This is a must-see for all type and letterpress fans out there: The veteran and influential English printer Alan Kitching is one of the few figures in the trade who has made the transition from a time when letterpress printing was an essential part of mass media to a current moment in which much of the appeal of this technique lies, on one hand, in the exploration of its plastic limits and, on the other, in the preservation of printing heritage. Kitching represents, at the same time, the tradition and the modernity of letterpress. He will open an exhibition, London’s Building Blocks at GRAGRA Gallery & Letterpress Studio, Madrid on March 28, 2025. The show explores the transmission of heritage and the craft of letterpress printing. Alongside his work, it will also feature pieces by three designers that Kitching mentored and influenced: Michelle Dwyer, Theo Hersey, and Christian Granados.
Through a succinct selection of works, Alan Kitching: London’s Building Blocks serves as a tribute not only to his career but to the past and present of London printing. In this proposal curated by Andrés Oliva, movable type is understood as the other building blocks (constituent elements) on which the modern city of London and the English cultural identity have been built.
The centrepiece of the exhibition are three typographic maps: Printing in London: 1476-1995 (1995), Broadside 10, Dr. Samuel Johnson (2010) and Mr. Kitching’s Travels (2012). These three panels, typographical schematisations of the topography of London, mark a number of landmarks in English literature and its book industry. Also included is a poster for Hamlet, commissioned by the Globe Theatre and ultimately unused, and the first of the Broadside panels, a quintessential print of Kitching’s style.
Alongside Alan’s work, the exhibition includes works made for the occasion by two of his closest current collaborators, Michelle Dwyer and Theo Hersey, young printers whom he has mentored. The first will feature a mural (The British Tongue) celebrating various idioms from the English capital that, as a New Yorker, have caught her attention. The second will feature a typographic specimen from The Typography Workshop, a workshop that Kitching started in the late 1980s and which Hersey continues today. To complete the set, a poster made for the exhibition by the three designers mentioned above and Christian Granados will be presented.
The exhibition will be open to the public at GRAGRA from 28 March to 30 June.
