Related to the recent post on how books are produced at Random House, here’s another fantastic video from Russian publisher Lamartis Publishing House on how they produce one of their books. Taking a more handmade approach, the process is beautiful as each step contributes to a wonderful finished artifact, only furthering the belief that print is not yet dead.
For those that still believe print is dead, just take a look at this video of the making of Jonathan Safran Foer’s new book Tree of Codes. This is the future of publishing: capitalizing on the inherent properties of the printed word to producing something unique, interactive, and lasting. Disposable books won’t last, but this will.
(Sidenote: I just read Safran Foer’s first novel Everything is Illuminated and it’s one of the best novel’s I’ve read recently.)
Charley Harper has long been one of my favorite illustrators. I still remember the first time I saw his work (or at least the first time his work made an impression on me); it was about five years ago, I was still in high school and just starting out in this whole art life and I stumbled across an article on Mr. Harper in an issue of Dwell magazine. Like great artwork does, it stuck with me and I still find myself turning to his work for inspiration.
It’s always interesting to me when I look back at someone who has inspired me for years to see how their work has influenced mine. I saw Charley Harper’s illustrations before I ever started illustrating myself and I was still new to this design thing, yet his philosophies and aesthetics have had a profound impact on my work.
I was working on some illustrations tonight so I naturally found myself looking over his work again and even after all these years, I still get that same feeling I got when I first saw those images in Dwell.
