Small Press on Small Press

[poiesthesis]

I've been going through a lot of zines and books recently from independent publishers about the publishing process, and thought I'd get a little thread started for that. Not surprisingly this seems to be a really rich little sub-genre: publishers making and sharing resources, engaging in debate and dialogue with each other, and documenting our history.

This first batch has six. Please feel free to add your own things too—I'm interested in seeing what everyone else is referencing/reading/producing!

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The Library Was
OOMK, Book Works, 2016
— Contributors: Sofia Niazi, Rose Nordin, Rianna Jade Parker, Leila Kassir, Hudda Khaireh, Heiba Lamara, and Fehras Publishing Practices
ISBN 978-1-906012-76-2
150×240mm (var. page size) 44 pp. paperback (b/w on var. stock + staple bound)

1. Paperback $15.95–23.95 (sliding scale)
2. WorldCat entry (for library access)

This is a little anthology of texts about the purpose and culture of the library. It mixes together essays, histories, principles, suggestions for zine libraries, and collection lists—all framed as the research materials of a fictional rogue library, in a future where the library as institution has become extinct. Each of the pieces in it is treated and formed as its own publication, with its own trim size, type layout, and material; sharing only a spine.

A beautiful zine that was an enjoyable and thoughtful read, especially with the different forms included. Mode switching from prose to poetry to history to future. It also does a really successful job of blending and blurring the line between fact and fiction in the collection, which opens up the reader to consider their own relationship with libraries, and their role as librarian.

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Publishing in the Realm of Plant Fibers and Electrons
Temporary Services (Brett Bloom & Marc Fischer), Half Letter Press, 2014
— with illustrations by Kione Kochi
— and contributions from Kristian Johansson and Leah Mackin
5.5×8.5” 32 pp. paperback (risograph 3 color + french flap + staple bound)

1. Booklet $7.00 (out of stock)
2. ePub $2.00
3. PDF-5 $2.00
4. 72dpi PDF ~free~
5. WorldCat entry (for library access)

This was one of the first zines on publishing I found (tucked away in Seattle’s only artists’ book store, Mount Analogue) and it led me to developing this little collection. It's a fantastic public statement on contemporary independent publishing. It functions 50% as manifesto (as evidenced by the title) and 50% as instruction book (with many production, budget, and distribution details/statistics/charts—including the graphic at the top of these forums). I frequently recommend this to colleagues interested in publishing, because it addresses one of those critical, early questions: Why publish now, in this environment?—and follows through by talking about how to do this kind of publishing.

There is a lot of discussion of the printed booklet vs. digital publishing and when each makes sense with regards to production cost, access (also championing the free publication), and environmentalism. A section of the text titled the “Social Space of Print,” discusses the role and value of the physical block of printed matter, the space it occupies, and its potential in education and social experience

This zine provides useful insights into the history of Half Letter Press and Temporary Services too. They talk about how they got into publishing, its relationship to events and happenings, their earliest publications, and the transition points and process shifts that have lead to their current publishing model. For many publications they outline the process of developing those titles, distributing them, and how readership grew and shifted with time. They also include in full a number of demands, principles, and questions which have been collaboratively developed to guide their practice. They end with a survey of the artist publisher ecosystem.

I’ve dog-eared many of these pages for future reference, and marked some of the manifesto paragraphs too, as reminders for myself while I’m figuring out this whole publishing beast.

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How to Art Book Fair
Paul Shortt, Paul Shortt & Friends, 2018
5.5×8.5" 14 pp. paperback (risograph 1 var. color on var. stock + staple bound)

1. Booklet $10.00
2. WorldCat entry (for library access)

A quick and practical guide to showing + tabling at art book fairs, interspersed throughout with quotes, advice, and quips from many others. It starts out with some simple principles (can you afford to travel, do you have inventory, who is the audience, etc.), moves onto basic planning and general advice, into tips from from other publishers (variously tactical and comical), and concludes with a reminder to engage with the community and participate actively in the fair.

I found this on these forums actually. Unfortunately I can't provide a lot of insight on the advice within, having not yet ever tabled—but I can say that after reading it, I feel like tabling as a prospect is accessible, no longer a big unknown. It's also vibrantly printed, a pleasure to hold and thumb through, and a humorous, quick read. Last note, Paul set this up as a dynamic publication, and invited others to contribute their advice and perspectives on how to book fair—so I'm excited to see what future printings hold.

[poiesthesis]

(Splitting this first post up into two pieces, due to the attachment limit.)

