Some paper is just squishier than others. So when artist and printer Lynn Jones is hand-feeding 20,000 blank greeting cards into a vintage letterpress machine, she needs to know exactly what she's working with. "I can adjust how much pressure the press is putting on the block or the type," she say. "I only give the blocks enough pressure to get a good impression."
And this is how Jones spends a lot of her time - printing original designs with letterpress printers at her Lynn-oleum workshop in Eureka. It's physically demanding, detail oriented, and there is no "undo" feature if she makes a mistake.
Luckily, she says she's never printed a typo. "I'm a bit of a perfectionist," she laughs.
On Talk Humboldt, Jones tells Keith Flamer and Michael Spagna about her process, her aesthetic, and how she came to be one a very small group of artists who combine linoleum and presswork.
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TRANSCRIPT:
JONES: There aren't very many people who are doing what I'm doing. There are other people who are drawing something on an iPad, emailing it to a digital printer, and they never have to touch their product at all.
ANNCR: In Old Town Eureka, Lynn Jones's printing presses are a throwback to centuries-old technology. Think of a rubber stamp. But instead of rubber, Jones carves an inverted image into a linoleum block, which ultimately gets pressed into paper. The process includes both fine detail as well as physically laborious press work. From her linoleum print shop in Old Town Eureka. Here's Keith Flamer and Michael Spagna.
SPAGNA: I'm Mike Spagna. I'm interim president of Cal Poly Humboldt, and I'm here with my friend and colleague, Keith Flamer.
FLAMER: And I'm the president of College of the Redwoods.
SPAGNA: We're here with Lynn Jones, the owner of Lynn-oleum. And so, Lynn, let's start with the first question, which is, having looked around your business here, I think we're both very interested from a perspective as educators. Talk to us a little bit about how you got into this business. Was this an apprentice model that you got involved with?
JONES: Yeah. So, I was a graphic design studio art major at HSU…Call Poly Humboldt..
SPAGNA:You’re good! (LAUGHS)
JONES: And my professor had lined up a field trip. We went down to San Francisco and Berkeley. We went to just a regular design firm, and everybody's just sitting around in cubicles on computers. And I was like, oh man.
SPAGNA: You were thinking ahead—yeah—what that career would look like?
JONES: Absolutely. Then the next day, we went to the studio of David Lance Goines in Berkeley, and I was blown away. I was just fascinated by his process. He was doing everything by hand. I mean, He used the computer a little bit. He was printing these gorgeous posters one color at a time. He was carving linoleum blocks by hand. A couple of weeks later, he called my professor and asked if I was available for a summer internship.
SPAGNA: Wow. Wow.
FLAMER: Yeah. That's perfect.
JONES: He ended up needing help for the Chez Panisse Café Cookbook. So I ended up working for him all summer carving linoleum blocks in his style. He showed me how to use the letterpress machines. That's when I decided that letterpress was going to be my thing.
FLAMER: Okay then. I'm looking around your shop, and the first thing I saw was the lack of computers. What's the process of going from idea to printing? How do you do that?
JONES: Sure. So I definitely use a mix of hand tools and digital tools. I usually start with some reference photos, and then I come up with a composite sketch—definitely digital at that point. So I then print out something on the laser printer. I'm able to use a special kind of permanent marker to release the toner from the laser printout onto the top of a linoleum block.
FLAMER: So we're looking at a block that has a picture of a skunk.
JONES: Okay, so I carve them by hand with these little knives. And everything that I carve away will not be printed in the press. So everything that's still there on the block and raised up will receive ink from the ink rollers, and then get pushed into the paper and leave behind ink on the paper.
When I print with the linoleum blocks, the linoleum is a little bit squishy and it does deteriorate over time.
So I can adjust how much pressure the press is putting on the block or the type or whatever. So I only give the blocks enough pressure to get a good impression, so it doesn't always leave an impression in the paper. If you're using really squishy cotton paper—thick like watercolor paper—then you'll get an impression even from a block.
But the card paper that I use—it isn't squishy, really. So the only time that I get an impression in the paper on my cards is when I use what are called photo polymer plates. So this is my linoleum block illustration, the squirrel. But then the balloons and the gift bag on there are part of a digital illustration.
I send those files to a plastic plate maker in upstate New York. They send back a thin piece of plastic that has the raised surface where I want those lines to be, and I can pop that in the press. And because it's plastic, it holds up way better than even lead type or linoleum blocks.
SPAGNA: Kind of counterintuitive. It's plastic and it's more resilient.
JONES: Yeah. Yeah. It really takes a beating, so I can press it nice and hard into that paper and get that texture.
FLAMER: So you had to carve it backwards. Yeah, that’s a trick.
JONES: Yeah. So when you do words carved into a block, you just have to trust that it's going to be right when you print it.
FLAMER: Have you ever misspelled a word and had to start over?
JONES: No.
FLAMER: That was a quick answer, but OK…[LAUGHTER]
JONES: I'm a bit of a perfectionist. And that comes with spelling and grammar too.
FLAMER: Yeah. Oh yeah. Oh perfect. Yeah, I like that.
SPAGNA: Looking at a squirrel—
FLAMER: Oh my gosh, they're—
SPAGNA: Holding balloons.
FLAMER: This does look—you know—it has so much depth.
SPAGNA: It does. It does look three-dimensional.
FLAMER: I'd never have thought that was possible.
JONES: Yeah. So that card right there—I have sold that one to Barnes and Noble and Paper Source—and I think that I've shipped out about 20,000 of those cards since November.
SPAGNA: I have to ask you, Lynn, about your aesthetic choices. So I see animals. I see a historic building. Talk about the give and take of that. Are these things that are contracted with you, like “we need something on this historic building”? Is this something you see in your environment? What do you gravitate toward—or does that depend?
JONES: I do tend to gravitate toward natural subjects—plants, animals. You know, if you do a portrait of a squirrel, the squirrel doesn't get mad at you for messing up certain features.
FLAMER: Maybe even appreciate it. Oh God.
SPAGNA: It's not giving you feedback about “why did you make my tail a certain level of fluffy?”
JONES: I mean, that's helpful. But, you know, I had worked for all these organic shapes and, you know, plant leaves and that kind of thing for a long time. And then I decided I wanted to do a bunch of straight lines for a while. So I did a series of 12 Victorian houses here in Eureka. And then, last December, someone from the city of Eureka in the visitor center came over and said, “Hey, if you have anything that's Eureka-centric, we want some merch.”
And I said, “Well, funny you should ask. I have this design that I've been sitting on for a few years now,” I was like, “You know what? Let's do it.”
FLAMER: Very interesting. So how many people in this area do your type of work?
JONES: There are a few printmakers—you know, fine art printmakers—but no, I don't think anybody else is printing letterpress commercially.
FLAMER: So I do want to close with this one. How do you compete against the bigger companies that do everything via computer?
JONES: I consider it more competing against myself. There aren't very many people who are doing what I'm doing. There are other people who are drawing something on an iPad, emailing it to a digital printer, and they never have to touch their product at all. You know, my card has been—there would be missing—yeah, I don't know. I feel like my cards have more character.
SPAGNA: Well, Lynn, you're an inspiration. Thank you for sharing with us today.
ANNCR: In Old Town Eureka, that's linoleum block printer Lynn Jones. To see photos of these prints and to hear other episodes of Talk Humboldt, visit KHSU.org.
