At the start of September, the Small Performances team were privileged to participate in a unique three-day conference at the University of Cambridge: “The Craft, Texture, and Aesthetics of Letter Forms from Antiquity to the Present”, and to present two updates on the Baskerville project. Two of the Small Performances team, Marcos Martinon-Torres and Maciej Pawlikowski were on the conference organising committee.
The conference was held at the Faculty of English at the University of Cambridge, between the 2nd and 4th September, and was joint-hosted by the Faculty of English, the Cambridge University Library Research Institute, and Stanford Text Technologies, Stanford University. The unique nature of the conference drew participants from across the UK, and as far as the USA. Among the participants were researchers, archivists, paper-makers, photographers, artists, letter-cutters, weavers, calligraphers, scribes, among others. From this diverse group of people, a love of letters and their form and craft was very evident, and fostered a unique conference atmosphere with genuine interest and open information sharing. Two Small Performances presentations were given by various team members. One presentation, given on behalf of the whole Small Performances team was led by Maciej Pawlikowski, and supported by Marcos Martinon-Torres and Emily Watt. This talk provided an update on each angle of the Small Performances project and an indication of the exciting avenues currently under investigation. The second presentation was by Riccardo Olocco, giving an overview of the revival of a Baskerville font and an update on the typography workshops he and Michele Patane are running as part of that endeavour.
During the conference, there was an opportunity to visit the Historical Printing Room at the Cambridge University Library, with demonstrations from Small Performances colleagues Liam Sims and David McFarlane, where delegates were able to view the historical printing press workshop and some rare books, including Baskerville material.
It was a brilliant conference that fostered a great deal of conversation not only between academics and practitioners, but across the various craftforms, media, cultures, time, and disciplines represented by the expertise of the diverse attendees.