photo credit: Michelle Marques
Colleen and Bettina at the exquisite corpse station at the North Bay Print & Poetry Festival in Graton.

The first annual North Bay Print & Poetry Festival was held in Graton on Saturday, October 4th. KRCB spoke with the organizers and artists at the event.

It’s not every day you see a steamroller used to make art, but that was just one of the activities on Saturday in the Graton Town Square – the lot next to Underwood Bar and Bistro.

“It's fun. Yeah, you get to drive a steam roller over a bunch of paper and ink and linoleum and out come these beautiful prints,” said a man named Adam.

“So, does your regular job allow you to drive steam rollers?” I asked.

“It has on occasion, but not, not normally, no,” said Adam.

“So, what kind of qualifications do you have to have to do this?” I asked.

“Uh, you have to be awesome and willing to just show up and drive a steam roller,” said Adam.

That’s Adam who was filling the second shift on steamroller duty. There were a whole series of prints clipped to a line along a fence.

Rose Haynes Touhy is board president for North Bay Letterpress Arts, and she says the lino prints made with a steamroller or road paver were just one aspect of the day’s festivities.

“The next set of poetry is coming on in just a minute as well and it should be some incredible poets,” said Touhy.

“And then there's an Exquisite Corpse where you can choose three blocks ahead of middle and a lower part and make it into your own, your very own print and you get to, you know, ink it and pull the press and everything.”

Touhy explains the mission of North Bay Letterpress Arts.

“We preserve traditional printing presses, and we teach people about the history of them, but mostly we teach people to use them. And we like to talk about slow media and invite people to be thoughtful and careful with the way that they put words into the world,” said Touhy.

At the nearby stage, Erik Soto was reading poetry to the audience seated on hay bales under the shade of a willow tree.

“Sometimes I think I hear your voice rustle from the shoulders of a blue-tailed lizard or perhaps in the swaying frail tips of sage brush surviving summer. In this departing hour, a silver horizon falls beneath my feet,” read Soto.

The Exquisite Corpse station was a way for people to try their hand at printing with the help of a volunteer named Bettina.

“Right now we have five different heads, so five different torsos and five different bottoms. Guests can assemble them as they wish and print them on a little proofing press,” said Bettina.

Board member Colleen Dwire carved each of the images, and she is the one inking the blocks, with her hands covered in black ink.

“Well it’s almost Halloween so, yeah, there's a Dracula and a, and a mummy body and witch's feet and Frankenstein feet, that sort of thing,” said Dwire.

“That's lovely. I see your hands are a little black,” I said.

“Yeah, not a good time to touch my face. Which I do all the time. Do I have any ink on my face? No. Oh, thank you!” said Dwire.

There were also places for children to make posters with local group PepToc, a zine making station, a mystery box where you could get a print or a piece of poetry for a donation, an artist creating personalized poems on a typewriter, and live music.

Learn more at NorthBayLetterpress.org.