Congratulations are in order for second-year Book & Paper student Heather Buechler, who has just been selected as TRANSIT’s first Artist-In-Residence. TRANSIT is a residency program that will provide the time, space, and needs of artists by partnering with existing facilities, rather than by being a retreat or facility in itself, and by showcasing the work they create during their residencies.

Buechler creates prints, drawings, and sculptural objects that explore a rural agricultural Midwest in flux. Her work examines the history of agriculture and industry, and its relationship to current ecological and social concerns of rural Midwestern America.

Over the course of the last few months, she has been researching the history of manufacturing and printing textile and paper sacks used for packaging and shipping agricultural goods in the late 19th and early 20th century. Wood type, cuts and engravings were key players during the early part of this manufacturing history. The Hamilton Wood Type & Printing Museum, as one of the largest manufacturers of wood type during this time, is seated uniquely within the historic scope of this research. For her residency she will work with museum staff to locate these items of interest, and begin to curate them into a research catalogue

TRANSIT is a not for profit residency founded in 2010, which aims to serve artists from multiple disciplines within written, visual, music and performance arts, who seek opportunities to create in an urban environment and/or specifically culturally rich Chicago.