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Stolen Sharpie Revolution
Alex Wrekk, Lunchroom Publishing, 2014
ISBN 978-0-9817941-1-2
11×14 cm 152 pp. paperback (offset b/w + perfect bound)

1. Book $10
2. WorldCat entry (for library access)

Stolen Sharpie Revolution very much is written for the DIY zinester, and takes a punk approach to publishing. It is extremely approachable—encouraging the reader to produce and publish with whatever they have access to. It introduces what a zine is, what they can contain, and some simple questions to establish purpose, content, and audience for the novice zinester (and tips for editing & revising); then moves on to talk about production, promotion, distribution, and community etiquette.

What I really love about this book is that it's extremely accessible, it encourages the reader/zinester to make with whatever they have available. The core of the book is all the little bits of guidance the author has collected and the discoveries she's made in her experience with zines—and much of that results in a compendium of options and methods. She talks about collage, mark making, using a typewriter, stamps, spray paint, and sharpies—how to source content from magazines, friends, journals, recycle bins, stationery, and garage sales. Binding runs the gamut from pamphlet stitches, safety pins, brads, sewing machines, and of course the stapler (including a tip to staple into the ground and bend back by hand if you don't have a long-arm stapler). One section of the book is cowritten by other publishers, and goes into paper making, screen printing, and block printing. The production section concludes with photocopier tricks.

Now, for the most part these topics aren't covered in depth—the book isn't a manual, it's a permission to make, and espouses an ethos of access. Where it does go more in detail is where it talks about interacting with the zine community. It provides guidelines for interacting by mail/post, how to work with (and run) distros, libraries, and tours and offers insights about the nuances of these spaces. The last third of the book is all resources: lists of distros, stores, libraries, reviewers, suppliers, and events.

This little book is sort of a staple—I see it often in anarchist bookstores and on the shelves in printing co-ops—and for good reason, it really embodies the independent aspect of small press.

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Dear Lulu/Blurb/Magcloud
Hochschule Darmstadt Fachbereich Gestaltung, 2014
— James Goggin and students of Design at the University of Applied Sciences Darmstadt
5.83×8.26" 96 pp. paperback (digital process + perfect bound)

1. Book $10 (Lulu)
2. Book $41 (Blurb)
3. Book $17 (Magcloud)
4. PDF ~free~ (from Archive.org)
5. WorldCat entry (for library access)
6. Project writeup on Speak Up
7. P—DPA entry

This quirky little resource is a book was designed to test the quality of printing from print-on-demand service Lulu. It exists in both printed form and as a free PDF, allowing you to see how exactly Lulu processes and prints the source material. It spends most of its volume on color printing, testing the appearance of multiple palettes, swatches, and image formats (CMYK, RGB, grayscale, and halftone bitmap)—and how type appears at different sizes/colors. It also does a deep dive on the appearance of black (with comparisons between 100% key and rich black), and the quality of repeating patterns and fine line gradients, exploring the moiré patterns that appear as printing resolution can no longer match the original file. Lastly it has a section of sample pages testing the finishing, the accuracy of trim lines, bleed alignment, full-spread printing, and the legible depth of the gutter in the spine.

I found this while looking for references about what-to-expect when using a print-on-demand service like Lulu or Blurb—it's a fascinating little test print—and now my standard for figuring out a best guess of how things will render. Printing through these services is sort of a practice in shooting blind (the proofing process is to publish a book, buy a copy from the marketplace, and then make edits and re-publish if you need changes) and this illuminates that darkness quite a bit.

EDIT: Added the Blurb and Magcloud editions to the list of sources, provided by @billhanscom.

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Tiny Report—Micro-Press Yearbook 2016
Robyn Chapman, Paper Rocket Minicomics, 2017
— with Kevin Czap, Virginia Paine, and Jonathan Rotsztain
5.5×8.5" 32 pp. paperback (risograph 1 color covers/insert + digital process + perfect bound)

1. Zine $6

Robyn Chapman has been putting together the Tiny Report since 2013. Each annual issue contains interviews, catalogues, articles, and sample pages—but the core of the publication is a growing list of North American small comic presses and everything they've put out in the last year. This was the first one I came across and it includes a profile of Toronto-based comic shop The Beguiling and a story about the closing of Sparkplug Comics many years after its founder's passing (with an overview of their most memorable releases and a full catalog of their works). There are many a small press catalog, but I really liked the combination of archive/journal that the Tiny Report presents. Robyn is also collecting information for the 2018 edition of this zine now, so if you have anything to add to it, you can do so at the 2018 Micro-Press Survey.

---------------

I'll keep collecting small press on small press and updating this list, it'll probably be a combination of guidebooks, process/project documentation, technical info, manifestos, histories, etc. Please contribute things or add your own reviews for what's already up!

