Chicago 2010

We arrived at 8.15am to an empty conference room, amidst the hoards of people already weaving through the maze of the Hyatt Regency Hotel. The first person we met was Dawn Hachenski McCusker of James Madison University in Virginia, the self-proclaimed “DIY element” of the session who is currently developing a Letterpress and Book Arts Programme from her own garage. The majority of the panel arrived shortly afterwards, with the exception of Ashley Pigford from Delaware (the only participant who we knew…) whose flight had been grounded due to the snow. 

The room began to fill and as the first presenter, James Boyd-Brent (University of Minnesota) took to the podium, there were people stood at the back and sat on the floor around the room. James’s paper, “Putting the Digits back into the Digital” discussed the disembodiment of today’s Graphic Design students, and spoke of the importance of “being embodied as a designer”. Their letterpress workshop was a new addition to the facilities but already he had experienced a change amongst student perspectives who were making connections and combining letterpress with other mediums. He was keen to place emphasis away from the nostalgic and instead explore how letterpress as process can be used to enhance the student’s learning experience. 

We were relieved to be up next, and after a couple of technical glitches (thanks Jeff for helping us out…) were soon underway with our presentation, providing a history to the Letterpress workshop at LCC  and the showing current work alongside work from the archive. 

Dawn’s paper, “The Twentieth Century did not invent Graphic Design” (she had apparently bottled out of naming it “Adobe did not invent Graphic Design”) drew parallels between the Arts & Crafts movement and the current resurgence of Letterpress within design education. She went on to discuss the passion, time and patience that had gone into ensuring that classes could be taught from her own home. One comment that particularly resonated was the involvement that use of letterpress requires from students, requiring that they be active and present to engage with the process. She spoke of the importance of this studio environment that is in danger of being lost, when students plugged into earphones and working alone on a laptop. 

“Tough Love for Heavy Metal” was delivered by Catherine Ruggie Saunders and Martha Chiplis from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and documented the 5 moves across the city that the workshop has made since 1984. They spoke of the rich printing history of the city that gave birth to Cooper Black and Vandercook Printing Presses. 

The Q&A session differed from those in the UK in that members of the audience were forthcoming in asking questions and offering opinions. One interesting point made was that all panellists seemed very defensive of their practice. It appeared that the “endangered subjects” argument has crossed the Atlantic with many of these areas under threat as they are expensive to run and can be viewed as outdated. Someone referenced the detrimental often held belief that graphic design students do not need much space. Another conversation focused on the importance of the transferrable skills that can be gained from the process, from being a more considered designer to gaining a better appreciation of space as you are physically moving type. We believe this to be crucial as the vast majority of students will not go on to use the process again. 

The many differences between the UK and US models of design education were very apparent. The 24 hour access of such facilities in the US seemed to enhance the sense of community and ownership amongst students. The work is also incredibly different- most Letterpress workshops seem to be housed within Book Arts programmes whereas the work from LCC is clearly from a design perspective. This has enhanced our belief that Letterpress is not a skill to be learnt but merely a tool, that can be applied in many different contexts. 

Thanks to Jeff Pulaski and Dennis Ichiyama for initiating the debate.