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Let’s give a warm welcome to Dave Buchen!
Hello all and thanks for this opportunity to share my work. I started making books on my printing press back in 2000, hand-printing, coloring, and binding 100 books at a time. As the books I wanted to make got more complex, I moved to self-publishing in various forms.
My newest book is Why is an Apple an Apple? A Garden of Etymology. It tells the story of how our words for fruits and vegetables have evolved over the years with 50+ papercut illustrations. The story of words like rice, rhubarb, and rutabaga led me down many rabbit holes of where fruits were first grown and how they traveled the world. For example, rhubarb can be translated as “Russian Barbarian” or “Wet Barbarian.” I make children’s books, but as a father and former teacher who has read countless children’s books, I try to write them in a way that any age can read them and be neither bored or overwhelmed.
This book is a sequel to Why is a Tiger a Tiger? A Bestiary of Etymology which I published years ago. My fascination with etymology was really sparked back in Chicago when I found a great dictionary with etymologies in the garbage. It’s its own way of studying culture and language that reveals connections and meanings that one wouldn’t have otherwise deduced. I then published a Spanish version which included new animals and some other animals taken out. An interesting etymology in one language does not guarantee an equally fascinating story in the other!
In many ways, my books have evolved as my children have grown up. I made Bilingual ABC Bilingüe back when they were small, and I was faced with a dilemma. I moved to Puerto Rico in 1999, and my children were both born here and are bilingual. Finding a decent bilingual ABC was way harder than it should have been. Too many books had pages like “A is for Apple [ M es para Manzana]”! So I made my own in which the letters actually match the words in English and Spanish (Acrobat/Acróbata, Bubbles/Burbujas etc.). This was originally hand-printed, but after they sold out I resurrected it as a print-on-demand book.
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I still make books by hand as well as an annual calendar. I have a Vandercook #1 press in my laundry shed. Hush Little Baby is a version that I used to sing to my kids in semi-improvised variations to get them to sleep. For a model of parent and child, I was able to turn to my nephew and his new daughter. I have also used the press to make an annual calendar since 1999. It began as the Bestiary Calendar and has evolved over the years to have such themes as the French Revolutionary Calendar, dancing, masks in the first year of covid, and people embracing in covid’s aftermath. This year’s theme was going to be birds you can see from my garden, but I broadened it to Puerto Rico in general to get some more striking birds other than the ones that visit me.
For the calendar, my daughter, now an adult, contributed three of the prints including the hummingbird.
The print-on-demand books are available at Amazon, which has a de facto monopoly on the kind of self-publishing I do, sigh.
Info about my hand-printed books and calendars can be found on my website.
Do we throw up our hands or do we roll up our sleeves?
WaterGirl
Dave, please let us know when you get here, I know there will be questions!
Dave Buchen
@WaterGirl: hello! And thanks again for your help and work and this chance to share my work
Another Scott
Thanks for sharing your work with us. Beautiful stuff. I imagine the carving and printing can be quite cathartic at times.
Your bilingual ABCs approach makes so much sense!! :-)
Your fuzzy helper looks quite intense.
Thanks again.
Best wishes,
Scott.
comrade scotts agenda of rage
Zooburbia ordered.
zhena gogolia
Wow, beautiful. I love woodcuts.
TBone
How to say make a booking in German!
Your animals (and everything else) have mucho wonderful personality. Awesome.
Dave Buchen
@TBone: I wish I knew! Most of my family came from Germany but by my generation it had all but disappeared except for schnibbles which were the bits of bite sized bits of a turkey getting carved.
Snarki, child of Loki
Those young-kids books:
“A is for apple, B is for bear, C is for Crocodile (oh, so fair)”
Always made me want to write one where the first letter of each of the words was either silent, or of atypical pronunciation. English is chaotic, so possible!
Ghoti => fish
Dave Buchen
@Another Scott: Indeed! The anual calendar printing lasts for 13 days. Music, old radio mysteries etc while I turn a crank and print for a few hours is often good therapy!
Dave Buchen
@Snarki, child of Loki: yes! Write that book please. A brilliant idea. A is for aisle. And for B?
KatKapCC
Okay, I love etymology and I may have to get these. It’s a far more fascinating topic than I think most people realize. Or maybe I’m just a big nerd :D
KatKapCC
@Snarki, child of Loki: Welllll someone might have beaten you to the punch on that one :P
P Is For Pterodactyl
But I’d bet you could come up with another 26 and make your own!
LoveNOLA
Dave is a great artist and a great person too. He has other many other talents I remember from his time in Chicago. Bravo to you Dave.
stinger
Fascinating, and I love the woodcuts!
Dave Buchen
@LoveNOLA: hello!
