The Art of Letterpress at The Compound Gallery celebrates the era of letterpress printing with a renaissance exhibition, illustrating how this antiquated medium is being utilized by contemporary artists. Co-curated by Bay Area letterpress artist, Rebecca Peters this exhibition features the work of artists who work in letterpress using both in the traditional type setting and the modern polymer and magnesium plates.

The exhibition features some of the finest local and national letterpress artists including Amos Paul Kennedy Jr., Lisa Rappoport, Lisa Berman, Vanessa Huang, Bryan Kring, Rachel Foster and Brooklyn artist Tim Fite.  The vitrines in the middle of the gallery show the different kinds of type and the myriad tools used in letterpress design as well as the letterpress machines throughout the exhibition, which help the audience really appreciate how labor intensive it was to make broadsides, art objects, and printed paper products.

Like photographers who look towards abstraction in their medium, it seems fittingly paradoxical that in an increasing digital age people long for something that is tangible and tactile, which the characteristic textures of the inks and surface of letterpress offers.

The “Art of Letterpress” runs until March 25, 2012 with a closing Tea Sunday, March 25th from 3-6pm.