More Zephyrus Images
Printing History 33 ran the article “Subversive Letterpress: The Art of Zephyrus Image” by Alastair Johnston. That brief overview, based on his bibliography, showed only four images. Shortly after publication, I saw some framed Zephyrus Image prints owned by Daniel Gardiner Morris of The Arm Letterpress, who shared the digital files below and for which Mr. Johnston supplied captions. —Editor
Zephyrus Image was a creative zany political press active in Northern California from 1970 until the early 1980s. The principals were Holbrook Teter, a scholar who ran the Linotype, and Michael Myers, an artist whose medium was linoleum cuts that looked like fine Rapidograph pen drawings. They attacked the Nixon White House and produced literary works by the likes of Ed Dorn, Robert Creeley, Lucia Berlin (her first book), Joanne Kyger, Stan Brakhage, William T. Wiley and many others.
The press name in a cartouche with a zeppelin and ibis, in the style of an Egyptian hieroglyph. Linocut by Michael Myers. No explanation, other than the Sacred Ibis was connected to the God Thoth who invented writing. Zeppelins were popular in 1970 because of the rock band Led Zeppelin.
“I don’t want to repeat the same mistakes” — a poem by Joanne Kyger, from Kent State Arts Festival portfolio, 1974 (This was a portfolio containing 9 poems by Ed Dorn, Devo, and others). Border of honeysuckle and bee is a linocut by Michael Myers.
The Menu appendix from Caxton’s cookbook is a spoof on fine printing, 1978. Bound like a cheap diner menu in plastic sheets with a wood veneer-style back cover. The words “Original Cookbook” are in Morris Romanized Black, a rare typeface that must have come from the Smithsonian recasting program. The border in a Venetian style shows a Linotype pot emitting steam and type-sticks. Some of the jokes are local, like Stauffacher Jack Cheese and Kerned Beef Nash; Ourhen Press Duck is a pun on Auerhahn Press.
The Richter Household Seismometer from 1971 is a real working seismometer, though I don’t know how accurate it is. The instruction sheet tells you to suspend a bead from a thread and a pin at the top. I did and remember looking at it once during an earthquake! The 69th-anniversary edition has a blue newspaper block beneath Myers’s linocut, the bead goes through Henry Kissinger’s forehead.
The Liberate Berkeley block was later altered to read “Detonate Sutro Tower”. This is an early work from 1970. Teter said, “Berkeley was trying to liberate the world, we thought we would liberate Berkeley.”
This chapbook was the kind of activism Z.I. was involved in: they typeset and printed an account of the murder of Fred Hampton and gave away hundreds of copies. They used the imprint Hermes Free Press on some of their political items. Click to read a larger image.
Typical squibs using found blocks from a newspaper morgue
“On a wing and a prayer,” 1977. There was a show at the Walnut Art Center in Berkeley, and Holbrook and Michael showed up and handed these out. The rebus on the wing says “Lettuce Pray”, they said they had just made it to the show on a wing and a prayer.
These prints show Michael’s very fine linoleum cutting.
“Don’t bother about a stone” A broadside from Ten Sonnets to Orpheus by Rilke, translated by Robert Bly. The four colors in the rose and leaves are perfectly registered linoblocks, as well as the border, by Michael Myers.