LPF2012, running at The Leeds Gallery, was an intelligently curated
programme of events running over four days bringing together
small printers, designers and makers, to celebrate print media. It
was an exciting and thought-provoking weekend, and, hopefully
the first of many. The gallery, a new commercial art space, is sited
in a growing cultural quarter which includes Cafe 164, The West
Yorkshire Playhouse, Duke Street Studios, and ethical music venue
Wharf Chambers, in the Lower Kirkgate area.
For us the weekend started with Friday night’s opening party. Chris
Lestaret, whose live demo stall was set up under Mick Marston’s
gory silk-screened images of kittens in a bathtub beheading other
kittens with a saw, was helping all-comers get stuck into making
their own lino cuttings, and we were at the next table with our 8x5
Adana printing press.
Both stalls were incredibly popular. Drinks sloshed around in glasses
while members of the increasingly boozy crowd did their best to
run our press one-handed (not recommended, by the way). “It’s
like getting a present!” one woman said joyfully, as she lifted her
“I Printed This!” card out of the machine.
Sunday was a more relaxed affair with talks from
two designers and a printer. Generation Press
from Brighton showed how it’s possible to run
an ecologically-sound printing business, whilst
producing a range of high-quality printed items,
bringing to mind our friends at Leeds’ Footprint
Workers Co-op. Later Si Scott explained how he
produces his intricate hand-drawn type treatments,
(which are nothing short of mindblowing). Anthony
Burrill’s witty work is produced through a variety
of different media, from the humble photocopier
to giant letterpress wood blocks. His screenprinted
‘oil and water do not mix’ poster was printed using
actual oil from the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill – an
example of how a simple poster and a pro-active
process can raise awareness of global issues.
If LPF2012 did one thing, it showed that print is still very much
alive and constantly being redefined and reused in ever exciting
ways. From five year old kids printing on an ‘outmoded’ Adana
letterpress to retired compositors re-visiting the changes they’ve
witnessed in the printing industry, LPF2012 put smiles on people’s
faces and, we’d like to think, inspired them into picking up the
‘printing glove’ to produce their own printed matter. Hats off to
the LPF2012 team for taking the first step in what we hope will be
an ongoing celebration of creativity for the region.
The Print Project, Bradford
Photographs: Ricky Adam
“A Print Festival? What’s that, some kind of weird fetish event?”
The words “Print’s not Dead” were buzzing around all weekend,
especially at Saturday’s print fair. A variety of stalls showed
the wide-ranging possibilities of print, from cute typewriter
drawings to representations of time and space in book form. In
one corner, the Salford Zine Library stall showed what happens
when people print for love. Curator Craig John Barr had brought
zines covering subjects from the effect of social networking on
mental health, to menstruation, to bike riding, showing the truly
egalitarian nature of this form of publishing.
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