Canadian photographer Michael Torosian purchased his first printing press in 1981. Through trial and error, along with some helpful advice from Toronto’s private press community, Torosian taught himself the mechanics of book making and launched his publishing imprint Lumiere Press out of a studio in west Toronto. Owing to his background, his books focused exclusively on photography – today, it is the only fine press in the world devoted exclusively to photography and photographers, and has featured some of the most important photo artists of the last century, including Edward Weston, Lewis Hine, Dave Heath and Saul Leiter. In the spirit of the fine press tradition, the books are entirely handmade: they are cast in lead, hand printed and hand bound, in limited editions of between 150 and 300, making each book a unique object of artisanal skill.

This exhibition features material gathered from the Lumiere Press Papers, which was donated to the Fisher Library in 2017.