Minds of the Press, Vol. 18

Chad Pastotnik of Deep Wood Press

This interview with Chad has been a long time in the works and we are so excited to finally share this conversation. Deep Wood Press holds a special place in my heart in particular because it is the press the most feels like home to me. Located in the type of woods in Northern Michigan that I spent time in as a kid, there is something really magical about the location and the imprint that Chad has created in his own little paradise. For most productions, Chad is taking the book from start to finish through the hot metal typesetting, letterpress printing, hand binding, and even doing engravings for his projects at times, he can pretty much do it all. His production of Heart of Darkness is a crowning achievement in fine press bookmaking and is highly sought after, but all of work is inspired and exudes his dedication to the craft. We hope you enjoy this conversation with the man behind Deep Wood Press.

Q: It’s been a long time in the works and excited this is finally happening, especially as you are a fellow Michigander and Grand Valley State alum! Can you give us a little of the backstory of how you first encountered letterpress printing and bookbinding and what some of your earliest influences were?

I first encountered letterpress as an art form through my printmaking professor in undergrad, Dellas Henke, who had come from the Iowa school and studied under Kim Merker. At that time, I wasn’t so much interested in including words but had started taking bookbinding workshops through the Guild of Bookworkers and putting my engravings and mezzotints in book form. It wasn’t until after I’d graduated that I found a small letterpress job shop “Butte’s Printing” on the NW side of Grand Rapids. Bud Butte was retiring and happy to show me the basics and equip me with some decent type to begin using with my recently acquired Challenge MP-15 in 1992. Early influences were the usual suspects like Bruce Rogers, the Grabhorns, William Morris and George Jones.

Chad Pastotnik of Deep Wood Press

I had an acquaintance with Iowa City before I’d even declared a major in printmaking having gone there to work as a migrant laborer to de-tassel seed corn - a job that paid enough to cover a good chunk of college in those days. While there I’d frequently cut through the old library building catching a whiff of ink. I had classmates who went on to pursue masters’ degrees at Iowa (I knew then I didn’t want to teach full time so no MFA for me) and other friends in town encouraging me to visit. I eventually befriended David Wall, Kim Merker’s assistant at the Windhover Press, Kay Amert and started receiving unsolicited critiques from the great Mauricio Lasansky. With their encouragement, I attended one of the last meetings of the Typocrafters in Iowa City in 1997 where I got to truly experience the contemporary fine press scene of printers, typographers, paper makers, printing historians and other book lovers for the first time.

This experience is probably the second big turning point for my work at DWP: finally understanding that there might be a contemporary market for what I loved to do. This same year the FPBA was founded at Oak Knoll. A good year indeed!

Q: Through the years you have also picked up numerous other skills such as wood engraving. Was this a natural extension of your interests that you had already been doing for years or something that came out of a necessity for a particular project you were working on?

I have a BFA in printmaking where I specialized in the processes of copper engraving, roulette and mezzotint, all non-etching techniques. I’d done plenty of wood and linoleum cuts but didn’t try my hand at wood engraving until I owned letterpress equipment of my own. Editioning intaglio prints can be excruciatingly slow compared to relief printing via letterpress so I naturally began experimenting with these processes more.

Q: The origin of the name of the imprint, Deep Wood Press, seems inevitable having been to your workshop and the serene isolation of the location. Nature seems to be a unifying thread throughout your body of work. Can you tell us a little more about your property, workspace, and why this has been such a consistent subject for your imprint?

Deep Wood Press Location on the Cedar River

Even when I was a lowly painter my subject matter has been tree, stream, and flora centric. When I returned to Northern Michigan and found my bit of paradise alongside the Cedar River - a stream I had been fishing for some years already, I knew my path had been presented. I had been involved in a serious car accident that left me blind for a couple of months; the accident insurance payout became the money down for a crappy fishing shack in a brilliant location. I built the first studio building in the fall of ’92 and immediately began filling it with my first intaglio press and that’s when the golden days of small print shops literally gave away the letterpress stuff to make room for on-demand type of digital junk.

All the pieces were in place and I started making books that would be very popular today in the artist’s book scene with pop-ups, foldouts, cutouts and funky bindings, learning new skills along the way to attain my goal of making proper books. I’m still aspiring towards that.

