Since I began my career in a printing workshop in Darlington in 1956 I haven't been able to separate my work from the heavy, industrial machinery of the letterpress, the Linotype machine, and the rough-cut letterblocks that have permeated throughout my work to this day. Letterpress printing is a method of typographic reproduction from a 'relief' printing surface, which is inked by a roller and then paper pressed onto the surface to give a printed image.
A-Z of Letter Press
I'm lucky enough to have my studio in my home in Kennington, South London, so every other room has become an extension of my practice, where I've held exhibitions, talks and performances. I wouldn't call myself a collector, despite having the biggest collection of wood type in the Western world, and if you walk into my studio you'll see the walls, shelves and draws are filled with letterblocks. It is not a collection as such, as it is my raw material. I make all my images from these tools by hand, and that is inherent to my practice as a typographer.
When design began to go digital in the late 1980s there was a general feeling among designers to invest in what is now seen as quite primitive technology, but was a sign of huge changes in the future of design. I couldn't just sit at a desk and design something; the physical process of printing was all I knew, and I couldn't imagine making work without a letterpress. For me, it's the awkwardness and unyielding nature of the material, and the fact I hand-ink the type surface, that gives such a lively and tactile appearance to the finished image. So in 1988, I left Omnific, a Design studio, to work on my own. When asked what I planned to do next I simply said "I want to buy the press and the type and go and print". I then acquired about £26,000 worth of type and presses and haven't looked back since!
The 'Art of Typography' is the setting and disposition of types (fonts) in various combination to convey a text and or message in a powerful and meaningful way. Therefore, when I design or sketch out a print, I often choose a play on words, or correspond the weight of the meaning of the word to the colours used, for example, when I designed a mural for the foyer at the Guardian offices in the early 2000s. Whenever I visited The Guardian I was struck by the large expanse of bare wall in the reception area, and saw it as the ideal place for a typographic mural. I then dissected the original Manchester Guardian's 1821 manifesto which set forth the principles of the newspaper. I chose seven words - 'spirited', zealously, 'liberty', 'unbiased', 'boldly', 'accuracy' and 'debates' - that would convey the essence of the paper's ambitions, and used each as the centrepiece of seven items of letterpress artwork.
One of my favourite prints is Musical Types, from a series I collaborated on with my late wife, Celia, Entertaining Types. It's a collage inspired by a billboard site with overlapping torn posters, where you end up with a history site of what's been displayed, and what's been seen over the years. Each word is either the first or second name of one the heroes we love to hear, depending on what we know them by, for example Hendrix isn't known as 'Jimi', Dylan isn't known as 'Bob' and I always refer to Billie Holliday as just 'Billie'. There's a rationale behind the composition of the piece, as I thought of it as which name would be torn off, and where that name would be on the original poster.
With all my work I try to find the logic behind each decision, and this goes back to the nature of the very stubborn qualities of using wood type. Each letter has a measurement, and if you want to change the size, you have to physically cut the letters, and type gets spaced apart into unorthodox compositions. So finding logic and reason behind colour, placement and composition is what I find really interesting.
Alan Kitching: A Life In Letterpress by John L. Waters is published by Laurence King and only available from their website. Limited Edition £75, Collector's Edition £200. Visit LaurenceKing.com and search "Exclusives."