The "Ryman" Style

I just finished a poster for an event in North Carolina called "Experience Hendrix". The poster looked great and I have got a ton of positive criticism for my use of color as well as the use of negative space, and the cleanliness of the image. The person ordering the design wanted a poster in the style of the Ryman Auditorium.

The Ryman is a place that was originally created for religious sermons, but eventually became the home of the Grand Ole Opry. Hatch Show Print has a long history with the Ryman, and the Ole Opry. In fact, there is an entire case at Hatch dedicated to Grand Ole Opry images. Last weekend when my family came to town, we toured the Ryman and got to stand on the same stage that country legends-and a bunch of tourists-have stood on.

Upstairs at the Ryman is a hallway of Hatch Show Prints. Most of them(or maybe all, I forgot)are signed by the artists they promote. Some of them are really great prints, some of them are mediocre, but they all have the "Ryman Style".

What is the Ryman Style anyway? That is the same thing I asked myself as I opened the folder for the Experience Hendrix assignment. The difference is that a traditional Hatch poster is very wordy, little negative space, and is usually used to advertise something in particular, while a Ryman show poster is more about art, and is used as a collectors item or souvenir bought at the event instead of advertising the event.

My next assignment is to design a poster for the "Jammin' to beat the Blues" concert. It is a benefit for the Mental Health Association of Middle Tennessee. This show is at the Ryman, but they did not ask for "the Ryman Style". This is because it is less about the souvenir, or artistic aspect of the show and more about the advertising of the event. It is a very basic, 2 color print, with a lot of text like a traditional Hatch Show Print poster. Because of this it may not end up on the wall of the Ryman with an autograph on it, but it is still cool to think about the long Ryman/Hatch tradition that I am becoming a part of. To see more of the Ryman's Hatch collection click here

Keeping Track of Everything

I am learning a lot about Nashville during my time here. For example: If you threw 2 rocks anywhere in Nashville, there is a pretty good chance you will hit a Musician, or a Hatch Show Print poster. Tonight we saw a man wearing a shirt at Burger King that had the same image as one of the posters in the back. There are prints in the restaurants, the bars, the shops, the museums, EVERYWHERE! The same with musicians, only replace museums and shops with street corners.

In addition to learning a lot, we are also doing a ton of stuff! There is always something going on, and 9 times out of 10 I can bike to it. Because there is so much going on I have decided that I would keep a pocket journal/sketchbook, of events of interest during my internship. It is so small that at the end of the night I can whip it out and write down the days events without having to log into blogspot to do it(sorry blogspot, I'm sort of a Luddite!).

The above image is an example of what kind of stuff will be going into the book. I think that is will be a nice reminder of the time spent in Nashville. Maybe someday when I am old and out of my head I will look at the page posted above and have my memory jogged about the wonderful day I spent with my family and friends doing cartwheels at the Parthenon in Centennial Park, or maybe I will look at the chicken scratch on the page and say to my grandkids: "What the hell is this? Can't you see I'm watching the Price is Right?!?!"

Either way, so far I have a pretty good list of the places and things I have witnessed while in Nashville, as well as sketches, and lists of the prints that I have printed while at Hatch.

Appropriation.

This image taken from World Famous Design Junkies is a part of a larger post that explores the ideas of appropriation. Appropriation is a beautiful, and confusing thing. Sometimes it is good to borrow the ideas of others when you share a similar view. Sometimes, you are just a rip-off artist.

In the case of the above concert poster, it is a playful tribute to the history of the concert poster. Why did I choose this image? Because the Silas Green poster is a Hatch Show Print poster. This image has a lot of history, and it is interesting to know so much about the origin of this image in particular, and see how it is appropriated. Be sure to check the link above and see the rest of the appropriated images, it really is cool to see the way people are influenced by certain aspects of print culture.

The Future of Letterpress.

Hello. Long Time no See!

I realize I haven't posted in a while, and for that, I apologize. Things have been busy! We have been making prints and seeing the sights. I would love to tell you all about everything, but I have to go to work soon.

