Home / Exhibitions & Events / Lectures and Public Programs

Upcoming Programs

Click to View the Spring 2013 Events Brochure

The Interdisciplinary Arts Department hosts year-round public programs.
Unless otherwise noted, all events take place at the Center for Book and Paper Arts, 1104 South Wabash Ave, 2^nd floor.

Marilyn Sward Visiting Artist Lecture: Jeffrey s. Peachey | Thursday, May 23, 6:00 p.m.
Visiting Artist Lecture: IsabEl BarAOna | Thursday, May 30, 6:00 p.m.
Third Annual Typography symposium | June 12–15, 2013
Artist Talk: Mary Hark | Thursday June 20, 6:00 p.m.
Artist Talk: Miller&Shellabarger | July 18, 6:00 p.m.
Artist Talk: Judith Berliner | July 25, 6:00 p.m.

Marilyn Sward Visiting Artist Lecture

Jeffrey S. Peachey
Book Boxes: Historic, Practical, and Artistic

Thursday, May 23, 6:30 p.m.,
1104 S. WABASH AVENUE, ROOM 205

Many rare, fine press, and artist books are housed in boxes for their protection and presentation. This talk will survey many styles of housing, from Ethiopian manuscript cases to the modern machine made corrugated clamshell. In the twentieth century, the drop spine box itself has become an element for artistic expression, often reflecting or commenting on its contents. Peachey will discuss a wide variety of innovative—and a few borderline insane—ways to box a book. This lecture is on the occasion of a concurrent community Drop Spine Cradle Box workshop.

Jeffrey S. Peachey is a book conservator and toolmaker. For more than 20 years, he has specialized in the conservation of books and paper artifacts for institutions and individuals as the owner of a New York City-based studio. He is Professional Associate in the American Institute for Conservation, has served as Chair of the Conservators In Private Practice, and was recently awarded the Sherman Fairchild Conservation Research Fellowship at The Morgan Library and Museum. He is the inventor of the Peachey Board Slotting Machine, which is used in conservation labs around the world. His most recent publication is “Beating, Rolling and Pressing: The Compression of Signatures in Bookbinding Prior to Sewing” in Suave Mechanicals: Essays in the History of Bookbinding, The Legacy Press, 2013.

Journal of Artists' Books Artist in Residence Lecture

Isabel Baraona

Thursday, May 30, 6:00 p.m.,
1104 S. WABASH AVENUE, ROOM 205 | event info + directions

Isabel Baraona graduated in Painting and Tridimensional Studies at LA Cambre, Brussels, Belgium, 2002. In 2011 she obtained a Ph.D. in Visual Arts with the research study Self-Portrait and Self-Representation, a Change of Paradigm in the Twentieth Century, in UPValência, Spain. She is a member of Oficina do Cego (2009), a graphic arts non-profit organization located in Lisbon. Baraona has been lecturing at ESAD.CR (Escola Superior de Arte e Design de Caldas da Raínha), Portugal, since 2003. She has exhibited her work since 2001, participating in several solo and group shows in Belgium, Portugal, Norway, and South Korea. More information is here.

3rd Annual Typography Symposium | June 12–15, 2013

CO-ORGANIZED WITH THE SOCIETY FOR TYPOGRAPHIC ARTS

June 12–15, 2013  

This annual event brings together leaders in the field of art and design for public programs addressing innovative topics in typography, design and history. Our topic this year, Signage and Street Typography, considers use of image and language in the public places, as well as the role of the artist's hand in lettering. Join the conversation by viewing our exhibition, Word on the Street, attending our panel discussion, Chicago's Street Typography, or taking our sign painting workshop with John Downer.

WEDNESDAY, JUNE 12

Panel Discussion
Lettering in Chicago: From the Street to the Gallery
Creative Go-Round, 345 North Canal St., Chicago Wednesday, June 12, 7:00–9:00 p.m. | Free
RSVP TO ERIN@sta-chicago.org

Chicago's streets are full of typographic inspiration with layers of new and weathered hand-painted signs. If you're lucky enough, you’ll spot freshly sprayed colorful bubbly lettered graffiti before it's buffed, or a piece of art intended to make you smile or convince you to change your mind. When it all comes together, these forms of typography make our urban landscape always changing and unique.

During this Design Week event we welcome Stephen Reynolds, Miguel Aguilar and Nick Adam and moderator Ryan McGovern of Design Chat to discuss the historic and current techniques of three forms of typography that we see on the streets of Chicago. We'll look at hand-painted signs, Chicago's rich influential graffiti scene, and artists who have used the street as their canvas to share a message instead of a gallery.

