With newspapers folding and books going electronic, the printed word seems to be on the way out, but in East Oakland a small company is bucking the trend and keeping the presses rolling.
Located inside a small warehouse on an industrial backstreet, Horwinski Printing has been turning out handset letterpress posters for music concerts, movies, political campaigns, roller derbies and boxing events since 1906. Hulking flat files fill the space, their drawers lined with alphabets of wood and metal type in every font and size. Owner James Lang, 56, flips the switch on a Heidelberg press, and the motor hums to life. He explains how he inks up the type and feeds in sheets of paper and then moves on to demo a massive Miehle flatbed press the size of a small car that slumbers in the back room. "I remember my grandfather holding me up over that thing to show me how it worked and being terrified."
The shop walls are a pop culture time capsule — a playbill for the 1963 run of Liz Taylor and Richard Burton's Cleopatra at the Grand Lake Theater hangs beside a poster announcing a Cassius Clay/Sonny Liston match at the Oakland Auditorium. Over the years, Horwinski has also dealt in more mundane material — picket signs, "No Parking" placards, letterhead and business cards.
Nowadays, work is slow, but Lang continues to sell reprints of classic posters and has attracted a following of artists who are drawn to the handcrafted quality of his work. Oakland curator Joseph del Pesco has collaborated with him on several art projects and organized a gallery show of Horwinski posters in 2005. "It's a treasure trove experience walking in there," he explains. "You can't help but feel you're witnessing history."
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Since 2006, a bevy of businesses has popped up along Oakland's 40th Street Corridor, all of them owned by young, creative entrepreneurs who sell everything from bikes to zines to tattoos and vintage threads. As a sideline, several of them show local artists' works on their walls, so Oakland curator Obi Kaufmann, who lived in the neighborhood, suggested they all collaborate on an
art event.
This past spring, the 40th Street Art Quest was born. It's a walk scheduled semi-regularly where guests stroll from shop to shop with a treasure map that guides them Monopoly board-like through this up-and-coming neighborhood. More than just an Art Murmur north, Art Quest is a combination art walk and shop local campaign where participants who visit each venue get their map stamped for a chance to win a gift certificate.
Among the shops and galleries are Manifesto where Sam Cunningham and Mackay Gibbs sell new and rebuilt bikes and 1-2-3-4 Go! Records where Steve Stevenson doles out advice on the latest indie and punk vinyl. SubRosa Coffee fuels art strollers with its Four Barrel brew while at Issues, husband-and-wife team Noella Teele and Joe Colley, run a jaw-droppingly comprehensive international newsstand. At Premium Tattoo and Vintage, artist Matt Decker is famous for his ink while wife Hilary Decker sells vintage threads.
The one true gallery among the bunch — Rowan Morrison Gallery — features exhibits and fine art books curated by Pete and Narangkar Glover. "We want folks to think of 40th Street as more than a way to get from Piedmont to MacArthur BART," Narangkar Glover says. "We're proud of what's happening in the neighborhood and that all the businesses are independently owned
and operated."
So who said art and commerce don't mix?
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A Life in Letters: An Oakland Printer Keeps the Art of Handset Type Alive
Art and Commerce Collide