Here's a quick breakdown without pictures. Please forgive me! I will try to make it up to you!

Went to the Road To Bonnaroo concert @ the Mercy Lounge (the bands all ended up getting crappy reviews in the NASHVILLE SCENE

Went to the Art Of Protest show at Vanderbilt University

Saw Ben Sollee and Daniel Martin Moore perform and in store @ Grimey's record store

Saw a lecture by Stanley Hainsworth @ Lipscomb University

Had a drink @ the 12 South taproom and grill. Which had an entire wall of Hatch posters.

Friday I went directly from Hatch Show Print and back to Louisville. Celebrated Kara's Birthday

Saturday and Sunday I worked at my retail job and then tried to hang out with as many people as possible. I mostly succeeded. Sunday driving back home, I was pulled over for going 81 in a 70. Also I was sick all weekend.

Monday we went to Beyond the Edge to watch the Blazers beat Memphis, then to the 5 Spot for their monday dance party "Keep on Moving" People were dancing, I was listening to the music. 50's & 60's rock and soul.

As far as the internship itself goes, we got our first real clients! I was excited to find that mine was a band called The Low Anthem. I have never heard of them, but watch the video below, and get a feel for their sound. Sometimes it sounds real rough like this, which I love, but they also go to the other extreme with real nice quiet smooth vocal folk stuff. I believe they were described to me as being a "folk rock trio"



They loved my design, but the color scheme was the hard part to pin down. It started with red or brown and ended up being yellow or blue. Then I had to do a linoleum cut of a windmill which was a lot of fun! Yesterday I proofed everything, and it looks great. I mixed up a nice blue similar to the one seen on the cover in the video, and the text will be black. Don't worry. I'm taking pics of the entire process so I can show you guys after the client gets to see it and sell it first.

My next project is for an event called Experience Hendrix. Yeah, that's right, a Jimi Hendrix poster. I think I will be a little less traditional.

Art of Protest: A Review

One time at UofL we had a show that I am pretty sure was simply called "Dissent". It was a good show. Tons of political works wheatpasted to the walls. They even had some stuff by Shepard Fairey in the show.

Well tonight, I thought that I would be treated to a similar experience at Vanderbilt University's Divinity School. The Divinity School had an opening reception tonight for a show titled "Art of Protest". I didn't know what the Divinity School even was, but I just assumed that was the name of their art building. It isn't. It is a school for religion, and houses their religion grad program. What this has to do with art I do not know, especially the art of protest.

Thank goodness it wasn't in the school's art department. The exhibit could have been called "Art of Art" because while some of the work was politically charged, a lot of people's art is, but I wouldn't call it "protest art".

Many works, such as the George Bush portrait made out of matches and matchbooks, would have fit in great during the 2004 election, while others seemed like fine pieces of art, but hardly seemed to protest anything. Some dealt with race relations, some dealt with consumerism, some dealt with the way/the things we eat, but I never really got the Protest vibe.

These were just the way these people feel about the subjects. That's what most artists do. Externalize the internal. I guess when I hear "Protest" I think sit-ins, fliers, t-shirts, and giant signs, maybe a folk singer. It's as if the curator(s) of the show had lumped protest work with general artistic emotion. That is to say that any work that strayed away from technical skill to that place of conceptual thought, was considered protest.*

I am not critiquing the artists in the show at all though. Every artist there brought their "A" game. Everyone's work looked very solid technically as well as conceptually, and the works ranged from very traditional paintings, drawings, a few video works, amazing print work by Sue Coe, as well as some work that incorporated found objects.

I think that the best way to remedy the lack of a "protest vibe" would have been to include an artist statement, or a short description of the particular piece. When Bob Dylan started singing protest songs, he used powerful imagery, but it was catchy enough and easy enough to read that you got the message. With these works the meaning behind them often seemed so esoteric, that it was impossible for me to decode what exactly the artist was protesting. Was the explosive vest made from crayola crayons a statement about child soldiers? Was it a comment on the loss of innocence in war-torn Countries? I don't know.

