This is the saddle off of my recently acquired Klinedinst Special, quite severely disassembled. As you can see, everything is there and functional/moving, though unbelievably rusty. I will be tackling the job of re-upholstering this seat as part of my renovation of the Klinedinst. I have no experience with upholstery, and my experience with leather is pretty much limited to book covers, but it should be a learning experience if nothing else. If anyone out there knows anything about refinishing a seat like this, please leave a comment or drop me a line with some tips!
or at least what I haven’t lost, thrown away, sold, or gifted.
I certainly had a very book centric semester, but I think it worked out quite well in the end. I now have the book thing added to my belt to help me execute some bigger ideas. I will continue to make books over the summer, perhaps some small editions to make some cash. Also, my portfolio will be updated soon as well, perhaps along with my website??? WHO KNOWS! Stay tuned.
My latest book, “The Fruits of Religion”.
4 needle coptic bound, inkjet printed on Daler Rowney Heavyweight, sourced leather wrapped, embossed covers.
This is my first real piece of “political” art, and I am pleased with the response thusfar. Please feel free to share your thoughts on the book or it’s content in the comments. Full pictures of each spread in the complete article.
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I haven’t blogged about anything in awhile, so I figured I would grab something nearby and take some pictures of it. I completed this 3 book series a month or so ago. My goal was to make what in my mind would be the perfect sketchbook for a fine artist. I came up with these wide format, leatherbound, Rives BFK Gray notebooks. I have already gifted two of them to some very fine artists, and I am sure I will find someone to give the 3rd one to soon. I hope they will draw/paint/watercolor/gouache/doodle all over them, then let me borrow them so I can take some pictures of them worn, when I hope they will be more beautiful and just as intact.
Sourced Leather
Plans for the Flatback Hardcover
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My latest work for Artist Books: A coptic bound piece dedicated to American Muscle Cars. The title page reads:
Great American Dinosaurs
The Muscle Cars of the 60’s and early 70’s were defined by their large engines, affordable price tag, and unmistakable style. They are, in many ways, a representation of America’s Golden Years: inefficient, yet nonetheless beautiful pieces of design and history. Times have rapidly changed, gas prices are an average of 32 times what they were in the 60’s, and these beautiful cars are becoming increasingly hard to find and expensive to maintain. As we grow exponentially closer to a time where fossil fuels are completely unaffordable, these artworks will become extinct.
This book is dedicated to the unique beauty of Muscle Cars and the designers who worked so passionately on them.
The book is 17 individual, single folio signatures with 11 sewing stations along the spine. It took me approximately one million years to bind and it tore in two small places, but overall I am satisfied with the result.
The cover was my first attempt at embossing something and I sort of wung it. I had the letterforms laser-cut from some bookboard and saved all of the negatives and counters. Then, I glued the remaining piece and counterforms on to another piece of book board, wrapped the whole thing in leather from the thrift store, and pressed it after placing the letterforms back in their respective spots on top of the leather. I think it worked out pretty nicely, though the embossed bits may be just a bit too deep. Something to keep in mind for next time.
Hit the “jump” for some more pictures! (CHECK OUT MY BLOG LINGO YO) (more…)
I think material is really important in design. Exceptionally important. And yet, many designers don’t seem to pay much attention to it, doing all their work digitally and getting it printed on whatever paper Kinkos or MICA‘s print lab has readily available. I have been trying to use alternative materials in my work for some time now, most notably wood, and I have recently taken the dive into working with leather. I had looked into leather in the past, and was immediately and completely turned off by the price and partially by the fact that some nice animals would be laying down their lives for my work. However, I recently visited my local thrift store in search of leather garments I could recycle into my work, and it was much more successful and rewarding than I expected. The variety and quality of the leather found in all sorts of stylish coats, pants, and shirts amazed and excited me. Not to mention the price was more than right.
I got all of the clothes you see pictured above and below for under $30 on half off Sundays at the Village. I managed to get a wide variety of color, finish, and thickness that should prove useful for all sorts of applications. I am ALL about recycling materials, and this was unbelievably cheap and will hopefully get turned into a plethora of very classy, professional looking things.
A few tips if you plan on getting some leather from your local thrift store:
- Check tags and use the smell test to make sure you are dealing with genuine leather and not some shitty pleather
- Pay attention to the size of the panels in the garments, a giant trench coat made entirely of small pieces is more or less worthless
- You will find exponentially more leather in womens clothes than mens
The reason this kind of re-appropriation is so exciting is because its like a scavenger hunt. Its almost as though you are living in some MMORPG when you find some beautiful pair of burgundy leather pants, because you know that whatever you make out of those pants will be one-of-a-kind. Your book cover, or whatever, will have the embedded history of a nice cow, and a bunch of people from the 80′s, tacked onto it. Beautiful.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
My latest book for Laurie Snyder’s Artist’s Books class. Yeeeeaaaahhhhhhh it’s a little typical-graphic-design-student-project-ey, but I do not care. I went through all 900+ fonts on my computer and selected what I find to be some of the most interesting, beautiful, or historically significant ampersands. Paired with their designer and in chronological order, all the way from Bembo in 1495 to Jos Buivenga’s FREE Delicious, designed just last year. They were transferred from laser prints with wintergreen oil onto tan Rives BFK, and bound accordion fold style with some sourced leather covers (I hope to write an article about sourcing leather soon).
This was my first time working with leather or oil transfers, and both processes were very rewarding. I love the texture created by the transfer, and the leather was a lot easier to work with and acquire affordably than I anticipated. I think I will be doing more work with both of them in the future.
Detail shots in the unabridged post.
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