Deep Wood is a spoof on Errol Flynn swinging onto that tree branch in Robin Hood and exclaiming “Welcome to Sherwood” - something I used to mimic to new visitors to DWP in the early days lol.

Q: With your multi-talent skill set, a lot of the functions that many presses collaborate on with third parties are done internally. Obviously, you bring in outside artists to contribute to your projects, but are there any other ways you collaborate with other artisans to keep the process fresh and to challenge your own thinking?

I attend the major book fairs when I can but also the Guild of Book Worker events on occasion and participate in the Wood Engravers Network: plenty of talented people making incredible things to be inspired by and have discussions with. I collaborate more with some of my writers to help shape a vision of a book project in different ways. I learn a lot working with my apprentices and students - finding solutions to problems I wouldn’t have even thought about! My new collaborations with French colleagues are also turning out to be very interesting.

Q: It is also a trademark of the press that you use artwork printed from the original plates including wood engraving, linocuts, intaglio, and other forms. Why is this such an important aspect for you and what do you think it adds to your projects that can’t be replicated with other forms of printing?

 This is exceedingly important to me. I have watched the fine art printmaking world have to adapt to giclée prints flooding markets and confusing buyers with garbage inkjets that are signed and numbered as if the artist had anything to do with it and I see the same thing happening to fine press.

So, it is important to me to maintain the old processes; they require skill, dedication and craftsmanship to even approach a level of competency — like so many other things around fine book production. This extends beyond the artwork for DWP books - the type is either set by hand or composed on my Model 31 Linotype machine. One simply cannot improve on typefaces designed to be printed via letterpress. With the additional typographic refinements and logotypes I have for many of my Linotype faces the kerning and letter fitment is even better than digital.

So much has been lost already in the name of convenience and progress (laziness and ignorance) and so many of our collectors who were skilled viewers are, sadly, leaving us at an accelerated pace. Some books should continue to be made as they have for the past 500 years without the benefits of modern technology.

Q: In 2008, you released a version of Heart of Darkness that won the Carl Hertzog Award for excellence in book design and this project has become highly sought after by fine press collectors. The wonderful illustrations by renowned maritime artist Marc Castelli, beautiful presentation, and wonderful typography and layout came together perfectly. Why do you think this book in particular has become so sought after and did you know you had something special on your hands at the time of publication?

It was a perfect storm of all the things you mentioned. I think it was the third book James Dissette (Chester River Press) and I had worked on together for the type composition and thus came when we’d cultivated a very comfortable relationship. In addition, Marc Castelli lived near James and was thus available for frequent discussions about the illustrations. When I spec’d the materials we were going to use and made up the prototype I knew we had something good but it didn’t receive a lot of response at the fairs. It trickled out the door for a couple of years before we ran out of copies. I’m honestly not sure how it came to be so coveted for so many private libraries but I am thankful it has!

Q: You’ve been at this for more than three decades now and have produced a significant body of work. Can you share about the first project that you were really proud of and also what piece you would point to if you could only show one work that would be representative of what you are trying to achieve with your press?

The first book I was proud of would probably be Green Man, which I wrote and did intaglio prints for in 1994. Heavily influenced by Joseph Cambell, Robert Bly and explorations in Hermeticism. It was nine prints accompanying aspects of the male psyche via The Wildman, Grief, The Warrior, The Lover, The Fool and The Green Man which I also attempted to write verse for at the level of understanding I had at the time for such things. Very few people have ever seen it and I only made twenty copies.

The Wind in the Willows is probably the most ambitious and representative book so far. Specially commissioned paper, incredible artwork and a larger format but not cumbersome. It is a book meant to be read and enjoyed.

But I’m also rather partial to one of my little books There Be Monsters, which is all hand set type, it features a little wood engraving and a 6 color linoleum cut. I wrote it as a parody of Jabberwocky and in my version, the monster wins. It’s short, sweet and has a lot of playful elements all wrapped up in some Iowa PC4G paper in a limp binding.

Q: A few years ago you embarked on a collective venture with Jim Dissette of Chester River Press and the artist Vladimir Zimakov (recently interview by us) under the name Mad Parrot Press. Can you share the story of how this collaboration came about to create your gorgeous edition of Wind in the Willows? Also, is there anyone else out there in the fine press world that you would love to collaborate with on a future project?