Its a really nice show, but if you go, don't go in thinking "art school protest show". The work is quality, but the organization of the show under the banner of "Protest" was just bad marketing.

*I guess thinking, could be a form of protest(1984?), but that means every art show would be a protest art show, so as deep as that may be getting, I don't think that's where they were going with that.

Images From My First Week @ Hatch Show Print

The first week has come to an end, and what a week it was. I learned how to spot Franklin Gothic and other fonts, how to use a pantone book, run a vandercook letter press, how to measure in picas and points, what a serif is, how to read type upside down and backwards with no problem, and all kinds of other printmaking and design oriented stuff. On an un-printmaking related note, I also learned how Jack Daniel's is distilled while touring the distillery in Lynchburg.
This image shows a typical job in progress, or a job being dismantlement by interns. Since we have not done any jobs ourselves, this one is probably being put back. Each letter, and piece of metal or wood (rigglets)must be put back into their original drawer. There are drawers(cases) and shelves of type everywhere in the shop, and a lot of it is very small.
Here, intern Harry runs a Vandercook press to do a re-strike of the Hatch Cats Poster. A re-strike is when an existing poster is reprinted. Usually this is done with the older posters that are used for sale to the general public one at a time.
On this Vandercook press, ink is aplied to the top vibrating roller which distributes the ink to the other rollers. When the wheel is turned the ink is rolled onto the block (seen here already inked) then the paper is locked onto the drum and rolls over the image creating with enough pressure to create the print.
The final product. These posters seem to be quite popular. Between 4 interns we printed over 400 of these.
Michaela and David were assigned to decorate this birdhouse for a charity auction. All the images on the house were made from print proofs which are called make-readys in Hatch speak. I would let my birds live there.
100 print order+2colors+the start up fee=$350...I hope she said "Yes"
Oh you can use GOJO, and soap and water, but sometimes that ink just doesn't come off! I still have blue under my fingernails from Friday.
HUEY THE HUGE!! He is fat, loves attention, and drools. He reminds me of my cat Danger back in Louisville.
Bethany Taylor designed this poster and printed the orange/yellow background. I printed the black.
I forget who did the blue, but here is the final product.Friday was an interesting day. We put up lots of type, I printed re-strikes for Alrico stunt shows, and the radio show "American Routes" came in to record. I think that I messed up the Alrico assignment.

The colors were inconsistent, either because I had to mix up a new batch of ink which was not quite like the other, or because the ink was running low on some of them and they turned out lighter. The colors printed for the background before we got there were also inconsistent which led to the borders being off on some of them. Instead of resetting the furniture(pieces of wood used to keep the plate in place on the press) I decided to print straight through them all because the 2 colors still lined up at the same border which would have still made it the same size poster when we trimmed them.

Speaking of borders! When NPR was doing their interviews with Jim and touring the shop recording we decided to step out for a long lunch next door at a place called Bailey's. We played ping pong, pool, and watched the Olympics for a while just to stay out of their hair.


After lunch we walked back and they were still recording. Jim and the NPR people walked over to me printing (the only one printing at the time)and Jim asked me how the re-strike was coming along. As soon as I opened my mouth to talk about the way in which I had to adjust the border about 1 pica to the left, this fuzzy microphone was there in my face. They cut, and Jim told me I needed to say it again, but really describe it for the radio audience. No pressure or anything. I tried again and probably sounded a lot more nervous than I did the first time. It threw me for a loop, and my smooth moves at the press where thrown off. The lady kept recording the sounds of me applying ink, and the sound of me making prints. It was pretty cool. I am excited to hear the show. Brad says stuff like this happens probably once a month.

In addition to the NPR people, tour groups kept coming through the studio and taking pictures of everything, including me printing. It is interesting, and also a little unnerving to be the center of attention like that. With all of this excitement around all the time, I wonder if it ever gets old.

The rest of the time spent outside of the internship was spent hanging with the other interns, or hanging at home mostly. I ride my bike almost 4 miles a day 5 days a week and yesterday we went to the Jack Daniel's distillery and then saw a show at The Basement on 8th st.

Having a wonderful time, wish you were here.