Wednesday, 14 April 2010
Tuesday, 30 March 2010
ENSIXTEEN EDITIONS - THE BOOKS - 'bio auto graphic': Lettering From America Part 2 - 2006
This last volume – of the set I later dubbed the 'You, Nighted States' issues – sees us starting in Boston before heading to Mette's old stomping grounds in Nashua, New Hampshire and then on to Northampton, Massachusetts.
We enjoyed the unstinting hospitality and good spirits of friends old and new, stood on mountain tops, sampled indigenous art and food and beers.
As passengers we enjoyed the open freeways of New England, with the hint of a cooler season in the air as our time dwindled.
At Smith College we visited for the closure of an exhibition of artist's books, one Monday lunchtime, and met a man who would become a dear friend (as detailed in another set of books to come in 2008).
As we spent a final night in Boston, before a return to NYC for our flight home, the weather closed in and the edge of distant Hurricane Katrina brushed the North East.
The trilogy ends with a quote from Sgt. Phil Esterhaus, stalwart of the Hill Street precinct, as played by Michael Conrad (1925 - 1983) in 'Hill Street Blues':
'You have declared your faith in society. Keep that faith and it will keep you.'
ENSIXTEEN EDITIONS - THE BOOKS - 'bio auto graphic': Lettering From America Part 1 - 2005/6
This 2nd part tells of our unforgettable stay in Manhattan.
Despite all our time together we had never had the finances to really travel anywhere so significantly distant and for any length of time. Things had changed for the better and we revelled in the chance.
A classic rooftop water tower, framed in the window of our hotel room as I raised the blinds for the first time, supplied a signature icon for what lay ahead.
We pounded the baking pavements, North to South, East to West, walking through the language of popular culture, with cricked necks and enjoyably sore feet.
The definitive 21st century urban experience.
The Human Experiment.
An American dream?
In 1987 I had stood at the top of a tall, tall tower and looked across the world.
We walked to where that tower fell, feeling numbed by the enormity of events, alive and uneasy at the hawkers selling their Disaster Porn memorabilia.
After the London Bombings the place was on a heightened level of security. Men in full combat uniform, heavily armed, patrolled the streets down between the towers that remained.
We finally headed North on the train, the glittering sea to our right as we headed through Connecticut to Boston.
ENSIXTEEN EDITIONS - THE BOOKS - 'bio auto graphic': 'I, in the sky' Issue 2005
This 1st volume - of what turned out to be three - put down thoughts about an outbound trip made to the United States by myself and Danish designer and book artist Mette-Sofie D. Ambeck.
I had long been fascinated with this extraordinary country - since as a small child watching 1950's horror movies like 'Them', to the avalanche of US sci-fi and cop shows like 'The Invaders' and ' The Streets of San Francisco' and my eventual immersion in the pages of Stan Lee's Marvel Comics.
I had visited before (Washington and New York), but not for 17 years. Mette had contacts in New Hampshire and I had an old friend in Massachusetts, but we planned to begin in New York.
The experience of the flight out there proved sufficiently thought-provoking to occupy the 1st volume all on its own.
It was produced to be read backwards - that is to say the spine is on your right as you access the pages and you read right page to left. Was I turning Japanese? Well, this was actually to mirror the travel across Atlantic from East to West - a detail that tickled my mild OCD. In the end, a slight dislocation in the reading suited the sentiment throughout that we were stepping through a cultural looking glass of sorts.
Drawn months after the bombings on the London Underground, the book references those events, their connection to World Policing of the period (post Twin Towers) and also the fragile, fractured state of the English national identity in the face of US 'cultural bleed' in lifestyle since my last visit in 1987.
The book ends as Mette and I arrive in NYC - Big Apple Numero Uno.
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