From 23rd to 25th May 2024 TYPA centre was hosting the annual Association of European Printing Museums (AEPM) conference, bringing together print museums, print artists, researchers and enthusiasts from across Europe and on a global scale. Over three days conversations, lessons and exchanges will contribute to the active survival and exchange of knowledge. Moreover, this year Tartu was declared the European Capital of Culture so I had one more reason to travel to this charming city ;)
Wednesday. 22.05.
Since many participants had already travelled to Tartu a day earlier, the organization hosted a film screening. The featured film 'Elu ja armastus' (Life and Love), directed by Helen Takkin (EE) and based on the novel of the same name by A.H. Tammsaare takes us to the center of an unexpected love story set during the 1930s. Apparently many scenes of the film were shot between the printing presses of the TYPA museum. Something the museum is very proud of.
Thursday. 23.05.
The first day of the conference in the TYPA museum starts with a fun 'meet & greet' session and a 'tote bag' printing workshop. And this on the Dingler hand press, the oldest cast iron hand press in the TYPA collection. This model was created in 1837 by the German entrepreneur Christian Dingler. Although Dingler himself called the press "Zweibrücken press", after the German city where the press was built, it became famous in Europe under his own name. Such presses are often called Gutenberg presses, as they resemble the printing press made by Johannes Gutenberg in the middle of the 15th century. The press is used daily in TYPA for tours and workshops. And today Eva from Upupæpop (CZ) was in charge of printing the tote bags.
The space of the TYPA centre consists of a papermaking workshop with a gallery, an enclosed space for typesetting equipment such as Monotype and Linotype (including a Soviet model), a bookbinding workshop and an open workshop with various printing presses and a collection of wood and metal type, in Latin and Cyrillic. There was a clear distinction between the unique collection pieces and the letters that may be used for the workshops or by the artists. At 4 p.m. there was a tour by a museum employee where we learned more about how the museum works. About the fact that every employee/volunteer of the museum was trained to guide visitors. How, years ago, they began to collect printing presses without knowing exactly how they work, how they have already moved four times and how far they've got right now. What a fantastic example of dedication to the craft! After the tour, there was some time to get to know the participants (visitors and speakers) and to greet old acquaintances. An official opening followed at 6 p.m.: a speech by the chairman Stefan Soltek of Klingspoor Museum in Offenbach (DE), followed by the opening of the exhibition of Oleksiy Chekal (UA) organised by Mart Anderson (EE) and Valentyna Bochkovska (UA). Since Oleksiy was not allowed to leave the country, his friend Mart took on the practical duties regarding the exhibition. In the end, Stefan Soltek warmly thanked the TYPA employees for all the work they had done to ensure everything ran smoothly. Applause! And now it's time for dinner in the cosy and sunny outdoor courtyard of the museum. The time for the conversations about printmaking and typography and all this under the Estonian music vibes that we still need to get to know better.
Friday. 24.05.
The morning kicked off with the annual meeting of AEPM, accompanied by a presentation (5 minutes) given by the members of AEPM where they could tell about future projects. After these short talks by me, Armina Ghazaryan (Industriemuseum, BE), Madis Mikkor (TYPA, EE), Ineta Vaivode (The National Library of Latvia, LT), Knut Ketil Oftendal (Kunstprentverket, NO), Sarah Zabel (Guttenberg museum, DE) and a coffee break, the official program has begun. The first speakers of the day, Ion and Dana Georgescu (RO), told us about running a paper mill and about social engagement within their community. 'Moara de hartie' (Paper Mill) was founded in 2009 when they took over various printing and bookbinding materials. In 2011 they moved to Comana where all their activities currently take place. In 2016, six more Romanian traditional craft workshops were added to form the Crafts Village. Since 2020, it also has had a kitchen, a certified social enterprise that provides food to visitors and also offers free food to vulnerable people from the community. 'Moara de hartie' functions as an NGO, where they own their properties and have an efficient way to keep this company running, with already 14 employees so far: through educational projects, production of print work, handmade paper and distribution of it to various shops. The next speaker Arina Stoenescu (SE) from Lund University also had Romanian roots but moved to Sweden when she was 17. Her presentation was about typography and politics in communist Romania from 1948 to 1989. Mainly about the influences of the Soviet Union. After the lunch break, there was time for a fascinating lecture by designer Ivar Sakk (EE) about Estonian typography and a search for the national style. About the influences of 'Runic' and 'Fraktuur' type styles on Estonian type design. With beautiful examples by type designer Mart Anderson (EE). Based on the Estonian tradition of stone carving, the angular shapes look simple but are based on a strict system where each adjacent letter fits together in a mosaic-like manner to form a complete pattern. A style that is immediately recognizable to Estonians. Examples followed from mid-20th century Estonian typographers such as Günther Reindorff, Paul Luhtein and Villu Toots, who were able to reconcile multilingual texts and styles (EE and RU) on book covers. Like the cover of Villu Toots executed in Estonian and Russian, which looked so homogeneous.
