Purgatory Pie Press ~ New York
(Esther K. Smith & Dikko Faust)

Bob & Roberta Smith books
Insta-Book series
Collaborations with Susan Happersett
Poetry collaborations
Tracts & Toys
Miniatures by Purgatory Pie Press

Do Si Do
By Georgia Luna Smith Faust
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 2002.

6.5 x 6" bound do-si-do so that each book can be the accessed from the "front." Uses linoleum illustrations. Printed letterpress.

Two stories by Georgia Luna Smith Faust designed into one book. In "On The A Train" the artist is gripped by a mysterious hand on the crowded train. She develops six different endings to this unsettling event. "Everything Falls into Place" is a spunky piece told by a sixteen year old New York City girl.
$100

Travelog Map & Guide
Map by Jessie Hartland and text by Donna Ratajczak
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1994. Edition of 150.

18.75 x 26" map folds to 9.4 x 4.4 x .25 guide. Types used Kabel & Kaufmann Bold with green, blue & red on pale yellow Bodleian. Signed by Ratajczak; Hartland; Esther K. Smith; and Dikko Faust.

Join Arthur in his journey through life "Points West." Arthur is "thinking of driving cross-country in his Corolla... He gets a bunch of road maps from gas stations. He files them in the glove compartment."

Travelog tells the story of a rather sad-sack parole officer named Arthur, whose movements are charted in a jaunty fold-out map.
$74

Lily Lou
By Holly Anderson
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1986. Edition of 200.

12 x 6"; 16 pages. Printed letterpress using Weiss Roman foundry type on Phoenix Imperial Paper. Profile printed in two-tone Purgacolor. Background printed from Dikko-made sandpaper. Bound in paper-covered boards with illustrated dust jacket. Signed by Anderson.

Lily Lou is a quirky tale about a 17-year-old girl who vomits sand but is cured from that affliction when she loses her virginity.

Holly Anderson is a New York poet and writer.

$100

Fibonacci Flower
By Susan Happersett
New York, New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 2006. Edition of 123.

7.125 x 7.125"; 10 pages. Progression of hand generated flowers presented in a combination accordion-and-sewn binding that displays the Fibonacci Sequence in action. Wrapped in a folded cardstock case printed with the same flowers. Weiss Roman, Sylvan, Gallia, Raleigh Cursive, Modern #20, and Derby types. Arches and St. Armand paper. Design and structure by Esther K. Smith; letterpress and hand typography by Dikko Faust; hand generated flowers by Susan Happersett.

Susan Happersett: "Fibonacci Flower is an artist book made up of letterpress prints of drawings. In each drawing I have mathematically generated a flower, using the Fibonacci Sequence to determine the number of petals in the outer ring of each bloom. On the first page there is one petal inside on petal. On the next page, the flower grows with a new ring of two petals. The next page [shows a] three-petal ring, then five, eight, up to 34 petals. Fibonacci Flower has a unique structure that is a combination of an accordion and a sewn binding, that allows the viewer to see two or three consecutive Fibonacci flowers at the same time."
$89

Infinity Remove
By Susan Happersett
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 2004. Edition of 100.

2 x 9" with six accordion cut-out pages. Bound in orange silk covers. Housed in Blue Tiziano paper slipcase with orange and yellow titles. Drawings and research by Susan Happersett. Designed by Esther K. Smith. Hand typography and letterpress printmaking by Dikko Faust.

This lovely orange and blue tall book includes quotes from a number of famous and infamous people on infinity including Georg Cantor. Cantor, considered a mathematical heretic at the time, developed Set Theory and his now-famous fractal Cantor Set in the 1870's.
$100

No sensible magnitude is infinite.
                                            ~Aristotle

Space is almost infinite. As a matter of fact, we think it is infinite.                                ~Dan Quayle

I can't help it, in spite of myself, infinity torments me.
                                             ~Alfred Demusset

That which ... is not infinite is finite. - I experience true pleasure in conceiving infinity as I have, and I throw myself into it ... and when I come back down toward finiteness I see with equal clarity and beauty the two concepts once more becoming one and converging in the concept of finite integer.                     ~Georg Cantor

The Happersett Accordion
By Susan Happersett
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 2001. Edition of 100.

3-D object of one paper Möbius strip in box (15 x 7 x 7 cm). Strip of stiff brown paper with black markings on one side and white markings on the other, creased into accordion folds and glued together at the ends to form a Möbius strip. Features black markings on one side and white markings on the other side of a brown strip, with 13 markings, or strokes, per grid square.

