Art Metropole

12 - 13 Sep. 2007

Book launch for new publications from Standard Form

Publisher

Standard Form Printing & Publishing

Artists

Katie Bond Pretti and Tonik Wojtyra

Time

7 pm - 10 pm

Art Metropole is happy to announce the launch of Standard Form’s first 3 artists’ books. Please join us on September 13, 2007 to launch the press and to meet the publisher and the artists.

The 3 books being launched are:

Sonority of Words by Katie Bond Pretti

Sonority of Words, consists of three chapters designed to develop a narrative as the drawings progress from beginning to end. Though not containing any literal message, the lines and shapes which form each drawing direct the viewer through a sequence of events. Similar to way in which the letter-symbol elements of sound poetry necessitate that the viewer forms their own associations, this story depends upon handmade marks to express dynamics and intonation. The format of the book echoes the linear theme featuring fold-outs to accommodate larger and continuous images, while its scale maintains intimacy.

A special hand-coloured version will be released in a limited edition.

A Report by Alex Durlak

A Report is a response to a report written in 1978 by the Advisory Arts Panel to the Canada Council entitled The Future of the Canada Council. The government-subsidized publication features an introduction originally written in a concrete poetry style explaining the importance of art in society. Alex Durlak has created a new layout for the text using the introduction to both critique the challenges of contemporary artistic practices and to reinvest the ideals held by the late-70’s artistic community. Written in both French and English, this new rendition features colourful typographic layouts and will be printed and bound entirely by the artist.

I got an A+ in Art and You can too by Tonik

Specifically published for the art student, this guide, full of explanatory text and pictures, delves into exposing how art school operates and how and why students should address the system. Written in a clear and jargon free prose, it elucidates a cheat sheet for the naïve, lazy, artless or keen student; complete with a glossary and chapters concerning “What is higher learning?” and “Good Art vs Good Grades.” Tonik sums up the book thus:

School is indoctrinated smoke and mirrors, man. All you gotta do is check the world these institutions are creating. Weed beer guns AIDS? What happened to bread, peace, work, dignity? It’s the new millennium! This is a manifesto kind of, but more so, I had to right it. If not me, then who? If not now, then when?

A special edition of 77 accompanies this release.

Standard Form Printing & Publishing is a Toronto based press that is growing out of a cross-pollinated fine art and indie music scene in Toronto. It is a young press interested in working with artists within the vanguard of Canada’s flourishing art scene and its catalogue is printed entirely in-house. Standard Form provides small and medium run print and bindery services for artistic projects. Our speciality is paper-based album packaging (for both CDs and vinyl) and paperback books. Our favorite work involves uncoated, recycled stocks with spot colour printing.

Born July 6, 1980, graduate with honours from the Ontario College of Art and Design 2004, Katie Bond Pretti is a Toronto based artist exploring narrative abstraction in drawing and painting. Pretti has held studios in Los Angeles, Buenos Aires, and Brooklyn and has been artist in residence at COME (Buenos Aires), Ctrllab (Montreal), The White House (Toronto), and Spark Box Studios (Picton, Ontario). Her book of drawings, Sonority of Words, was launched in Toronto by Art Metropole, featured at the 2007 NYC Art Book Fair, and subsequently added to the collection of The National Gallery of Canada. Pretti’s work has been profiled in Carte Blanche Volume 2: Painting (a survey of Canadian Painters), Magenta Magazine Online, Elle Canada, Fashion Magazine, Canadian House and Home, Inside Entertainment, and others.

Born in Poland, part French, tall, white, ugly and raised in the jungle… Tonik’s art investigates the pneumatic romance between everything and nothing at all. His work is represented by Art Metropole, Toronto and Printed Matter, New York. Tonik is looking forward to going back to Europe in the autumn of 2007.

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