Books, Design and Culture
After organizing their bookcase at home, Sean Ohlenkamp and his wife Lisa Blonder Ohlenkamp have now done a beautiful job of ‘organizing’ the shelves of Toronto independent bookstore Type Books on Queen Street West:
Lovely.
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A trailer for a short film by Greg Durrell about Canadian graphic designer and painter Burton Kramer to be released in Spring 2012:
Durrell has also published a book about Kramer’s design work called Burton Kramer Identities.
(via Swiss Legacy)
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In the first of a new podcast series from Quill and Quire, web editor Sue Carter Flinn talks with C. S. Richardson, vice-president and creative director at Random House Canada, about his 30-year career in book design:
Quillcast: C. S. Richardson mp3
Comments closedIn this short film, Nicholas Kennedy proprietor of Trip Print Press in Toronto talks about the process of printing with letterpress and running a print shop:
(via Tania)
Comments closedGoing to the library is one of my earliest memories. I don’t remember much about the books, but I remember the building — its steps and its smell — and I remember the funny pinkish orange library tickets for children. I think I could take out three books at once.
I also remember that the library was not that close to where we first lived. We must have gone on the bus. It was surely an adventure for me, but a pain for my parents.
We’re more fortunate now. My family and I can walk to the library. It takes about 5 minutes — longer if we are distracted by a friendly dog or the need to jump off a wall.
I borrow picture books and music for their kids; books, comics, DVD and CDs for me. I request most of things from the library website. I can do it whenever something comes to mind or I read about it online. The books (and it is mostly books if I am honest) come from libraries across the city and I get a call at home when they arrive at my branch. I don’t know how many books I can borrow at once — I’ve never hit my limit (not for lack of trying, however) — but I must have at least 7 or 8 things out at the moment. It is an amazing service.
Our library is always busy — no matter the time of day — with people of all ages and from all walks of life. Some, like me, are borrowing books, movies or music. Others are reading newspapers and magazines. Some are making use of the programs that the library runs. Some are using the only computers they probably have any access to.
But here in Toronto, as in many towns and cities in the UK and US, library cuts are now being seriously discussed by politicians who do not appreciate their value to neighbourhoods and who apparently wouldn’t recognise Margaret Atwood on the street. It is hard to imagine they have visited to a library recently, let alone made use of its services.
On yesterday’s CBC news show The Current there was a lengthy and interesting discussion of libraries and their future. Contributors included librarian Ken Roberts, local councillor Sarah Doucette, and Julia Donaldson, the UK’s Children’s Laureate and author of The Gruffalo:
CBC RADIO THE CURRENT: Whither the Library?
If you live in Toronto, you can sign an online petition in support of the public library system here.
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Toronto-based designer Ingrid Paulson has designed these four covers for a new paperback reprint series called ‘Backlit’ to be published by ECW Press this fall.
Lovely stuff.
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Continuing today’s theme of being late to everything, I just finished reading Moving Pictures by Kathryn and Stuart Immonen.
Published in 2010 by Top Shelf, the book was heralded on a lot of best of the year lists and it’s been sitting in my ‘to read’ pile for months.
I’m sorry I waited so long. It is wonderful…
Dave Howard interviewed Kathryn and Stuart Immonen about the book for The Torontoist last year.
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Is this the cover in the painting?
Certainly a lot of people seem to think so and some things do fit. Titus Groan is, of course, the first book in the Gormenghast trilogy by Mervyn Peake, and this particular Penguin Modern Classics edition was, I believe, first published in 1974. The drawing on the cover (by Mervyn Peake?) is also somewhat similar stylistically to the work of Balthus, mentioned in the title of the painting, so that would make sense I suppose.
However, the features of the faces do not look particularly alike — the features in the painting are more angular — and the hair/shadow to the left of the face on the book cover is notably absent on the cover in the painting. The mood of both seem quite different (to me at least). Can this simply down to artistic license or painterly technique on the part of Hagan?
Other compelling suggestions have been thin on the ground. T.E. Lawrence’s The Mint has been suggested, and there are some similarities to the cover of The Waves by Virginia Woolf, but neither seems quite right and they do not fit with the trilogy alluded to in the title.
There may never be a definitive answer — the artist, Frederick Hagan, died in 2003 — but please let me know if you have any further suggestions or thoughts.
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Do you recognise these books?
Plant, Trilogy and Balthus is going to be part of an exhibition on the work of Canadian painter Frederick Hagan (1918–2003) at the MacLaren Art Centre this summer and curator Ben Portis would like your helps identifying the Penguin paperbacks in the picture (click the image above for a closer look).
The only other clues we have are that the books form a trilogy and were published prior to 1982.
If you recognise the books or have any further thoughts or suggestions, please leave a comment below or drop me a line and I’ll pass them on to Ben.
Here are the full details of the painting:
Plant, Trilogy and Balthus, 1982
Frederick Hagan (Canadian, 1918–2003)
oil on hardboard
40.4 x 60.6 cm
Thanks!
In this really nice short video for The Toronto Comics Art Festival, local cartoonists talk about their tools of choice:
(via Drawn!)
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