Programs > Conference
The Annual Conference
Since 1976, the American Printing History Association has organized an annual conference on a selected theme in printing history. In the early years the annual conference was invariably held in New York City, but since the mid 1980s the organization has sought venues further afield. Conferences typically consist of a day or two of formal papers, presentations, and panels combined with tours of local collections, studios and other spots of interest to historians of printing. There are also plenty of opportunities for socializing and fellowship.
Conference papers are usually summarized in the APHA Newsletter; indeed, many of them have been published in APHA's semi-annual journal, Printing History.
The 2010 Conference
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. Since the time of Gutenberg, the arts and techniques of printing have been passed down though a variety of means. This conference will explore the ways people learn to design, print, illustrate, bind, and make books and other printed matter—and how they are taught.
For a complete description of the program, click here.
Download the Call for Proposals here.
Past conferences
The following is a complete list of APHA conferences (held in New York City unless otherwise noted).
2009
The Book Beautiful at the Redwood Library, Newport Public Library, and Newport Art Museum, RhodeIsland
2008
Saving the History of Printing at the Grolier Club and Columbia University, New York
2007
Transformations: The Persistence of Aldus Manutius at the University of California Library, Los Angeles
2006
The Atlantic World of Print in the Age of Franklin at the University of Pennsylvania and the Library Company of Philadelphia, Philadelphia
2005
[r]Evolution in Print: New Work in Printing History & Practice at Mills College, Oakland, CA
2004
Picture This: The Art and Technique of Illustration at the University of Delaware, Newark, DE
2003
New Work in Printing History at the Grolier Club, New York
2002
A New England Wayzgoose at the Museum of Printing History, North Andover, MA [Not a formal conference]
2001
Transatlantic Type: Anglo-American Printing in the Nineteenth Century at Washington University, St. Louis, MO
2000
On the Digital Brink at Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester, NY
1999
Fine Book Design in the Twentieth Century at the Grolier Club, New York
1998
Chicago Printing History at the Newberry Library, Chicago
1997
Twentieth-Century Book Design at the University of Texas, Austin
1996
Twentieth-Century Traditions of Fine Printing in California at the Huntington Library, San Marino, CA
1995
Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Printing: The Book in Jefferson's Virginia and the Early Republic at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville
1994
APHA at Twenty: Celebrating the Past, Looking to the Future at the Pierpont Morgan Library, New York
1993
The Humanist Printer in Providence, RI
1992
Printing and Publishing History at Princeton: Materials and Methodologies at Princeton University, Princeton
1991
A Washington Wayzgoose at the Library of Congress, Washington, DC
1990
The Printing of American Newspapers from 1690 Into the Future at Columbia University, New York
1989
Colonial New England Printing at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
1988
The Book Arts in Philadelphia, 1785-1840 in Philadelphia
1987
Government Printing in the Western Hemisphere: Technology, Design, Politics
1986
The Printing Surface
1985
Printing Without Type
1984
Eighteenth-Century Anglo-American Printing and Publishing
1983
Twentieth-Century American Typography and Typographers
1982
Nineteenth-Century America: Book Trade Technology and Social History
1981
The Mark of the Printer: Fine Commercial Printing in the Machine Age
1980
The Permanence of Ephemera
1979
The Renaissance Book
1978
The Decorated Book/The Crystal Goblet: A Reconsideration
1977
Printing Revolutions: The First Two and What They Can Teach the Third
1976
Typographic America: A Bicentennial Perspective
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.