Printing, Binding, & Lil' Wayne

I disappeared over the holidays for several reasons. One of those was that Anthony and I were working on the most amazing project of all time. We compiled all of the hip-hop tracks from the Billboard Hot 100 for every year from 1993 to the present. Getting all of the music took forever, then the track and artist names had to be formatted. I also went through and tagged all of the songs for easy organization in iTunes. Massive undertaking. But that's not all, folks. We also screenprinted posters for a few friends. The background text is (most of) the track and artist names from the compilation. The main copy is the title of the compilation, but more importantly it's how we feel about our friends. I was thrilled about how the project turned out, and so happy to send these little packages out to people I love.

This was my first time screenprinting on paper or with multiple screens so Anthony's experience was clutch. We printed on a craft paper, which I love the look of, but came with its own set of issues. Not only was the paper uneven, but it came off of a roll, so curling was a big issue (I ♥ masking tape). The first layer was originally intended to be a vivid turquoise acrylic mixed with screen printing medium (a method that allows you to get a lot of colors you can't otherwise get, and more cheaply than buying some of the nicer screenprinting inks). The ink ended up on the thin side, though, and as it was the middle of the night and we really needed to get printing, we changed colors. The heavier body of the white we switched to made wrinkles in the paper less of an issue.

I'm really looking forward to more screen printing projects, but I think I'll wait till I have a little more space to dedicate to the activity. Doing it all in someone else's house without a proper studio was not ideal. So in the meantime I've been working on some smaller scale paper projects, including different sized portfolios based on one that caught my eye at an art store last week. The largest one I'm working on is for 11"x17" paper. Above is a half-sheet (5.5" x 8.5") test run that I did prior to starting on the big one. Digging it.

Moleskine Re-Pimp

Say "hello" to my (re)refreshed Moleskine. The spine of this little trooper was threatening to give out so I gave him a facelift. Plus it gave me an excuse to trade out the green endpapers (from last year's fix/pimp) for yellow ones. Pantone^® may find it passé, but I'm still about it.

This was my second attempt to fix this particular issue, so I'm extra proud that it turned out so fly. On the first go the book cloth refused to adhere to the cover. This time I scored the cover along the perimeter of the to-be-recovered area and (carefully) peeled away the black plastic-y stuff, leaving exposed book board. Problem solved. Moleskine pimped. Fresh as fuck.

International

My dad's immigration file is a stack of photocopies of photocopies of forms and typewritten letters. Halfway through the pile is his application for permanent residency, followed by another sheet that's blank except for this picture. ID photos for the application. I love the look on his face and the quality of the image.

I requested his file during my attempt to get Italian citizenship, an effort which proved unnecessary, since I've apparently had dual citizenship all along. Since I got my Italian passport a couple of summers ago, I haven't really thought much about taking advantage of it. Moving out of the country has been a hazy, unforeseeable future daydream. I started thinking about it more concretely today, though. While I was looking up information about binding, I found a book arts program in London. Of course the tuition for international students puts the program completely out of my reach. But tuition for UK and EU citizens is only a third of that. I've already started my application.

Procrastination

Per usual I have gotten a lot of useless things done over the last couple of days when there were plenty of important tasks I should have been about. Once I finished modding my moleskine, I slapped PVA and paper onto anything that would stand still. I ended up with a small softcover notebook for the trip, so my important one doesn't get ruined, and I put a new cover on a completely hideous and useless large notebook, just because it was sitting there. The moleskine has new endpapers, ribbon/bookmark, a new pocket, and (!!!) elastic bands on the spine to hold a pen.



I'm relatively certain that I have everything I need for tomorrow, though I'll have to leave some errands for a trustworthy friend, and I'll be making phone calls during layovers. With all the time changes and everything, I leave on the morning of the 1st, and don't arrive in Colombo until 2am on the 3rd. I haven't gotten a full night's sleep, or anywhere close to it, in longer than I can remember, though, so I'm looking forward to tons of that. When I arrive, I'll medicate myself into the appropriate level of wake fullness and hopefully avoid most of the jet lag. Just talking about this is making me too tired to go on. Nap time.