00:00:00 MODERATOR: Hello. Good morning everyone. Time to get started. Hi. Welcome to the twenty- first (21st) Annual New Jersey Book Arts Symposium. It's hard to believe it's been twenty-one (21) years but our Founding Director, Michael Joseph, has been in charge -- I believe -- of every single one of them added. For many years it was held in Newark at the Dana Library at Rutgers and I believe it 00:00:30 was a Princeton one (1) year and this is the third year in New Brunswick at the Rutgers Libraries. I also wanted to thank our co-sponsors very much. You've been so supportive and one of the great advantages of having it at Middlesex County is that we have the Middlesex County Cultural & Heritage Commission and just to point out a few dignitaries: Isha Veyez who is the head of the Arts History Program Services at the Commission; and Eva Walter 00:01:00 is in charge of folklife at the Commission; and our Director Emeritus, Anash Gennus who was responsible for much of the history of that great organization. You'll be hearing a word or two (2) from Isha later on. So, welcome to the Rutgers Library. You've come during the two hundred fiftieth (250th) anniversary celebration just in time for the kickoff, which 00:01:30 is going to be this coming Tuesday with a ringing of the bell at Old Queen's. We have a great exhibition that we'd love you to see. It's almost up, so you could see the preliminaries today but please come back. We have a big public program on Thursday this coming Thursday the 12th at five thirty (5:30) p.m. We're going to kick off the exhibition and the anniversary celebration at that time. Again, we're very proud to host this at the Rutgers University Libraries. And 00:02:00 I would like to now introduce you to our Vice President for Information Services and University Librarian, Krisellen Maloney. Krisellen comes to us from the University of Texas at San Antonio. Many, many years of experience in libraries and we're really excited about working with her and this is her first Book Arts Symposium. So, without further ado. KRISELLEN MALONEY: Well, I'm very honored to be here to 00:02:30 welcome you to this year -- the twenty-first (21st) New Jersey Book Arts Symposium and I should have probably coordinated my remarks a little better because mine are going to almost be a repeat of what Ron just said. But, I did want to acknowledge that the symposium was founded by Susan Salzberg and our own Michael Joseph in nineteen ninety-four (1994), and it is such a wonderful community that me 00:03:00 being up here is difficult to acknowledge all of the people that have been involved for all of the years, so I'm going to rely on others to do that. But I do want to say that it's very important for us to have it here. What I did before to prepare for this is I looked at a couple of the symposia that were available on RU Core -- the videos. Just so you know, this one (1) is going to be videotaped -- you probably know that - and it will also be on RU Core. RU Coreis 00:03:30 indexed by Google so you can just simply type "New Jersey Book Art Symposium" in and you'll see the video and it's really great. It was really helpful for me because I did learn some things as I went back and looked at the the videos that are there. The most importantI think is that the weather in New Jersey is very unpredictable in early November, so the video of last year's symposium shows a group of people in turtlenecks and winter coats and happy to finally see sun. I ntwo thousand twelve (2012) 00:04:00 the symposium was canceled. So, the Princeton symposium was actually I believe canceled due to Hurricane Sandy. So, today's balmy seventy-five (75) degrees is welcome to me coming here from Texas. I can tell you it's eased my transition quite a bit but it really does add to the unpredictability of the of the weather here. Another thing that stands out though is the amazing content. I looked at 00:04:30 last year's and I thought it was so spectacular, how could we how could we do this again. How could you do this again? I look at what's going on today and I'm just amazingly impressed by this group of people and what you've done together. So, I'm looking forward to this continuing over time. It's fostered such a vibrant book art community in this area. You know, this event and you coming together in this way one wouldn't expect to see New Jersey as 00:05:00 being such a -- sorry I don't want to say it that way, especially coming from Texas, so I don't mean to say it that way -- but it is such a vibrant community, such a rich community. You should all be very proud of what you've done here. In the interest of time I'm not going to acknowledge all the participants. I do want to take a moment to acknowledge the support of the Middlesex County Cultural & Heritage Commission because that's very important to us and in a few minutes Isha Veyez is also going to speak. So, 00:05:30 thank you all for coming. I hope you have a wonderful day. I know it started off great already. Thank you to Michael Joseph and Ron. I hope you enjoy the day. Thank you. MODERATOR: So, the Middlesex County Cultural & Heritage Commission [is] certainly the largest and most active commission in the state. We support so much in terms of culture, arts and history in New Jersey and it's really been their dedicated staff 00:06:00 that has done it all and it's made it the premier one (1) and I think that's one (1) of the reasons why we're here today through that co-sponsorship. So, without further ado, here is Isha Veyez to greet us. ISHA VEYEZ: Good morning. On behalf of the Middlesex County Board of chosen Freeholders, I'm delighted to be here. Three (3) years ago when 00:06:30 we were approached to be a co-sponsor of this symposium Ann and I were absolutely delighted to co-sponsor it. But unfortunately, at that time, year one (1), I was traveling to India and Nepal and last year I was in Amsterdam and London and [I] could not make it. But this year since I had no exotic travel plans and I was going to be here I was so excited and determined to be here today. Of course, we are always very pleased to support this remarkable event – twenty-one (21) 00:07:00 years -- it's remarkable. Congratulations all of you. Book and arts are perfect together and we all know this is a rapidly evolving field and this symposium not only explores the contemporary interpretations of [the] book as art, but also preserves and documents the history and the tradition of book arts. For that we are very grateful. We congratulate Michael Joseph his team and all of you here who have made this symposium a 00:07:30 continued success for twenty-one (21) years. Of course, we at the Middlesex County Cultural Heritage Commission want to be part of this success for many more years to come. Thank you and congratulations again. MODERATOR: So, Michael we're nice and early. Michael Joseph Rutgers University Library's Rare Book Librarian and the founder of the New Jersey Book Art Symposium. MICHAEL JOSEPH: Hi. I 00:08:00 just love that Southern voice. Thank you, Kris and thank you Isha and Ron for making everybody feel welcome and thank you everybody for coming out on this beautiful autumn day. Everyone thinks November is kind of the coldest part of the year. There's a poem by Robert Grace in which he calls November the "rawest of seasons," but this part of November can be exquisite. I 00:08:30 heard on the radio this morning that this weekend is Peak Fall Foliage Viewing Weekend. Thank you very much for surrendering your peak fall foliage viewing to come here. Let me also thank Asha Ganpat -- who's outside cleaning up and working on the workshop -- for a fabulous workshop this morning. Asha is a trip. Asha you are at trip! In the 00:09:00 best sense of the word. I'm just going to talk about a couple of wrinkles in the program. Karen is going to come up and introduce the featured speakers, but before I do that I want to ask Lois Morrison to step up here and talk to you about a matter of some profound concern to everyone who does books -- everyone who is involved in making artist's books and involved in letter- press and in the history of the book. So, Lois if you would. LOIS MORRISON: I was startled, I 00:09:30 got a call from Julie Chen who has been teaching at Mills. She's was a student at Mills years ago. She's been teaching at Mills since and was applying for her doctorate -- not her doctorate -- for her full professorship at Mills and all of a sudden with thirty (30) days notice they were told that they were considering closing 00:10:00 the program for Book Arts at Mills College.