Lumiere Press is a private press located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, specializing in photography. Founded in 1981, Lumiere Press publishes books that are letterpress printed and hand bound. The press is owned and run entirely by Michael Torosian, who learned bookmaking in the 1970s, [1] and is described as, "...the very definition of a one-man band... writer, photographer, curator, designer, typesetter, publisher, printer." [2]
Private press publishing, with respect to books, is an endeavor performed by craft-based expert or aspiring artisans, either amateur or professional, who, among other things, print and build books, typically by hand, with emphasis on design, graphics, layout, fine printing, binding, covers, paper, stitching, and the like.
Toronto is the provincial capital of Ontario and the most populous city in Canada, with a population of 2,731,571 in 2016. Current to 2016, the Toronto census metropolitan area (CMA), of which the majority is within the Greater Toronto Area (GTA), held a population of 5,928,040, making it Canada's most populous CMA. Toronto is the anchor of an urban agglomeration, known as the Golden Horseshoe in Southern Ontario, located on the northwestern shore of Lake Ontario. A global city, Toronto is a centre of business, finance, arts, and culture, and is recognized as one of the most multicultural and cosmopolitan cities in the world.
Ontario is one of the 13 provinces and territories of Canada and is located in east-central Canada. It is Canada's most populous province accounting for 38.3 percent of the country's population, and is the second-largest province in total area. Ontario is fourth-largest jurisdiction in total area when the territories of the Northwest Territories and Nunavut are included. It is home to the nation's capital city, Ottawa, and the nation's most populous city, Toronto, which is also Ontario's provincial capital.
Lumiere Press is the only private press exclusively publishing photography books in Canada.[ citation needed ] The shop's first printing press was acquired in 1981, and the first book, Edward Weston: Dedicated to Simplicity, was published in 1986. To date, the press has published twenty-one limited edition books, on photographers such as, Edward Weston, Paul Strand, Edward Steichen, Frederick Sommer, Lewis Hine, Edward Burtynsky, Gordon Parks, as well as Torosian's own photographic work. Produced in editions of 50-300, often commissioned by galleries or institutions, [3] the books have been acquired by both private collectors and over 150 public institutions (many with standing orders), [4] including the Museum of Modern Art, Thomas Fisher Rare Book Library, International Center of Photography, National Gallery of Canada, Victoria and Albert Museum, New York Public Library; J. Paul Getty Museum, and George Eastman House.
A printing press is a mechanical device for applying pressure to an inked surface resting upon a print medium, thereby transferring the ink. It marked a dramatic improvement on earlier printing methods in which the cloth, paper or other medium was brushed or rubbed repeatedly to achieve the transfer of ink, and accelerated the process. Typically used for texts, the invention and global spread of the printing press was one of the most influential events in the second millennium.
Edward Henry Weston was a 20th-century American photographer. He has been called "one of the most innovative and influential American photographers…" and "one of the masters of 20th century photography." Over the course of his 40-year career Weston photographed an increasingly expansive set of subjects, including landscapes, still lives, nudes, portraits, genre scenes and even whimsical parodies. It is said that he developed a "quintessentially American, and specially Californian, approach to modern photography" because of his focus on the people and places of the American West. In 1937 Weston was the first photographer to receive a Guggenheim Fellowship, and over the next two years he produced nearly 1,400 negatives using his 8 × 10 view camera. Some of his most famous photographs were taken of the trees and rocks at Point Lobos, California, near where he lived for many years.
The books have been recognized for design and production excellence, including the "Fifty Books of the Year" award from the American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA), the George Wittenborn Memorial Book Award for Excellence in Art Publishing, and a succession of awards from the Alcuin Society.
A voluntary association established in 1965 by Geoff Spencer, the Alcuin Society is a non-profit organisation founded for the book arts. It is located in Canada. It should not be confused with the Alcuin Club, an Anglican publishing society.
