MY STORY
While making my mom a collage for Christmas at the age of seven, I rummaged through a box of photographs and began cutting, gluing and pasting the family photos on poster board. That’s how my interest in collage began.
In 1991, I worked at a stationery store called Bon Papier in Sacramento. There, I was inspired by Mary Engelbriet's work. I admired how brilliantly she told a story in her greeting cards. I also was a fan of Michel & Company's sweet stationery and licensed products. Eight years later I became a Senior Designer for them. At 19, I attended my first trade show in Los Angeles, and felt a strong pull toward the paper products industry. So, I enrolled in the Graphic Design/Visual Communications program at Chico State.
1991 Bon Papier. I give you all permission to laugh!!!
After
graduation, I was hired as a freelancer at The
Gifted Line, where I had the honor of designing with The John and Caroyln Grossman's Collection
—one of the largest and finest ephemera collections in the world. Assembled over twenty six years, John collected 250,000 museum quality Edwardian and Victorian originals produced between 1800's and early 1900's. The John and Carolyn Grossman Collection is currently housed at the Winterthur in Delaware through 2012, and hopefully longer. Winterthur is currently raising funds for it's acquisition.
©The John and Carolyn Grossman Collection
Working with the senior designers—Holly and Laura—under John’s art direction, I developed the foundations of Victorian style of collage. John Grossman, a brilliant designer and a man of high integrity, was very much a mentor to me and, along with his wonderful wife Caroyln, he remains so to this day.
©The Gifted Line. Dear Faces
What is ephemera?
EPHEMERA definition by John Grossman
Ephemera is the plural form of the Greek word ephemeron which means
something that lasts only a very short time. When applied to collectibles,
ephemera refers to the minor transient documents of everyday life that were
intended to be used and generally expected to be discarded. Greeting cards,
product labels, tickets, calendars, invitations and paper dolls are classic
forms of paper ephemera.
But not all ephemera can be regarded as minor or even transient. Birth and
marriage certificates, mourning cards, banknotes, sheet music, manuscripts and
bookplates are examples of ephemera with considerable importance to the user or
owner. Baseball cards, holiday ornaments, paper dolls and souvenir items are
also considered ephemera, yet they were designed to be kept.
Some ephemera were deliberately preserved in family albums or attic trunks
because they were beautiful images, held sentimental value or marked an event
of historical importance. Tradecards, diecut scraps, invitations and newspaper
articles are some examples. Still other forms of ephemera were inadvertently
saved by routine storage year after year. Billheads, catalogs and annual
reports come to mind. Whether by intention or accident, ephemera survive as
treasures of material culture and as reminders of our past and present history.
What is Chromolithography?
Chromolithography is the art or process of printing color pictures from a series of stone or zinc plates. To learn more about the lithography printing process read here: Chromolithography
Rare litho stones from The John and Carolyn Grossman Collection.
©The John and Caroyln Grossman Collection. Rare greeting card salesman sample album from 1881.
One of my all-time favorite pieces in the collection (this is not the actual sample book) was a French ribbon salesman sample book. The colors, textures and patterns are as luscious as a Anthropologie store.
CREDIT
The technology has changed quite a lot since 1995—those days before soy lattes and the dot com explosion. The design process did not begin on the computer at The Gifted Line. There was a design prop room filled with beautiful fabrics, ribbons and various decorative objects. The designers used foam core boards covered by fabric, and we consulted with the curator, Dave M., about our current projects. He would assist us by searching the collection for imagery, per our requests. For example, my first collection was called “Kitty Christmas”. We created a three-dimensional repeat pattern with ephemera and props on the foam core board.
©1995 The Gifted Line. "Kitty Christmas"
Sometimes we took trips to the flower market in San Francisco early in the morning to use fresh flowers in our designs on the photo shoot day. When we had several design boards ready to go, we’d schedule a photographer, Sean Arbabi, for the day, who would first shoot Polaroids of our compositions. We’d take the prints to the color copier and make four repeats at 200%-400% scale. Then we’d quickly run to the drawing table, cut up the printouts, and piece them together with tape to see if there were any holes in our puzzle. Usually, there were several, so we would return to our compositions and move a few elements around, then repeat the process over a few more times until everything fit together as a repeat. The photographer then shot film and we’d receive two transparencies. The production manager, Julie Coyle, reviewed the film and chose the best exposure. Finally, the file was scanned and the art was put into greeting card, wrap or gift bag templates in the computer by the amazing production team.
©1995 The Gifted Line. "Kitty Christmas"
©1998 "Noel" The Gifted Line/Michel & Company. I bought fresh flowers and berries from the SF flower market to create the word Noel and repeat pattern on a crackled foam core board.
The Gifted Line was very well known for their Victorian die-cut gift and
greeting cards, intricate die-cut stickers and scrapbooking kits.
©1995 The Gifted Line.
“Midnight Angel”, one of the six 1995 Christmas stamps, was art directed by John Grossman and co-designed by Laura Alders. The Gifted Line got into the Halloween spirit and most of the employees came work in costumes. I dressed up as the Midnight Angel and won first place—and $100!
Jenny, Janelle, Holly, Julie, Jay, and Joan.
When the freelance project ended eleven months later, my roommate from college invited me to visit him in Hong Kong. I spent four months living there, and three months traveling solo through South East Asia in 1996. First stop was Bali, and from there I made my way by land and sea through Indonesia, Malaysia, and up to Thailand. This was a profound time in my life and those seven months in Asia influenced much of my current design work.
1996 Jenny in Mae Hong Song (Thailand) at a Hmong home.
When I returned home, I was hired at Landmark Calendars/At-A-Glance in 1996, which was bought by Day Dream Calendars (now Mead) in 1998. A week prior to being laid off, Anne Cook, Art Director at The Gifted Line—offered me a design position there. The Gifted Line changed ownership twice during my tenure, first to Michel & Company and then to Punch Studio—its current incarnation.
The Gifted Line graphics department: Ian (Production Artist), Anne (Art Director), Jenny (Designer) and Wally (Production)
STAY TUNED for Part 2 of 3 of my Ephemera Evolution story.
Want to know what these gifted people are up to today? Check out their links:
John and Carolyn Grossman Collection: http://www.johngrossmancollection.com/
Julie Coyle (former Production Manager): http://creativity-splash.blogspot.com/
Sean Arbabi (Photographer): https://www.facebook.com/mrphotoguru
Jay Young (former Production Artist/Manager) http://jayyoungdesign.com/
Anne Cook, bricoleur, (someone who creates from a diverse range of materials). See her work at http://annecook.com/
