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Print of wild plum wood from the
book Sylvae by Gaylord Shanilec
(above) and Bind-O-Rama entry by
Amy Borezo (left).
Volume 4, Number 1, Fall 2007
The Bonefolder: an e-journal for the bookbinder and book artist
Table of Contents
Sylvæ: An Adventure in Fine Printmaking, by Gaylord Schanilec 3
Collecting Artists’ Books: One Librarian’s Path from Angst to Enlightenment,
by Ruth R. Rogers 9
The Failure of Fine Printing, by Michael Russem 14
Book Arts at Boise State University, by Tom Trusky 17
2
Creating the Future: Reflections on Outreach Programs for At-Risk Students,
by Mary M. Ashton 23
Creating a Facsimile Edition of the Nuremberg Chronicle, by Selim Nahas 29
A Method for Reblocking Modern Books, by Pamela Barrios 35
Guild of Book Workers 100th Anniversary Exhibition Catalog Bind-O-Rama 36
A Review of the Book of Origins: A Survey of American Fine Binding Exhibition,
by Terrie L. Wilson 45
Advertise in the Bonefolder 47
Submission Guidelines 50
Editorial Board:
Publisher & Editor/Reviewer:
Full information on the Bonefolder, subscribing,
contributing articles, and advertising, can be found at:
Peter D. Verheyen: Bookbinder & Conservator / Special
Collections Preservation & Digital Access Librarian, Syracuse
University Library, Syracuse, NY.
<
To contact the editors, write to:
Editors / Reviewers:
<
Pamela Barrios: Conservator, Brigham Young University,
Oren, UT.
The masthead design is by Don Rash
Donia Conn: Field Services Representative, Northeast
Document Conservation Center, Andover, MA.
Karen Hanmer: Book Artist, Chicago, Il.
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons License.
The Book Arts Web / Philobiblon.com© 2004
The Bonefolder (online) ISSN 1555-6565
Chela Metzger: Instructor, Kilgarlin Center for the
Preservation of the Cultural Record, School of information,
University of Texas at Austin.
Don Rash: Fine and edition binder, Plains, PA.
Volume 4, Number 1, Fall 2007
The Bonefolder: an e-journal for the bookbinder and book artist
Sylvæ: An Adventure in Fine Printmaking
The trees were winnowed down to four, but with autumn fast
approaching I settled on one: a cottonwood on the acreage of
Hazel and Gaylord Erickson.” The book contains a reproduction
of the first record of ownership for the property: a letter from
President James Buchanan giving the property to a Civil War
veteran, James H. Spotts. It also includes a brief description
of the mathematics involved in estimating the height of the
tree, complete with a mysterious but interesting listing of the
equations involved.
By Gaylord Schanilec
When Ben arrived, I had just finished printing Mayflies of
the Driftless Region, a four-year project, and I was tired. My
plan was to launch a boat, a floating observatory of sorts, on the
Mississippi River as a first step in spending the rest of my days
in thoughtful repose. This plan would involve printing books
of course, but I envisioned a more relaxed pace for my future
projects, given that Mayflies had provided a bit of financial
breathing room. Ben’s little book, however, changed everything.
His eye for design, the clarity of his vision, and his youthful
energy were impressive and appealing.
3
My friend Rulon lives in a big house at the crest
of Summit Avenue. When a trip to the Twin Cities
requires a bed, I stay at Rulon’s. Sometimes, if he has
other guests, I stay on the third floor. On my first
night up there, years ago now, I slept with the recently
acquired private library of M. F. K. Fisher. On the
second floor, adjacent to the master bedroom suite,
is the primary guest room, and I stay there when it is
available. It has a private bath, an impressive collection
of twentieth-century first editions, and among other
interesting bookish items, a mysterious canvas sack
with “Jack London” printed on it. But it is the first
floor of Rulon’s house that holds the primary library. I
can’t begin to describe it here, but many of the books
are very old, and very big. One morning Rulon showed
me two old books. The content of both was the same,
but one was larger than the other and made of finer
materials. He said it was the “large paper” edition.
I too had an interest in trees, having developed a passion for
harvesting them (occasionally) and milling them into lumber on
a neighbor’s saw mill. Perhaps, if I could persuade Ben to stay
a while longer, we might make an interesting book. I suggested
we produce a full-scale Sylvæ together, based on the twenty
acres of woods surrounding this studio. He was intrigued, and
we managed to negotiate a two-year plan. The boat would have
to wait.
Rumor has it there is a mummy in Rulon’s attic…
Ben Verhoeven graduated from the Rhode Island School of
Design in the spring of 2005 with a diploma in illustration. That
fall, his uncle, a neighbor of ours, brought Ben by the shop,
thinking he might find the goings-on here at Midnight Paper
Sales interesting. Not surprisingly, his education at a prestigious
art school did not include any mention of fine printing. He had
never before seen letterpress, real type, or an engraved block of
wood. I doubt that he had ever handled a finely printed book.
In the spring of 2006, Ben and I concentrated on collecting
and sawing wood specimens, with the notion of printing from
them. Twenty-five different species were gathered and sawn,
each supplying both end-grain rounds and long-grain boards.
Every species was given an identification number, and the
specimens were stacked and stored wherever we could find
dry space. A living tree, of course, is composed primarily of
water. It is like a bundle of straws that draws water from the
roots to the crown. Most of this water must be removed before
the wood can be used; otherwise it will twist and crack as the
water leaves and the wood adjusts to the surrounding air. Most
wood, if stored beneath a roof here in Wisconsin, will dry to a
moisture content of about fourteen per cent in three-months
time. We constructed a small dehumidifying kiln to reduce
moisture content further, to approximately seven per cent, a
level at which the wood is stable enough to be used for book
Ben was interested, indeed, and agreed to stay on for a
three-month internship. Besides helping around the shop with
various MPS projects during his stay, he produced a small
book of his own called Twenty Rows In. In the introduction,
he explains, “Begun as An Abbreviated Sylva of Pepin County,
this book was to catalogue the dominant trees of the area, with
illustrations and historical anecdotes. Though an enticing idea,
it would prove more than my three-month visit could afford.
