Events
Upcoming
Open House and Release Party
When: Sunday, September 20, 3–5 p.m.
Where: Mirror Lab Studios, 3400 Cedar Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55407
Join Birchwood Palace Industries at Mirror Lab Studios for an afternoon celebrating three new publications, with a short presentation, Q&A, books and other work for sale, and guest artists.
The new Birchwood Palace titles are:
- Keep Clear: Scenes of Injury Death in International Safety Signage (BP023)
- I Consider Myself a Wonderful and Discreet Woman (BP024)
- The New Sidewalk Cartomancy Digital Handbook (BP025)
Guest artists Trina Fernandez and Sarah Evenson will also have work for sale. Both make book-related objects and publications; Sarah is also the proprietor of Gay Mail Friend, an excellent mail-order project to which you can and should subscribe.
There will also be a brief live presentation by a four-year-old on the subject of “Mr. Ouch,” the electric monster featured on the cover of Keep Clear.
This is not technically an open house, since Birchwood Palace’s actual studio is an attic and is in no condition to receive the public. But the general principle applies: come by, look at some things, meet some people, ask questions, and buy a book if so inclined.
Past
vickies.online Book Release Party
When: Friday, June 14, 6 p.m.
Where: Open Book, 1011 Washington Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55415
Birchwood Palace Industries joined photographer Trina Fernandez for the release of her photo book vickies.online. Trina read from the book, presented new work and marked the occasion with a bonus release of her companion publication We Have to Go.
About vickies.online
Trina’s photographic exploration of her physical and digital life, with an accompanying essay, is an inventory of her obsessions, preoccupations and self-identity. Dioramas and funny vignettes are interspersed with candid photographs of everyday life, circling through the material and psychic contents of her 400-square-foot prewar apartment.
The book touches on photo books, plastic figurines, the Filipino diaspora, pictures of Fred Gwynne, digital identity, office supplies, growing up online, prewar apartments and California history.
About Trina Fernandez
Trina Fernandez uses photography to sift through digital and social life, often approaching precarious contemporary conditions through humor, nostalgia and recreated scenes. She holds a BA in Photography and an MFA in Visual Studies, and has presented research at PCA/ACA, SECAC and the Smart Museum of Art at the University of Chicago.
Paper Palace One-Year Anniversary and Twin Cities Meet-Up & Pencil-and-Paper Game Tournament
When: Sunday, February 25, 2 p.m.
Where: BlackStack Brewing, 755 Prior Ave. N., St. Paul, MN 55104
Paper Palace celebrated its first year with a subscriber meet-up and tournament featuring its three most competitive games: NIM, ORDER & CHAOS and RACETRACK. The winner received an engraved trophy and the opportunity to appear in the next Paper Palace letter clutching it or holding it aloft.
Guests of all ages were welcome. Tournament play was open to Paper Palace subscribers.
Tournament Rules
- Participants were randomly assigned opponents for best-two-of-three rounds of NIM and ORDER & CHAOS, plus a single round of RACETRACK.
- Players received one point for each round of NIM or ORDER & CHAOS won, plus an additional point for winning two consecutive rounds.
- RACETRACK awarded two points to the winner and one point to the runner-up.
- A perfect tournament score was eight points.
- A tie in RACETRACK triggered a second race on a new track.
- If the final point totals were tied, the championship was decided by a multi-player RACETRACK round on a new track.
The Outer Periphery Book Release Party
When: Saturday, October 21, 2023, 4–6 p.m.
Where: The Chapel at the Center for Performing Arts, 3754 Pleasant Ave., Minneapolis, MN 55409
Birchwood Palace Industries celebrated the release of Andy Sturdevant’s The Outer Periphery: Amateur Spacecraft Designs from the U.S. Patent Office, 1960–2022.
The program included selections from the book, commentary and conversations with special guests Navin Ramalingam, Associate Attorney in the Intellectual Property and Technology Litigation Group at Robins Kaplan LLP; Trina Fernandez of the Center for Photography for Non-Photographers; and musical guest DJ Tonedef. Tang and astronaut ice cream were served.
About The Outer Periphery
A collection of patent illustrations for functioning spacecraft designed by amateurs, hobbyists, science-fiction enthusiasts, engineers and cranks. Ranging from somewhat plausible to completely off the wall, the drawings capture the delirious optimism of the space age and the conviction that designing a spacecraft in one’s garage might constitute a reasonable contribution to the future of humankind.
Black-and-white illustrations from U.S. Patent Office files. Saddle stitched, 5.5 × 8.5 inches. Product number BP014.
Do It Yourself / Hang In There, Baby Book Release Party
When: Saturday, November 13, 2021, 7–9 p.m.
Where: Soo Visual Arts Center, 2909 Bryant Ave. S., Minneapolis, MN 55408
Birchwood Palace Industries joined photographer Trina Fernandez for the release of Do It Yourself / Hang In There, Baby. Trina read from the book, interviewed her mother in California via Zoom, and served dishes featured in the publication, including SkyFlakes crackers. Copies of the book, a poster and free one-inch buttons were available.
About Do It Yourself / Hang In There, Baby
While cleaning out her mother’s house, Trina found a collaged cookbook from the early 1980s: what she describes as “a blueprint for the start of her family.” Using that book as a starting point, Do It Yourself reconstructs the improvised meals of Trina’s own adulthood, art-directed with the eye-watering excess of late-1970s Good Housekeeping cookbooks.
The recipes and instructions reflect struggles and heartbreak in her own life alongside those of her mother three decades earlier. Oversaturated photographic tableaus of middle-class abundance tie the two experiences together in an examination of memory, loneliness, depression and family that is both funny and deeply affecting.
About Trina Fernandez
Trina is a photographic installation artist whose work considers emotional experiences that are often difficult to discuss directly. Using popular imagery, nostalgia and artifice, she recreates scenes from the past as a means of connecting them to the present. Truth, vulnerability and the desire for deeper connection are central to the work. She is a self-described “intellectual bimbo.”