Burin Box and Board:
Lennart Forsberg

The wood engravings, wood cuts and linocuts of graphic artist Lennart Forsberg are at the centre of Burin, Box and Board. The book contains thirty-nine prints, all printed from the original wood or lino, as well as a photo of the artist taken beside his 1873 hand press. These prints, along with the text, reveal the many aspects of Forsberg’s long working life as an engraver, designer and printmaker. 

Above: wood engraving from Chaucer and blocks used in the book.

 
Burin Box & Board is one of Incline Press's most innovative designs. Working with the principles of asymmetrical typography, we have chosen clear aqua for all titling and a soft grey for the text to allow the the black and white wood engravings to take centre stage.

The book includes 14 wood engravings from the book Ryska Minnet (Russia Remembered) and 11 from a Swedish translation of The Canterbury Tales. An extract from the Swedish text with its English translation accompanies each image. Also shown are three engravings from the Vasa series, inspired by the 17th-century ship on display in Stockholm, linocuts, two multi-colour wood cuts and one of his wood-engraved bookplate designs. 

The text attempts to set the work in context and includes an introduction by Professor Nils G. Stenquist translated from the catalogue of Forsberg's 2005 retrospective exhibition in Stockholm, a short memoir by the artist, a translation of an article about Forsberg as a stamp designer originally printed in the newspaper Svenska Dagbladet, and Thorsten Sjölin’s description of his visit to Forsberg’s Stockholm studio last October.

Set in Gill Sans, the type includes the rarely seen alternative letterforms cut in the 1930s to conform to other sans serif designs. The book is about 10 inches square (260 mm), four 16-page sections, 57 pages in all and hand bound in the workshop of Stephen Conway in printed-paper over boards with a cloth spine.

Of an edition of 150, ten are the gift of the artist; one hundred copies are slip cased and include a loose copy of one of the three-colour woodcuts from the book.  Sheets of this edition for binders are priced at  £100.00; bound copies of the standard edition are £136.00.

Forty specials, each housed in a drop-back box, also include six signed and numbered prints (five multi-coloured and one black and white) printed specially for the edition by Lennart Forsberg in his studio in Sweden. A copy of the 23-page illustrated catalogue published for Forsberg’s 90th Anniversary Retrospective Exhibition and a photograph of the artist at his proofing press taken by Thorsten Sjölin in October 2005 are also included in the box. This special edition is priced at £282.00.