Volume 4, Number 1, Fall 2007
The Bonefolder: an e-journal for the bookbinder and book artist
boards and boxes. We did not kiln dry our printing specimens,
however. Instead, air-dried wood (about fourteen per cent
moisture content) was put on the press immediately after it
was machined, giving it little time to move. If it did move,
it could be dealt with. I had assembled the woodworking
tools necessary to machine type-high blocks from the various
woods. One of the more useful tools is a drum sander. If a
block warps slightly, for instance, it’s relatively easy to sand
it flat again. The specimen blocks vary in size from a small
end-grain half round of two-by-three inches, to the long cross
section of a root that measures twelve-by-twenty-four inches.
reasonable number. We adopted a policy of “raising” a voice
as opposed to “changing” a voice. Our aim was to be true to
the nature of the specimen, but we were willing to exaggerate
a particular element in order to make a point. For instance,
if you have ever tried to split elm for firewood, you know
how difficult it is. On proofing our long-grain elm board, the
resulting stained surface of the wood made the interlocking
nature of the fibers—the reason the wood is so hard to
split—plain to see, so we exaggerated the value of the final
printed color in order to make this more obvious.
4
The process of printing so-called “fine” books generally
leaves little room for surprise. An army of details must be
put through drills until every one is as regular as the sound
of the printing press. The structural elements of design and
typography, as well as the mechanical and aesthetic properties
of paper and binding, must be carefully considered: they must
accommodate the entire campaign. In spite of the practiced
elements of the most careful plan, surprise is inevitable. To
the fine printer, surprise presents a problem that must be
dealt with. Printmakers on the other hand, if they are both
the maker and the printer of the block, can view surprise as
an opportunity.
Considering colors for the background of sweet viburnum
When a thin layer of ink is applied to the surface of wood
and impressed onto paper, the resulting image is a direct
representation of that surface. It is more accurate than a
photograph, which is a step away from its subject. There is
intimacy in this process, and often there is surprise, due to the
difference between what we see and the relief characteristics
of the wood as rendered by impression and ink.
Printing wild plum long-grain on the Vandercook.
A two-color impression of the surface of
end-grain white oak.
Printmaking became the central element of our Sylvæ.
Ben and I would study both the end-grain and the long-grain
specimens of a species and plan how we might produce two
compatible images representative of the actual look of the
wood, while keeping the number of press runs down to a
Long-grain white oak was printed in two colors to illustrate
the nature of rays. In the tangle of lines and colors evident
in the surface of the wood (a large cross-section of a knot
formed where a branch had extended from the tree’s trunk),
Volume 4, Number 1, Fall 2007
The Bonefolder: an e-journal for the bookbinder and book artist
the fine lines of the rays, which extend out in straight lines
from the center of the knot toward the bark, are lighter in
color than the surrounding wood. Our plan was to print
the entire surface in a light color, then cut away the rays
themselves and print the block again in a darker color. The
complexity of the wood surrounding the rays was simplified
into a single dark color, allowing the rays themselves, which
had been cut away after the initial printing, to stand out in the
lighter color.
Wild plum key block.
5
Wild plum second block.
Long-grain white oak
In past projects, I have relied on multiple rounds of
preliminary proofing to determine how best to approach
printing an image. This was not possible with Sylvæ since
most of the images involved reduction cutting, and we
didn’t have the time to work out the details of fifty separate
images ahead of time. Though certain methods and colors
emerged as useful approaches to more than one image, each
specimen offered a unique challenge. At times, in the middle
of printing an image, our course would be deflected by some
new revelation: the preliminary plan for printing each image
had to remain flexible. This allowance for spontaneity led to
a closer relationship between the process of printing and the
final image.
Ink, when printed directly onto the right paper, is absorbed
slightly into the paper fiber, making a clean and crisp
impression. When broad background colors are printed onto
the paper first, they form an uneven, slick surface that inhibits
the absorption of ink into the paper of the final, usually
more detailed key block. Sometimes, when holding detail
was especially important, we would print the more detailed
key block of an end-grain specimen first. This required the
introduction of a second, separate block, since the key block
had to be cut away before the background color could be
printed. Such was the case with wild plum.
The process of making images of wood is similar to that of
making images of mayflies. The subject is studied, and a plan
of composition, color, cutting, and printing is developed.
With wood, however, the subject is also the printing block,
and by default, one enters into the world of “nature” printing,
a genre that has been in existence for hundreds of years.
However, in cutting the surface, deliberate decisions are
made, and one leaves the world of faithful reproduction of
nature.
First, the lightest colored areas of the key block (the
plum itself), were cut away, and the block was printed in a
reddish brown. At the end of the press run, we transferred
an impression from the key block onto a block of end-grain
maple. This transfer was accomplished by attaching a sheet
of Mylar to the impression cylinder of the press. The inked
surface of the key block was printed onto the Mylar. Then, the
key block was replaced in the bed of the press by the second,
blank block, and the impression of the key block (still wet ink
on the Mylar sheet) was printed onto the blank maple block.
The key block was then cut further and printed in a darker
color. Finally, second block was cut, leaving the entire shape
of the image, which was printed in a warm background color
over the previously printed colors.
Key block printed, re-cut, and printed again.
Volume 4, Number 1, Fall 2007
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