A81. Climb the Mountains

A81. Climb the Mountains

Thomas, Peter and Donna
Author: Muir, John

66.5 x 51 mm (2 5/8” x 2”), 17-page accordion, 100 copies.

Binding: Case-bound fold out accordion; full-bound in handmade paper over boards. Sierra wood panels on covers and spine. “John Muir” printed on label on spine. End of accordion slipped in a pocket on back inside cover of binding. Paper: Blue, handmade by Peter Thomas. Printing: Letterpress. Typography: All text linocut by Donna Thomas. Illustration: Sixteen linocuts by Donna Thomas.

“We began as crafts persons making blank books and handmade paper. We then became printers and learned to make fine press books. At that time the book was a simple and easily understood concept; the book was archetypal, a thing like the Gutenberg Bible, a monumental text in a beautiful and sturdy binding. This may explain why it was so long before we made our first accordion fold book. The format seemed too ephemeral, anathema to our current aesthetic. This may also explain why, when we did start to make accordion books, we tried to make them conform to our picture of a book and forced them into bindings. These attempts to contain the accordion were successful, and led to the creation of the case-bound fold-out accordion binding, which combines the formal structure of the case-bound book with the freedom of the accordion format. This was the first editioned book using our ‘case-bound fold-out accordion’ binding.

This was also the first ‘block book’ we made. It was printed using linoleum blocks Donna cut that had both text and illustration on each page. The illustrations are colored by colored pulp that was applied through stencils to the wet sheet of paper before it was pressed and dried."

Santa Cruz, California: Peter & Donna Thomas

1995

English