The first place I lived in Oakland was this weird little compound. My roommate Ben brought a Vandercook Universal one and a bunch of type from North Carolina and was kind enough to share. It lived in a beautiful garage. I lived in a separate garage with a  loft, possibly built to house a boat.  The main house was a tiny cottage, with one bedroom and a kitchen with a tiled bar. All on a corner lot with a fence and a lot of odd space. The first spring we dug  a garden. My cat was always dusty.  Our first winter we had an incredible housewarming party, with a deep frying vat in the kitchen, and two huge vegan King Cakes. The sober punks ended up frying everything in reach while the Lousiana pals drank all the whiskey.

Then Ben had the idea to host an art show. Maybe the theme was prince or pink or maybe that is just what I embraced. We collected prints and hung them on the fence and had a party.

My offering was a poster sized sheet of French paper, printed into six different postcard designs. None of the originals remain. I cut up what I had to mail to Keep Writing subscribers. I am my own worst archivist.  

Each card was a pun on homophones of “prints”: a Pantone reference to what color “raspberry beret” might be.  An image of Prince. Print-cess and a tiara.

I always think I am funny.

Letterpress printed with polymer plates, rule, handset type and hand carved linocut  on French Paper on Ben Sap’s Universal 1 in our garage in Oakland.

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