Nick Adam
Nick Adam’s work as a communication artist is focused on how audiences relate to messaging, environments and one other. He strives to create work that is positive, purpose-driven and powerful. See his website nickadam.us and his tumblr Like Signs.

Stephen Reynolds
Having earned degrees in the Fine Arts at the University of Michigan and the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, Stephen Reynolds later studied the art of lettering and gilding with a master sign painter in Chicago. He has completed sign painting commissions throughout the United States and Europe for major museums, cultural institutions, restaurants, businesses, and individual artists since 1985. Reynolds often works closely with architects, designers, artists, and project managers in the development of general concepts or specific layouts. His knowledge of typestyles, graphics, and period signs contributes to positive collaborative efforts.

Miguel Aguilar
Miguel ‘Kane One’ Aguilar is a graffiti artist, educator, and founder of Graffiti Institute. A Chicago native, he began painting graffiti in 1989. He’s installed works throughout the country and has become a historian of the social practice. Miguel holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts (2000) and a Masters of Art in Teaching (2011) from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, and was awarded a 3Arts Teaching Artist grant in 2012.

FRIDAY, JUNE 14

Exhibition Reception + Artist Talk
Word on the Street: Image, Language, Signage
June 14, 5:00–7:00 p.m.
Center for Book and Paper Arts, 1104 South Wabash Avenue | FREE

word

Word on the Street considers the expressive potential of image and language through signage: how do artists use the visual and physical characteristics of signage, along with its often site specific cultural currency, to create realms of poetic or political meaning in public space or the gallery? With a focus on forms of permanent and ephemeral signage this exhibition will consider artists' billboards, marquees, street signs, banners and posters among other forms of infrastructural signage. Artists include Superflex, Laura Kina, Chris Dorland, Mark Dean Veca, Joel Ross, Jason Thomas Pallas, Jaclyn Jacunski, Peter Liversidge, Jeffrey T. Jones, Jonathan Monk, Eric May, Steve Lambert, and Nicolas Lampert.

A Journeyman's Survey of 20th-Century American Sign Painting
June 14, 7:30 p.m.
Center for Book and Paper Arts, 1104 South Wabash Avenue | Free

John Downer has been a journeyman sign painter since 1973, a freelance typeface designer since 1983, and a crusader for designers’ rights his entire adult life in the lettering game. He has written about type and type history for various publications, and he is widely known as a perceptive type critic. His typefaces have been published by Bitstream, Font Bureau, Emigre, House Industries, and Design.

FRIDAY, JUNE 14–SATURDAY, JUNE 15

Workshop
Introduction to Sign Painting, with John Downer
Friday, June 14: 2:00–5:00 p.m.
Saturday, June 15: 9:00 a.m.–12:00 noon and 2:00–5:00 p.m.
Center for Book and Paper Arts, 1104 South Wabash Avenue

$75 for students, $150 STA members, $200 for non-members | Limit 20 students

Please register through the Society of Typographic Arts.

John Downer’s sign painting career began in the late 1960s and was instrumental in steering his path toward type design. In this introductory course, he will teach the two main kinds of letterform construction which have traditionally been done with a brush: single-stroke and built-up. Students will learn the importance of paint consistency and brush control. The class will focus on rendering a few particular styles of capital letters that were commonly used in American sign painting during the 20th century. Script lettering will not be addressed.

Artist Talk

Mary Hark 

Thursday, June 20, 6:00 p.m.
1104 South Wabash Avenue, Room 205 

Madison-based papermaker and artist Mary Hark will discuss her practice in relation to her community workshop Garden Papers.  

Artist in Residence Lecture

Miller&Shellabarger

Thursday, July 18, 6:00 p.m.
1104 South Wabash Avenue, Room 205

Based in Chicago, where they are represented by Western Exhibitions, Dutes Miller & Stan Shellabarger work collaboratively and independently, producing interdisciplinary works in sculpture, performance, artists' books, prints and installation that investigates the body in relation to gender and sexuality. For their residency, they will produce a suite of hand made papers with watermarks depicting their full bodies in silluets. This work grows out of their ongoing "garlands" which are cut paper silhouettes made from folded paper. Their work has been shown internationally and supported by Artadia, the Peter S. Reed Foundation, and the Louis Comfort Tiffany Foundation.

Artist Talk

Judith Berliner
Coming Full Circle: A History in Print

Thursday, July 25, 6:00 p.m.
1104 South Wabash Avenue, Room 205

Judith Berliner will chronical her own journey, and some of the do's and don'ts of being in business: Taking jobs that are a good fit with the equipment you have, and the different functions of letterpress.

2013 Programs Archive
2012 Programs Archive
2011 Programs Archive
2010 Programs Archive