We made this handprinted letterpress poster across two impressions. The first from a chase of historic woodtype, set by hand. The second from a laser-engraved plate. Re-inked between each pass, every sheet finding the balance between too much pressure and too little.
BOOM CHICKA BOOM. The sound Johnny Cash’s backing band made. That rolling, train-track rhythm underneath everything. He named his 76th album after it in 1990.
The word “chicka” started as a scan of a letterpress print of smaller woodtype, reworked digitally and composed alongside a halftone of Cash, then engraved into a single plate. Old type feeding new type.
Run your fingers across the woodtype letters and you’ll feel where the borers have been. Tiny tracks eaten through the endgrain, decades before the woodtype ever met our ink. Next to that, the laser plate sits clean and precise. Both surfaces carrying the image.
DIPLOMACY BY THE BARREL.
Four words about fuel, power, and foreign policy. The kind of commentary you can make on a poster that tends to get rinsed out in the digital landscape. Nobody can throttle it, flag it, or bury it. It just says what it says
Once you understand relief printing, the tools are everywhere. A laser engraver, a lino block, a carved piece of timber. The wood and lead type goes back in the container with us. The principle stays with you.
We’re at
@toowoombaartsociety this weekend 16th & 17th May with Handset, a two-day typographic workshop. Saturday and Sunday, 10am to 3pm. You’ll set type, lock up a forme, ink, register, and print your own edition from our Pop-Up Press. Three spots left out of eight. Link in bio or find Clint Harvey @ MTS on Eventbrite.
#letterpress #woodtype #reliefprinting #printmaking #artascommentary
