Chez Panisse

David Lance Goines on the Poster

This poster – no. 74 – was designed and printed by David Lance Goines for Alice Waters to promote the seventh anniversary of her restrauant, Chez Panisse.¹ It is one of more than thirty posters Goines has printed for Chez Panisse over the course of his 40-year career.

The reclining nude was originally intended for a Kenwood wine label, but the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms rejected it deeming the picture “obscene or indecent.” Goines redrew the label with a skeleton in place of the woman, but, as you could guess, the ATF was still unamused. He eventually recycled the design for Chez Panisse, who apparently had no regulatory issues with it.

No. 14, Red-Haired Lady, Chez Panisse, 1972

The wine label wasn’t Goines first run-in with the authorities. During his sophomore year at UC Berkeley he was expelled for his participation in the free speech movement, and even served a month in jail.² He was eventually readmitted but soon quit to apprentice under Marion Syrek at the Berkeley Free Press, where he “printed damned near every piece of inflammatory trash for damned near every radical cause for damned near seven years.” ³

No. 31, 2nd Anniversary, Chez Panisse, 1973

David and Alice met in 1966 and while David was learning to be a pressman, Alice was developing her philosophy on food. In 1968 they collaborated on a column, “Alice’s Restaurant,” for the alternative San Francisco Express Times. Goines collected the columns and printed them in 1970 as Thirty Recipes Suitable for Framing.⁴ The profits from the first three printings allowed him to buy out the Berkeley Free Press, which he rechristened as Saint Hieronymus Press. A year later Alice opened her now legendary restaurant, Chez Panisse.

No. 65, Garlic Festival, Chez Panisse, 1977

No. 170, 25th Anniversary, Chez Panisse, 1996

No. 209, Chez Panisse, 2005

Although Goines has designed and printed many different things; everything from books to wedding announcements to product labels, he would become best known for his posters.

Like many of his late-1960s Bay-area contemporaries, Goines was heavily influenced by the German Jugendstil movement, especially Lucian Bernhard and Ludwig Hohlwein.⁵ Unlike most of the psychedelic designers, however, he pared his designs down to only the most relavent elements: a strong central image, limited use of color, and a straightforward message. Anything more he felt was no longer a poster.

No. 4, Velo-Sport Bicycles, 1970

Goines has, at least quietly, earned an international reputation by retaining compete, and uncompromising, control over the entire artistic process. He personally chooses his clients, mostly local and often his friends, or as he stated in a 1999 interview: “...for an audience of people who are somewhat the same as me and the client.” Aside from Chez Panisse and significant work for the Pacific Film Archive, as well as a number of self-promotional pieces, many of his posters are for quite small local businesses or events:

No. 43, India ink Gallery, 1974

No. 62, Full Circle Gallery, 1976

No. 63, Queen of Hearts Ball, Coyote, 1977

Goines considers himself, first and formost, a journeyman printer. He prints all of the posters himself (on a 1954 ATF Solna Chief 24 press) as 2–21 color lithographs. Although some of his work has been compiled into books,⁶ 4-color reproductions simply don’t do the originals justice.

Today, some forty years after founding the Saint Hieronymus Press, Goines is still designing and printing posters, and still with the same high standards. As Meggs stated in A History of Graphic Design; “...it is possible for the individual artist or craftsman to define a personal direction and operate as an independent creative force with total control over his or her work.” Or, put another way, it is still possible for an artist to be successful and not sell out.

No. 145, Mount Veeder Winery, 1990

No. 169, Domaine Chandon Winery, 1996

1. For a complete list of his posters, including images, production notes and commentary, see goines.net.

2. Goines was arrested during the Sproul Hall takeover on 2 Dec 1964 giving him some serious radical antiestablishment cred. For a detailed history, see: Goines, David Lance. The Free Speech Movement: Coming of Age in the 1960s. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 1993. A revised version of the full text is available online at the University of California’s Calisphere site.

3. Which, honestly, is damned near the best thing ever quoted here by your humble narrator.

4. Waters, Alice, Goines, David Lance. Thirty Recipes Suitable for Framing. Berkeley: Saint Hieronymus Press, 1970. The folio, consisting of 30 lithographs in a paper cover, was in print until 1978. For more information about David and Alice, as well as a complete history of Chez Panisse, see: McNamee, Thomas. Alice Waters and Chez Panisse. New York: Penguin, 2007.

5. Between 16 Nov – 9 Dec 1965, the UC Berkeley University Art gallery held the exhibition Jugendstil and Expressionism in Germany Posters, curated by Herschel B. Chipp. The exhibit was immediately influential with the entire SF underground design community. As Goines recounts: “the very next posters were all but direct imitations of those of the Jugendstil, particularly reflecting the lettering of Ferdinand Andrei and Leopold Forstner of the Wiener Werkstätte.“

6. Here is the list: Goines, David Lance. Catalogue of Posters By David Lance Goines Exhibited at the Poster From the Fourteenth of April to the Thirty-First of May Ninteen Hundred Seventy-Three With a Note on the Technique Employed in Their Production. Berkeley: Saint Hieronymus Press, 1973. This portfolio of 27 lithographs is the title to get if you can find/afford it. The David Lance Goines Poster Book. New York: Harmony Books, 1978. David Lance Goines Posters. Natick, Massachusetts: Alphabet Press, 1985. David Lance Goines: Posters 1970 –1994. Berkeley: Ten Speed Press, 1994.

No. 62, Music and the Movies, Pacific Film Archive, 1975

11 Feb 2010 ‧ Illustration