Mr. Bemused Senior
@KatKapCC:
I can’t resist. From the Alice and Bob After Dinner Speech…
A for ‘Orses
B for Mutton
C for Yourself
D for Mation
E for Brick
F for Vescence
G for Police
H for Consent
I for Lutin
J for Orange
K for Teria
L for Leather
M for Sis
N for Mation
O for A Muse of Fire
P for Ate
Q for A Song
S for Something Else
T for Two
U for Mism
V for La France
W for Mism
X for Breakfast
Y for Lover
Z (zee) for yourself
[If anyone can explain “E for Brick” please do.]
Dave Buchen
@Mr. Bemused Senior: A thing of beauty!
schrodingers_cat
@Dave Buchen: I like your illustrations. What media do you use.
Timill
@Mr. Bemused Senior:
Here you go…
TBone
@Dave Buchen: great word!!! I am going to say schnibbles a lot. Especially if feeling creative.
It’s a beautiful thing that you last name derives from buch (book)! Buchen means to make a booking, i.e., a reservation.
Mr. Bemused Senior
@Timill: oooooh. Thanks.
oldgold
Your 2025 bird illustrations are excellent.
TBone
I heard a silent first letter song for adults but cannot now find it. I did, however, come across Disco Grover dressed like John Travolta doing the muppets boogie alphabet.
Dave Buchen
@schrodingers_cat: I started with Lino-cuts. A cheap easy way to make prints. I bought an old Vandercook Press #1 at an amazing warehouse in Chicago. First floor car parts, second floor old appliances, third floor printing equipment. All dusty and dark! But I’ve moved it with me again and again.
I don’t know why I started making paper-cuts. But it’s a fun puzzle because it is one piece of paper cut with an exacto. So it’s all connected, and it has become my non-fiction illustrative style. But pretty much the same idea as carving linoleum, getting rid of what isn’t needed.
I’ve also done some painting and charcoal work for a performance series called Baudelaire in a Box. We commissioned nearly a 100 musical versions of poems from la fleur du mal and behind the musicians I would turn a crank and my paintings would glide by, ahem, mostly, often glide.
https://youtu.be/6l3gEbvI5hM?si=IlUYtOvEfoKWa6la
Dave Buchen
@Timill: ha! The E was only one I couldn’t figure out. Thanks
TBone
@Dave Buchen: That is so freakin’ COOL
zhena gogolia
@zhena gogolia: I guess they’re linocuts! Still beautiful.
Ned F
Count me impressed.
Barbara
So if it’s print on demand, what kind of paper do you use? I have some young and not so young potential recipients but I wondered what the final product would be like. Thanks.
something fabulous
Dave! You won’t know me but I remember you from Chicago! Mutual Redmoon friends got me your calendar for several years for holiday gifts back in the day. How cool to see you here! Hi! Great work!
Dave Buchen
@Barbara: It’s a decent book to be honest. Well bound, good paper, the very heavy illustrations don’t bleed through.
Dave Buchen
@something fabulous: Hello! The first calendar I ever printed was with Redmoon! I fanagled them into giving me some money to buy the press, and then 12 members of redmoon carved the images, and I learned how to print!
Subcommandante Yakbreath
It’s great to see another book maker amongst the jackaltariat. Paper cuts are something I’ve never done, but I like the effect they give. Glad to see your work here.
Elizabelle
Beautiful work, Dave. The alphabet books will be especially useful.
StringOnAStick
As a lifetime lover of books, the thought of someone hand printing their own is thrilling to me! I’m so impressed with your work!
Barbara
@Dave Buchen: Thanks!
WaterGirl
Dave, my neighbor is heading over, so I just want total second to that you for sharing your talent with us.
Subcommandante Yakbreath
It just came to me; did you get your press from Dave Churchman? I think he was in Chicago.
Dave Buchen
@Subcommandante Yakbreath: oh, can’t remember his name. It was an old warehouse in Pilsen, half empty in 1997. My memory is of and older been at the junk resale business for awhile kind of guy, but that may be embellished memory
Subcommandante Yakbreath
@Dave Buchen:
No problem. I was never there, but Churchman’s place was kind of legendary. Hard to believe how long ago 1997 seems…
Barbara
@Barbara: I did order two. Everything I have ordered for Christmas thus far is going to come late, except for the Christmas presents that I forgot to give people last year. My gift giving skills have definitely declined with age.
Snarki, child of Loki
@KatKapCC: “P Is For Pterodactyl”
Damn rat-weasels stole my idea, before I even had it!
Insufferable, really.
Miss Bianca
Dave! Dave Buchen! I didn’t know you were hanging around this joint! How wonderful to see your art work again, I’ve missed it since our Chicago days.