Don’t you love it when the bookcloth arrives?

Hello, you enormous roll of Windsor Elcho! Aren’t you just the perfect shade of burnt orange? Just in the background of all the teaching and my my work with Dave Allen on our population project, I’ve been working away on a project with Robert Stillman and Anna Fewster. My part of the puzzle? How to fit all of this:

into one cohesive enclosure. And then do it 50 times. This is all part of something called the Leap of Death bookwork, and you can read all about it on Robert’s blog. Here is an excerpt for you in Robert’s words:

“Much of my past year has been devoted to a project called ‘LEAP OF DEATH’– it’s a collaboration with printer Anna Fewster and book artist Sarah Bryant, creating a limited edition bookwork/LP in response to the ‘lost’ 1928 film ‘4 Devils’. We’ve been drawing inspiration from the mysterious, fragmented archival remnants of this film (production stills, promotional material, film scripts, etc.) to create an ‘impressionistic reconstruction’ of its narrative using original music, imagery, and text.”

I am loving working on this project. I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, but there are few things I find as satisfying as solving enclosure puzzles.  I’ve been known to make a box full of boxes. And sure, maybe I enjoy designing my ooh la la deluxe editions a little too much. And now, what’s this? A bunch of stuff of all different sizes to put into one simple enclosure? What, is it my birthday? My work with Anna and Robert started here with a huge clamshell box.

Now I like box making as much as anyone can, but the deadline for this project is the beginning of May and I just don’t have fifty enormous clamshell boxes in me right now. But more than that, the box above was a little dull, a little straightforward, and a little too much like a traditional record case rather than an enclosure for a project with a larger scope. I  made a few small scale models  to puzzle out how to give the ephemera a little more attention and cut down on the binding hours once the editioning began.

Some quick chats with Anna and Robert and we’ve landed in this neighborhood:

A quick meeting confirmed that we are all on the same page, and this week I began ordering materials. Which is why a massive amount of book cloth arrived today. Tomorrow I’ll be sitting on the stoop waiting for the postman to bring me 25 sheets of warm gray Hahnemuhle Bugra paper and some glassine. I am in delivery heaven, but of course I can’t leave the house until everything arrives. Blogtime!

As I write this, I know that Anna is madly letterpress printing the ephemera to be contained in this box. I have been enjoying all of my recent collaborative activity. That’s the story over here. Now it’s time for me to cut that bookcloth into 50 pieces. Stay tuned for more about this project when we bring it home. Over and out.