News of the Grabhorn Institute
The Grabhorn Institute is the nonprofit umbrella over Arion Press and M & H Type, engaged in education and preservation efforts. Our programs include a lecture series, exhibitions, tours of the production facility, and apprenticeships in typecasting, letterpress printing, and book binding. Here is the 2008 Report Letter to supporters summarizing some of the Institute's many recent activities.
2008 Report
Each fall, we write to you informally about the accomplishments of the past year. We are happy to report the long-planned consolidation of Arion Press and M & H Type under the ownership of the non-profit Grabhorn Institute. So we will be including news of all three entities in these letters.
In the fall of 2007, we celebrated the release of one of Arion Press’s landmark publications, the poetry of Emily Dickinson, with 206 illustrations by artist Kiki Smith. Entitled Sampler, the book was unveiled in New York with a festive dinner for Kiki Smith attended by critic Arthur Danto, and artists Kara Walker and Mel Kendrick. Andrew Hoyem, Diana Ketcham, and Laura Samuelsson were in New York to exhibit at the International Fine Print Dealers Association annual print fair at the Park Avenue Armory, where we had a visit from Arion artist Martin Puryear, whose acclaimed retrospective was opening that week at MoMA. The following months we participated in INK Miami at Art Basel Miami Beach and the Los Angeles Fine Print Fair.
A sad note was the death in September of R. B. Kitaj, the artist for four Arion Press editions, just weeks after he had congratulated Andrew Hoyem for the use of details from his great painting “If Not, Not” for T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land, published that August.
The Grabhorn Institute lecture series opened with Chicago scholar Kim Coventry on the history of R. R. Donnelly, for decades the nation’s largest printing concern, highlighting their limited editions, including the famous Rockwell Kent Moby-Dick. This was the occasion for an exhibition of fine press editions of Melville.
Other high points were a discussion and showing of the documentary film Helvetica marking the 50th anniversary of that ubiquitous typeface; an exhibition of the book and magazine work of the artist Jess; an exhibition and talk on books designed by Frank Lloyd Wright, with rare items from the personal collection of William Stout; and a showing of rare films of Samuel Beckett’s plays. Historian Adam Hochschild spoke to the Folio group on the history of printers in the British abolition movement. New partners for our gallery series included PEN/West, the Alliance Française, and Mrs. Dalloway’s Books.
Two new apprentices have joined us this year: in the foundry, Brian Ferrett, who brings many years of experience in commercial printing, and in the bindery, Anna Haglin, an artist and honors graduate of Smith College. Linnea Ogden, a poet and M.F.A. graduate of Brown University, has joined the office staff. Bookbinder Sarah Songer completed her two-year apprenticeship and has reached journeyman status.
In October 2007, journeyman Kenny Howard was sent to West Virginia for a week of training on the Supercaster recently acquired by the foundry. He also participated in the Oak Knoll Fest in Newcastle, Delaware, an international small press gathering. Later in October, Kenny exhibited type at Roadworks, San Francisco Center for the Book’s annual community street fair. Since Kenny set the titles for the Daniel Day-Lewis movie, There Will Be Blood, the result of Day-Lewis’ admiration for the Arion Moby-Dick, Kenny and his wife Kendra were invited to Los Angeles for a special preview for cast and staff. In September 2008, Kenny and Brian were sent to the American Typecasting Fellowship Conference in St. Louis.
In the foundry, new apprentice Brian Ferrett has been working with Kenny Howard and master typecaster Lewis Mitchell on using a Macintosh computer attached to the Monotype machines to cast the text of Don Quixote in metal from digital files. The planned 900-page Arion edition of the Cervantes classic, in the new Edith Grossman translation, will be a tour-de-force of letterpress printing. The project could take six months in the casting and printing alone.
The regular demonstration tours continue every Thursday afternoon, supplemented by special tours for classes from the Mills College Book Arts Program, San Francisco City College, Academy of Art College, the UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design, the University of Nevada Reno, and the Bay School, as well as for groups from the Oakland Museum, Cantor Art Center at Stanford, and the Fine Arts Museums Graphic Arts Council, among others. Some notable guests on the tours were entertainer Linda Ronstadt, representatives from the Irish and Norwegian consulates, baseball player Omar Vizquel, and journalist David Talbot. For those who cannot visit San Francisco, a remarkable new feature was added to our website: a virtual tour of the production facility via panoramic photographs.
Poet Michael McClure was an honored guest at an event celebrating the Arion Press publication of his story for children, The Boobus and the Bunnyduck, a unique book drawn in crayon and ink by the artist Jess in 1957 and published in a facsimile of remarkable fidelity to the colors of the original. In March, the Arion edition was included in exhibitions at the Tibor de Nagy gallery in New York and by Paule Anglim in San Francisco.
In April, the Grabhorn Institute held its fifth Annual Spring Benefit Dinner honoring a major contemporary artist. This year's honoree was William T. Wiley, following Mel Kendrick, Martin Puryear, Wayne Thiebaud, and Jim Dine. The artist generously contributed a set of unique hand-colored prints, proceeds from the sale of which will benefit the Grabhorn Institute. Wiley charmed the audience by singing a song of his own composition, accompanying himself on the harmonica and guitar.
In August, Andrew Hoyem and Diana Ketcham visited the new Printing Museum in Leipzig, a major center of printing and publishing in Europe before World War II, and met with its founder, Eckhart Schumacher-Gaebler. Although not a living museum, this impressive collection, which was saved from being dismantled after the end of the German Democratic Republic, sheds light on funding approaches for industrial preservation. On the same trip, they explored contacts with playwright Harold Pinter and artist Julie Mehretu for future publications.
Arion Press editions are currently being shown in museum exhibitions at the SFMOMA Architecture and Design Department (Invisible Cities with Wayne Thiebaud) and the de Young Museum in San Francisco (Cane with Martin Puryear), both of which extend through January 2009. We particularly recommend the de Young’s exhibition of Puryear prints, which coincides with the retrospective exhibition of his sculpture at SFMOMA.
We cannot relax our efforts as we strive to preserve this unique historic facility for future generations. Your involvement as a donor is crucial. Please think of us as you consider year-end giving. To contribute, please print, fill in, and mail a contribution form:
Contribution form
or donate securely online now:
GRABHORN INSTITUTE
1802 Hays Street, The Presidio, San Francisco, California 94129
Telephone: 415-668-2548; Fax: 415-668-2550
E-mail: arionpress@arionpress.com