Simplex 17

On December 7, 2005 I sent the following invitation:
"this is an invitation to participate in a collaborative / constraint-based concrete poetry portfolio. Letraset was created as a business tool for the standardization of lettering in technical drawings and blueprints. Although it has fallen out of favour due to the proliferation of computers in technical drawing, letraset continues to be used in concrete poetry. By assigning the same material to a variety of international concrete poets and artists, this project examines how content and form interplay in concrete poetry, and will be an insight in to the malleability of language and materiality through different visual compositional structures and styles."

Seventeen poets and artists agreed to participate. Each received a full sheet of Simplex letraset dry-transfer lettering (every participant received the same typeface, although the size of the face varied due to difficulties i had in finding enough sheets) and were restricted to using only the material supplied (i.e.: no additional materials), and responses had to fit on a single sheet of 8 ½" x 11" (or A4 if international) paper.

Simplex 17 contains work by: Bruce Andrews, Jonathan Ball, John M. Bennett, Christian Bök, Nicole Burisch, Jason Christie, Craig Dworkin, Geoffrey Hlibchuk, Matthew Hollett, Frances Kruk, Donato Mancini, Billy Mavreas, kevin mcpherson-eckhoff, Max Middle, Rob Read, Pete Spence, Dan Waber


this brought back good memories (my Dad used to bring these home to us to play with -- he constantly made signs and doesn't hand letter well); why isn't Cage mentioned in the desc. wasn't his stuff letraset?

in addition to letraset there are -- or used to be -- more readily available vinyl letters in different sizes and faces, and more readily available exotic stencils of letters; now there are letter iron ons, candles, etc. easy to find

although I am finding the popularity of scrapbooking has led to a plethora of new strange paper shapes, interesting punches, and whatnot -- not only expensively, but also at the 99 cents store

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