We continued the day with guided tours and demonstrations in the TYPA museum. Demonstration of Monotype by Ian Gabb (UK) and Linotype by Jorgen Loot (EE). A printing workshop with wood type from the TYPA collection led by the duo Upupæpop from the Czech Republic. At the end of the day, we got a chance to dive into the rich collection of type specimens kept in TYPA archives: Russian, from 1890 (factory for the mechanical production of wooden poster letters and typographic furniture from A.C.Belinkin, Odessa) as well as German type specimens (Holztype-fabrik, Sach's & Co, AG Mannheim) from the same period or later.
Saturday. 26.05.
The third day of the conference started with a presentation by Maria Muuk (EE) and Aimur Takk (EE), the young generation of Estonian type and graphic designers who told us about the contemporary and historical approaches to type design and printing in Estonia. Where do TYPA's wooden block letters come from? Were they made in Estonia? What was printed with this? During the analysis of TYPA's type collection, Maria was able to find some sources and identify some letters based on the type samples from their collection. Such as Forma, Kwadraatne, Grotesk and others that, according to these sources, were produced in St-Pietersburg. A part of the wood type came to TYPA from the collections of Uhiselu and Polymer factory and was mainly used to print posters in the 1920s-30s. These posters can be seen in the 'Estonian Museum for Theater and Music' in Tallinn. In many cases, some of the wood type, originally supplied in Cyrillic, were 'adapted' to the Latin alphabet. By ruthlessly cutting away some parts of the letter. Others came from the Heidemann and Greif collection and looked a bit different in style and were probably made in Germany. Then Aimur presented his project 'Modular Type for and with TYPA'. About reproducing the wood type based on a new design, including a modular system of which he had already made a laser-cut prototype and brought to TYPA. After this presentation, we took the journey into 'Underground Printing House 'ab', led by Darius Zubrickas (LT). Found and run at great personal risk by Vytautas Andziulis (1930-2018) and Juozas Bacevičius (1918-1995), the 'Underground Printing House ab' operated during the last decade of the Soviet occupation under a greenhouse in the garden of Andziulis, on the outskirts of Kaunas. The printing house, dug by hand, published 23 clandestine titles on topics ranging from Lithuanian history to religion and poetry between 1978 and 1980. All on a hand-driven platen press that was constructed from various spare parts. A fun fact: on page number 17 of each book there was a code that stood for an edition number, the name of the printing company, the year, and the order number. Nowadays, the house can be visited (by appointment) and you will be given a tour by Vytautas' widow. The next speaker, Lina Nordenström (SE) came from Sweden and told us about letterpress printing and the art of survival within the small community at GG Print Studio in the remote Swedish village of Uttersberg. She established the studio with her partner and regularly organizes residency programs and workshops. She is also one of the founders of the recently established NLN, Nordic Letterpress Network, to promote the art of printmaking and knowledge exchange in the Scandinavian countries. We remained in Scandinavia for a while, as the next speaker came from Norway and it was time for the panel discussion about 'Letterpress United Europe' educational program. Former journalist Jan Erik Øvergård is the chairman of the Friends Association of the Newspaper Museum Fjeld-Ljom, Røros (NO). In recent years, this association has worked to attract and train young people in letterpress printing techniques (with the main focus on operating the typecasting machines) and in 2023 received a subsidy from the EU Commission for a European project. For this purpose, eight printers and enthusiasts from different countries were selected to participate in this training. Part of the training, as Katharina Walter (DE) told us, took place at the Museum für Druckkunst Leipzig under the supervision of Thomas Siemon, Hans Bote, Carolin Oberwahrenbrock and Thomas Kurz, the museum's employees. The museum currently has 4 permanent employees, 3 part-time and 4 volunteers with whom they can continue the activities and training. An interesting discussion was started by Patrick Goossens (BE) about the exact profile of the people who should be trained as Linotype or Monotype operators, about the fact that they should not necessarily be designers but should preferably come from technical backgrounds. Because this profession requires a lot of technical knowledge and offers few opportunities for designers, which logically creates little interest from designers.
The last speaker was the historian Valentyna Bochkovska (UA), the director of the Museum of Books and Printing in Kiev, Ukraine. She is concerned with documenting and especially preserving and digitizing cultural heritage, which is very important in these turbulent times of war. The Museum Virtual Portal project, which was created through collaboration with various parties, is the result of this.
Work by Aarne Mesikäpp (EE)
After the end of the official program, there was a visit to Rapina paper mill and a return trip to TYPA for the opening of the new exhibition “Damn Hard Exhibition” by Estonian artist Aarne Mesikäpp (1939). With unique letterpress printed illustrations typeset from ornaments. The illustrations Arne himself calls caricatures where the serious, even very serious subjects are treated with a great sense of humor.
During the three days of a perfectly organized AEPM conference in TYPA, it became clear that the 'Art of Printmaking WILL survive'!
Click here for more pictures of AEPM 2024
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