Alisa Golden
Alisa Golden memorized the California Job Case in a Graphic Arts class at Lincoln Jr. High School in Santa Monica, CA in 1974. When she enrolled in Betsy David's Letterpress Printing and Creative Writing class at California College of Arts and Crafts in Oakland, CA, she pursued picking metal type out of tiny compartments. never mind the press was born in 1983 with Golden's first book of poems, never mind the crowd.
The poetry of Patti Smith, Laurie Anderson, and Gertrude Stein originally sparked her writing, and the clear, clean printing of Shelley Hoyt and handmade paper/assemblage-like books of Walter Hamady inspired her printmaking and books. She gravitates towards the Dada and Surrealists, Japanese fiction, natural history and spare, modern writing.
Having completed her academic courses at UC Berkeley, Golden was free to think books until she graduated from CCAC in 1985 (BFA with High Distinction, printmaking).
After purchasing a Challenge cylinder press in 1987, Golden set up shop and made book art for a few years in Berkeley, then had the press moved to her home in Albany, CA. She bought several filled type cabinets from the daughter of a printer (Oquaga Press) and installed these in her garage.
March 1995 marked the press's move from the laundry room and garage to the newly- built studio. The larger space makes teaching printing and book collaborations possible. The first collaborative project was Tidal Poems, with Anne Schwartzburg, another poet and artist.
Golden has taught non-traditional book structures classes at the Albany Community Center since 1994. In addition to teaching, she currently plans the programs and is on the board of the Pacific Center for the Book Arts.
Her books incorporate a variety of textures, smooth and rough, poetry and prose, the subject matter juxtaposes social/anti-social and the absurd. Golden constantly struggles to balance the city and the wilderness. She recently finished her 50th artist's book, Eight Degrees of Charity.
They ran out.
never mind the press, Berkeley, CA, 1991.
Enclosed in printed mylar cover tied with artificial ivy vine. 18 cm.
Edition limited to 37 copies.
Rock Dove.
never mind the press, Berkeley, CA, 1988.
Printed on Mexican bark paper. Accordion folded pages inside paper covered boards held together with strips of paper glued to top and bottom of covers. 26 cm.
An edition of 44 copies.