sailorBOY press ~ Wisconsin
(Jeff Morin)

Sacred Space
2003. Edition of 35.

A sculptural piece containing a letterpress book as well as components to build a model for a chapel devoted to the alphabet. Book includes reduction lino prints as well as typographic illustrations using overprinting of letterforms. The chapel has a copper rod skeleton with a rice paper skin that is covered with a casting resin.
$1,750

The Twelve Articles
By Jeffrey W. Morin.

Text based on the articles of accusation that were leveled against Joan of Arc and remain part of the court record. It is a tale at once modern and recognizable, and religiously mythic. To deal with his sense of persecution as a victim of the disease AIDS, the protagonist, one John de Vaillantcoeur, folds his life into the life of St. Joan. There are voices on the wind, Saints (and perhaps lovers) Michael and Gabriel, a God who has "selected me and infected me," a refusal to submit to the "Church Militant," and the belief that "God loves those who are not in the majority." The voice of the book is a compelling fusion of John and Joan that defies separation into medieval or modern martyr. The integration of the voices is made manifest in the handmade paper, made from discarded cloth and comprised of layered pulps, so that a single finished sheet is dusky rose on one side, dusky blue on the other, inseparable. Morin's work — his St. Sebastian (1990) comes immediately to mind — displays a subtle sensitivity to subject matter and a spiritual sensibility that is current and pertinent. The Twelve Articles is a dialogue between the true spirit that underlies religion and the narrow dogmatism that chokes it back. Letterpress Bodoni with illuminated capitals based on Goudy's Cloister Initials. Text is complemented by reduction woodcuts that are overprinted in such a way that the ink of the image becomes as much a tactile as a visual experience. Exposed spine sewing. A card with a Plenary Indulgence is attached to a gold ribbon that wraps around the book. Housed in a clamshell box covered in blue cloth. Edition of 40. (9 x 11.5 inches; 48 pp.) Understated, thought-provoking. Exceptional craft.
$1,000

Two Months
$700