JD'A – 8: A CHECKLIST — 1977

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[photo of Joe D’Ambrosio] | D’AMBROSIO | A checklist to 1976 | The Compulsive Printer | 1977 | Portage, Indiana 46368

6 5/8 x 8 1/2 inches, gray endpaper, [1–2]: blank, [3]: title page, [4–7]: text, [8]: image from Anaked, one, [9]: text, [10]: image from Zarathustra, [11]: text, [12]: blank, [13]: text, [14]: image from The Ondt & the Gracehoper, [15]: text, [16]: image from Trapeze, [17]: text, [18]: blank, [19]: major collections, [20]: blank, [21]: logo of the compulsive printer [22–24] blank, gray endpaper.

Binding: Serigraphed Ingres paper over boards, signed vertically in pencil on bottom right of front cover: D’Ambrosio ‘77.

From 19 Years and Counting:

This book documents the work that I had done up to this point. Since I was not limited by the subject matter of the text, I was free to do whatever I wanted with the binding. I chose to experiment by serigraphing one color (black) twice in perpendicular lines. The color becomes a deeper hue where the lines cross. I used a grease pencil with glue resist on the screen to create the lines. The image is readable, but it is the product of my subconscious merging with the medium used to create it rather than a predetermined design. Mr. Mundell printed the text and made the illustrative plates with Nilotype.

From A Memoir of Book Design:

This book documents the work that I had done up to 1977 (including my collaboration with Mr. Mundell). He set all of the type by hand and printed it. The illustrations were printed from what was then termed Nyloplate (or "black light" plastic plates). He had the camera and all of the associated sundries in his garage print shop. Mr. Mundell had worked for many years at R.R. Donnelley & Company (printers of the famed Sears' catalog). He said that Mr. Donnelley himself had given him the equipment when he retired from the firm.

Since I was not limited by the subject matter of the text, I was free to do whatever I wanted with the binding. I chose to experiment by serigraphing one color (black) in two printings of perpendicular lines on light gray paper. The screen was prepared by drawing diagonal lines in one direction with a grease pencil. Water-based glue was then coagulated on top of the silkscreen mesh. Oil-based solvent was then used to clean the screen of the marks made by the grease pencil. This did not disturb the glue because it is water-based and thus unaffected. This created openings in the screen (for ink to penetrate onto a piece of paper) of only the slanted lines that I had drawn. Once I had printed the first set of diagonal lines, I could use that as a reference to show me how to draw diagonal lines going in the opposite direction, and thus create an image. Because the grease pencil is soft it leaves lines of variable thickness, and thus gives a graduated tone. The actual effect is somewhere between an etching and a lithograph. The image, although abstract, still shows enough recognizable shapes to give the viewer a frame of reference. It is simply a landscape. Clouds are overhead, and the sun is on the front cover while the moon is on the back cover. The orbs are suspended above mountain tops. The mountains themselves are held up by earth columns creating arched caverns within them.

If one wishes to explore the meaning expressed in this graphic print, it is simply done by relating to the material within the book itself. That material is the root of the work that I produced, and the cover image is the root of that which gives life to this planet earth, and thus to me so l may create the work. This emanation from me was not predetermined, but arose from allowing a medium of art to convey my thoughts without interference from domestic or egotistical coercions.

Since this book can be considered merely a catalogue, I thought at first to simply give it away to clients who might wish to add it to their collections as a reference volume. And then I theorized that most would say "yes" when confronted with something for nothing. So, to eliminate those who are not serious about my work, I decided to charge one dollar for each copy. A noted book dealer from another side of the country ordered five copies, and I sent with the copies a bill for five dollars due. The book dealer didn't pay me and didn't bother answering my letters of inquiry. Time went by and after a while the same book dealer contacted me to buy a copy of a book Mr. Mundell and I had recently completed. Remembering my past experience with this dealer, I said, "No." Mr. Mundell interceded and I sent a copy of the new book, but only after I received a check from that dealer for five dollars.

©Book Club of California