Quo vadis? Printing discovering its future
25 – 27 May 2023
The AEPM’s annual conference will be hosted in 2023 jointly by two member museums: the Klingspor Museum and the Haus der Stadtgeschichte in Offenbach am Main, Germany.
Sessions took place in the Klingspor Museum, the Haus der Stadtgeschichte (Offenbach local history museum) and in their jointly-run Printing Studio.
Talks were given in English. Discussions tookke place in whichever language worked!
The speakers
Dorothee Ader, director of the Klingspor Museum // Tania Arens, printmaker (Frankfurt) // Marit Brandsnes, Press Museum Fjeld-Ljom (Norway) // Hans Eckert, Senior-librarian of the University Library (Frankfurt) // Jürgen Eichenauer, director of the Haus der Stadtgeschichte (Offenbach local history museum) // Patrick Goossens, Letter-Kunde, Antwerp (Belgium) // Dominic Gussmann, Bernardbau print workshop (Offenbach) // Maarten Renkens (Belgium) // Heike Schnotale, Offizin Haag-Drugulin, Leipzig (Germany) // Katja Schneider, curator, Haus der Stadtgeschichte // Stefan Soltek, chair of the AEPM, Offenbach (Germany) // Ben Weiner, Printing Historical Society, London (United Kingdom).
Programme
Thursday 25 May
16:30
Visit to Manroland sheetfed printing press factory
A special coach will take participants to the Manroland Sheetfed factory for the visit.
Departure from Offenbach Town Hall (Rathaus) at 16.45. The Town Hall is located at Berliner Strasse 100, 3-5 minutes walk from the Klingspor Museum or the Hotel Graf.
(at the Manroland sheetfed printing press factory)
Welcome of the participants: Jürgen Eichenauer, Katja M. Schneider, Stefan Soltek (Museums of the City of Offenbach)
Willi Graeff, Manroland sheetfed: introduction to the printing press factory
Drinks, snacks
Friday 26 May
Morning
At the Haus der Stadtgeschichte (Offenbach Local History Museum)
Welcome from Dorothee Ader, director of the Klingspor Museum
Heike Schnotale, Offizin Haag-Drugulin
The way there! the way out?
In the Offizin Haag-Drugulin traditional work with lead letters and letterpresses was practiced for almost 200 years. What is probably Germany’s oldest continuously operating workshop has now had to cease operations following the death of its owner Eckehart SchumacherGebler in December 2022. Heike Schnotale was trained in the workshop as a typesetter in manual and Monotype typesetting. She reports on working in the traditional print shop and with Eckehart SchumacherGebler. As Germany’s youngest typesetter, she also gives an insight into how she came to this unusual profession and can perhaps offer a glimpse of the future.
Patrick Goossens (Belgium), Maarten Renkens (Belgium), Marit Brandsnes (Norway)
Round table discussion of how practical knowledge can be passed on on the print workshop to the museum
Hans Eckert, Senior-librarian of the University Library, Frankfurt
Bruce Rogers (1870-1957), typographer and book designer
Hans Eckert was curator of the Bruce Rogers exhibition at the Gutenberg Museum Mainz in 2007. Rogers is considered one of the most important book designers and typographers of the 20th century. In addition to his early work for the Riverside Press (1900-1911), the Odyssey Edition (1932) and the Oxford Lectern Bible of 1935 are particularly well known. In 1914 Rogers designed the Centaur Antiqua typeface which was widely used in the Monotype version from 1929.
Lunch at the nearby Cafe Frieda (Büsing Palais Park)
Afternoon
Sessions in the Klingspor Museum, the Haus der Stadtgeschichte and the Bernardbau Printing Studio
Circuit of presentations of the collections and activities of the Klingspor Museum, the Haus des Stadtgeschichte and the Bernardbau Printing Studio
led by:
— Katja Schneider, Highlights of the Haus der Stadgeschichte’s graphic collections (18th-21st century)
In recent years, the Museum’s graphic arts collections have been vigorously promoted by Katja Schneider in terms of their visibility and conservation and of the way they are perceived by the public. She will talk about how these aims have been pursued as well as about individual works from the wide-ranging collection, focal points being the 18th/19th century, the recent past and contemporary works.
— Dominic Gussmann, Demonstration of graphic techniques in the Print Workshop of the Offenbach Museums
The printing workshop operated by the two museums in the immediate vicinity is only a few years old. Here Dominic Gussmann, has assembled an ensemble of various letterpress, intaglio and especially lithography printing machines from various periods. An area for hand typesetting also allows for intensive work with young people to produce small printed items. Visitors will be shown illustrating how the workshop is also run for artists and in cooperation with the International Senefelder Foundation.
— Tania Arens, My art, my prints
In the Haus der Stadtgeschichte (Offenbach Local History Museum)
— Stefan Soltek, Plants blossom in the art of writing and books (In the Klingspor Museum)
Key type specimens by Otto Eckmann (1901) and Peter Behrens (1902), the Antiqua by Rudolf Koch (1925), Koch’s flower book (1927) and the beautiful Poèmes de Charles d’Orléans by Henri Matisse (1950) will be on display, as well as a work by Peter Heckwolf with the astonishing title ips typographus, sensational in terms of printing technology.
In the Klingspor Museum.
Saturday 27 May
Morning
In the Klingspor Museum
Ben Weiner
A British Printing Museum – hope and facts
Annual general meeting of the AEPM
Open principally to AEPM members, but also to non-members on a non-voting basis.
News from member museums and discussion
10-minute presentations
Afternoon
Visit to the Haus der Industriekultur with typefounder Rainer Gerstenberg
(The Haus der Industriekultur (House of Industrial Culture) is a Hessian State Museum located in Darmstadt, 30 km south of Offenbach.)
The museums
Klingspor Museum
Herrnstrasse 80
DE-63065
Offenbach am Main
Haus der Stadtgeschichte
Herrnstraße 61
DE-63065
Offenbach am Main