James and I had been working together for years at this point and planning for Wind in the Willows started as early as 2018. Chester River Press had started out with a couple other financial partners which were long gone by this point and James had started using the Chester River imprint for some of his vanity press offerings so we decided to come up with a new name for our new partnership around the project. James has a pet parrot that is jealous of his time so Mad Parrot comes from that stupid bird landing on my shoulder and pecking my face on more than one occasion.

Wind in the Willows from Mad Parrot Press

There are many craftsmen I’d love to collaborate with. I’ve a marbler near our home in Avignon that’s making a majority of my decorative papers now. The unfortunate loss of the Papeterie (paper maker) Saint Armand still hurts after David and I developed the Willows’ paper. I’d love to find someone to fill that hole. I know lots of printmakers, I’m sure more of them will appear in future editions.

Q: In 2014 you were featured in a series called A Craftsman’s Legacy: The Book Maker. How did you initially get on their radar and what was the experience like for you as someone who generally works in total solitude?

I’m not sure how they found me. A Craftsman’s Legacy is produced out of Michigan and a lot of the first season guests were Michigan based. Perhaps through other media stories or the Michigan Traditional Arts Apprenticeship Program and my Heritage award or the Hertzog press release stuff.

It was crazy. The studio is a comfortable work space for maybe 3 people so stuffing cameras, lighting and a film crew into the bindery, pressroom and linecasting spaces was fun. So many days of work edited for 30 minutes of viewing time. Nice contrast to the book world.

Q: You have been doing this now for decades and obviously have a dedication and commitment to the craft. After all of this time, what do you still love about your role as a fine press owner? What have you found to be the biggest challenge to having longevity in the fine press world?

Presentation Copy of In The Penal Colony from Deep Wood Press

I love all of it - except the selling and social media bits. Almost everything I do here at DWP is on speculation and there’s no crowdfunding or other crazy distractions from real work. The biggest challenge for me is just remembering to take pictures of the process, send out those mailing list updates or blog posts and keep the website current. Some of my peers are exceedingly good at this stuff, they must have taken business classes somewhere along the way. Not all the books have been a big success but the topics I choose seem to keep most of my collectors engaged. If you’re making books people read, the subject should be appealing.

Q: If there was one word or idea that came to people’s minds when they think of Deep Wood Press, what would you hope that it would be?

Eclectic yet harmonious.

Q: What should we be expecting for 2025 and beyond at Deep Wood Press? Are there any future projects or collaborations that you can speak of at this point?

Currently I’m finishing a new DWP book THE LIQUORSTORE pomes by James Gross which will be out late 2024. Another project with old friends and collaborators - writer Jerry Dennis and wood engraver/printer (former head of the art department at NMC) Glen Wolff, Mornings at Jackpine. Another book with poet Michael Delp exploring grief through a series of poems in the Ghazal form which I will illustrate. A chapter book with writer/poet Anne Marie Oomen. These are all authors from the Midwest and are accomplished, published and known entities but maybe not on the global scale many of my collectors normally engage with. It’s important to me to keep one foot in extremely speculative publishing I guess.

I’m also working on a couple of little projects for the Codex Foundation.

Progress continues on the next “big book” The Machine Stops by E. M. Forster but I can’t give details about the artwork just yet even though we’ve been working on it a number of years.

Joan of Arc, and this is a very “long game” project. I am a board member of the Foundation Louis Jou in Les Baux-de-Provence, France and Louis Jou produced a series of 17 large format wood engravings for a book whose manuscript was never delivered in the late 1940’s. I have been tasked with creating a new edition with these blocks so a search for an appropriate version of the story is underway. I plan to release this in a dual language English/French format and it will be composed in Jou’s proprietary typefaces, printed on NOS Jou paper and printed with his Stanhope iron hand presses in Les Baux.

I keep busy I guess…

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This interview was done in a series of communications back and forth with Chad and a visit to the workshop and we want to give our sincerest thanks for all his contributions. If you want more information on his work and where to get his paper then check out his website. You can also check them out on Instagram.

Interview by: Zach Harney co-founder of the Collectible Book Vault