available. We are also investigating ways to feed the publication to interested subscribers.