Andrew Belsey:
Bruce Bliven, in his book The Wonderful Writing Machine (New York: Random House, 1954) has a picture of a typewriter artist at work (page 153). There is no explanation of who or what is in the picture. All that Bliven says in the text is that “For some, typing is one of the fine arts” and there have been “fine artists who made typewritten pictures.”
Pietro (de) Saga was the pseudonym of an early Austrian typewriter artist, who Andrew Belsey informed us about. Since there’s so little info abot her online, we thought we’d post his explanation about her here:
There is no agreement about the real name and dates of Pietro Saga (sometimes Pietro de Saga). Her real name is usually stated to be Stefi Kiesler, but her first name sometimes appears as Stefani, Stefanie, Stephani, Steffi, etc. Her original surname was Fritsch or Frischer. Her dates are given as 1896-1965, 1897-1963 or 1900-1965.In 1920 she married the Austrian architect and designer Frederick Kiesler (1890-1965), and they were involved in European avant-garde art movements, such as De Stijl. In 1926 they emigrated to the USA, and lived thereafter in New York, where they were part of the modern art scene. She was also a librarian in the New York Public Library.
Thanks to Andrew Belsey for the De Stijl cover. Stefi Kiesler’s typewriter art originals are from page 371 here, from Yale University’s art collection.
Cover of Kontexts, issue 4 (1972/1973) with typewriter art by Amelia Etlinger. Kontexts was a magazine of concrete and experimental poetry edited by Michael Gibbs (no 1 co-edited with Paul Merchant).
Thanks to Andrew Belsey for sharing.
Back and front cover of catalog of exhibition Typewriter Art, Half a Century of Experiment, by Alan Riddell, exhibition at New 57 Gallery, Edinburgh, 1973. Thanks to Andrew Belsey for sharing.
Front and back cover of catalog of exhibition Typewriter Art, Half a Century of Experiment, by Alan Riddell, exhibition at Concourse Gallery, Polytechnic of Central London, 1974.
“I was in the typewriter art exhibition in London, the catalog cover of which you also display. But the date should be 1974 – they forgot to put the year on the cover. The exhibition was initially in Edinburgh in 1973, then in London in 1974, and then Alan Riddell used the material in his book Typewriter Art in 1975. Unfortunately Alan died in 1977, a great loss. The Edinburgh catalog cover is the same design, except that it says in all lower case: “new 57 gallery, 105 rose street, Edinburgh nov 17 – dec 6, 1973”. When the catalog was revised for the London exhibition they put the dates and months but forgot the year, which was, to repeat, 1974.” Andrew Belsey