A Möbius strip, or band, is the one-sided surface that results from joining together the two ends of a long strip of paper after twisting one end 180 degrees. The new version of Happersett's Möbius accordion features black markings on one side and white markings on the other side of a brown strip, with 13 markings, or strokes, per box. A novel twist on the Möbius strip which Happersett describes as a Möbius accordion.

Each unfolded copy comes with a droll certificate of authenticity along with assembly instructions and the mandatory warning that the product is a mind boggling "Möbius device."
$111

Quartet
Box of Growth: Bloemen, Conch, Leaf, Twig
By Susan Happersett
New York, New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1999. Edition of 89.

6.4 x 3"; 4 books. Each is one sheet, accordion folded and hand-sewn into handmade paper cover. All four booklets cased in a handmade paper enclosure. Johannot rag papers. Bloemen: Bernhard Gothic type; Conch: Kaufmann Bold type; Leaf: Modified, Globe, and Alternative Gothic types; Twig: Weiss, Sylvan, and Hamilton Post Oldstyle types.

Susan Happersett: "Many of the mathematical sequences in my work involve growth patterns. One series of drawings is based on the correlation between plant growth and the Fibonacci Sequence (1,1,2,3,5,8,13,21,34,...) I have also incorporated binary code, explored self-similarity, and chaos theory. Through these drawings I hope to reveal the grace and balance in the mathematics of nature and technology."

Box of Growth is four handmade books, each about a particular occurrence of the Fibonacci sequence in nature: growth and decay patterns of sunflowers (Bloemen); the growth patterns of conch shells; the growth patterns of leaves; and the growth and decay patterns of twigs. The books use a visual language of grids composed of marks increasing in Fibonacci progression (1 line, 2 lines, 3 lines, 5 lines), arranged to represent patterns of growth and decay. All books use a similar abstract representation of the sequence, but each book uses different colors, fonts, paper textures, end papers, and layout on the final page — variation within pattern and repetition.
$233

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6x6x6
By Richard Tipping
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1999. Edition of 216.

6 x 6"; 8 pages. Accordion book. Handset wood and metal type printed on black museum board. Titles printed on front and back covers.

Concrete poetry by Australian poet Richard Tipping.

Richard Tipping, web site: "Richard Kelly Tipping was born in Adelaide, South Australia, in 1949 and studied in humanities at Flinders University. His doctorate from the University of Technology Sydney (2007) is titled Word Art Works: visual poetry and textual objects. He was guest editor for Artlink magazine’s special issue Word as Art in 2007. He has published five books of poetry. ... He continues to explore the physical qualities of written language, making art with words and getting poetry off the page and into the streets."
$66

The World at my Fingertips
By Donna Ratajezak
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1988. Edition of 150.

8.75 x 6.5", 16 pages. Letterpress printed on Rosaspina and Kitikata papers. Types: Bodoni, Bookman, Caslon, Franklin. In stiff boards with red and black folded over wrapper. Printed by Dikko Faust. Designed by Esther K. Smith. Signed and numbered by Smith and Faust.

Esther K. Smith: “It's short fiction-- a continuous text--we designed it to look like newspaper clippings, but it reads in a straightforward way-- (as does it's companion map, Travelog by the same author).”

Donna Ratajezak's Travelog was also published by Purgatory Pie Press.

$150

Purgatory Subscription
(Purgatory Toys)
By Judy Hoffman; Harvey Redding; Susan Happersett; Stephanie Brody Lederman; Chris Collicott
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 2001. Edition of 150.

9.5 x 6.75" folded wrapper that holds the five toys in individual tabs made into the paper.

Five toys in the set:

Buggy Night by Judy Hoffman (1999)

 Miss Manageability by Harvey Redding (2000)

The Happersett Accordion by Susan Happersett (2000), a single surface Moebius strip which folds to reveal two distinct chiaroscuro faces.

The Divine Diviner by Stephanie Brody Lederman (2001), six "pages" hanging by a thread.

 Magic Postcard. Transmorgri-Factory by Chris Collicott (2004), a magic wheel postcard.

$250

Artist Tracts
By Harvey Redding; Laura Murawski; J. Gifford; Melinda Beck;
Wim Hourman
New York: Purgatory Pie Press, 1992. Edition of 250.

Boxed set of five juxtapositional triptychs. 7 x 5" tracts open to 7 x 15". In paper box 7 x 5 x 1/2" by Lauren Rowland which is Day-Glo Rococo hand marbled over pied wood type. Signed and numbered. Concept and design by Esther K. Smith.

Fascinated with those folded religious pamphlets, Esther K. Smith envisioned Artist tracts.

Triptychs: I Sing the Train Electric by Harvey Redding

Fandango by Laura Murawski

Chains of Memories by J. Gifford

Window Pain by Melinda Beck

Flood trip map by Wim Hourman

$350