Jesse England is a Pittsburgh-based artist probably best known for "backing up" an entire e-book of George Orwell's 1984 by machine-copying the entire thing and binding the printouts.
His new project, "Sincerity Machine," involved constructing an entire manual typewriter that can only type in the most ridiculed typeface of the past two decades, Comic Sans.
Here it is in action:
England explained his project as follows:
Sincerity Machine: The Comic Sans typewriter was made after viewing a document with a typewriter font present in it; I realized there was nothing stopping me from altering a typewriter to write in a different font. I used a laser engraving machine to etch new letters out of acrylic, and glued them onto the strikers of a 70's era, Sears-branded Brother Charger 11 typewriter, which I found in the street a couple years ago. I also used a vinyl cutter to make new key covers as well.
As part of my ongoing thesis of questioning how we create, consume, store (and fetishize) media, it's my wish that a classic, functioning typewriter altered to write in the most popularly despised font of modern times will provoke thoughts about such media concerns.