Next up are Publishing Manifestos from Miss Read, What Problems Can Artist Publishers Solve from Temporary Services, Riso Color Sciences Multipack from Ryan Cecil Smith, and The Book on Books on Artists Books from Arnaud Desjardin & The Everyday Press!

[billhanscom]

Hi Robert,

Thanks for the post. Good stuff.

Dear Lulu is also available from Blurb (Dear Blurb) and Magcloud (Dear Magcloud).

For some reason, the Blurb version costs more than the other two combined.

I would also add:



What Problems Can Artist Publishers Solve?
Temporary Services and Printroom, 2018
5.5 × 8.5 in, 40 pp., paperback (Four-color Risograph, staplebound)

1. Booklet $6.00
2. WorldCat

"Temporary Services booklet #118 is a collaboration with our old friends at PrintRoom in Rotterdam, produced in advance of a mini-showing of our Self-Reliance Library in July 2018. For this booklet we invited 17 artist publishers to respond to the question: Thinking locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally: What are some social, political, economic and ecological problems that artist publishers are equipped to address or solve using their knowledge, skills, and resources?

The result is a strong collection of texts (and images) with two pages given over to each contributor. To us, these represent some particularly vital thoughts about what artist publishers are capable of in this particular moment, with some great calls for solidarity, generosity, sharing, and experimentation."




ISBN: Commodification + Monopoly
Levi Sherman / Oxblood Publishing (H.R. Buechler), 2017

1. Booklet $10.00

"Sherman’s “ISBN: Commodification + Monopoly” is a brief essay presenting concerns with the current ISBN model in small press publishing, while also offering the potential of a cooperative solution.

The content of this book was printed digitally on 28# Mohawk Color Copy Premium with i-Tone. The covers were letterpress printed on a strange stock from the Wells College Book Arts Center paper storage room. The endpapers are a selection of ISBNs + SBNs from the author’s personal library.

For more information on Sherman’s proposed ISBN cooperative model, please contact info@partialpress.net."

[timd]

I'm a big fan of Brian Teare's "Paradise was typeset."

It's a tall, skinny chapbook, printed on surplus cuttings from other small press works. Handsewn binding, with a nice thick cardstock cover, all done in letter press. It's part of DoubleCross Press's Poetics of the Handmade series.

The text itself deals with why the writer engages in small press publications-- and what he sees as the benefits. His main interest seems to be the control you get for yourself-- getting to choose the enviro impact of the books you make by sourcing your material; getting to set your own price, and change it depending on who's buying. And at $5 (or trade) for the booklet, it's nice to see them walk the path they're talking about.

Website: https://mc-hyland.squarespace.com/chapb ... rian-teare

Some images:

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[brettbloom]

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Publishing Manifestos, by Michalis Pichler, Berlin: Miss Read, January 2018

I think that this book fits in this list—which is shaping up to be a good resource! This book is packed with "over forty essays and excerpts of texts related to self-publishing, publishing as performance, and other artist’s book practices, making it an invaluable anthology that charts the complex history or artistic bookmaking."

https://www.printedmatter.org/catalog/51042/

[timd]

Printed Matter had a nifty online "table" about books on books, a little while back.
....searching....
Oh hey, here it is: https://www.printedmatter.org/catalog/tables/7755

[marcfischer]

RE/Search Zines1

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RE/Search Zines2

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RE/Search: Zines! Volumes I and II
Published by RE/Search, Edited by V. Vale
1996 and 1997
https://www.researchpubs.com/

It's hard to believe these invaluable books are over 20 years old now and as such, newer generations of artist publishers don't always seem to be familiar with them in the way that EVERYONE was for many years. Vale and RE/Search really understand and embody the spirit of self-publishing, DIY, and artist publishing. It has been fun to see RE/Search making real straight up photocopied and stapled on the kitchen table 'zines again in recent years, in addition to their full-scale perfect bound books.

Both of these books are filled with a fascinating and diverse range of self-publishers and artists—many of whom are still active in this community just as RE/Search are.

[marcfischer]

Antoine Lefebvre's http://www.artzines.info website and zine series are also a great resource. The booklets Antoine makes include enjoyable interviews with artist publishers (some of whom post here, including uh... me) and a fun approach to design with little booklet inserts of different sizes in some issues. His website has lots of juicy photos of recent art zines (if you click on the cover you can usually see interior shots) and the focus is on fairly recent material so some of this stuff is still in print or findable. A refreshing survey of contemporary activity from around the world.

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[marcfischer]

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Queer Zines vol. 1 (second edition)
Publisher: Printed Matter Inc.
New York, NY
August 2013
Pages: 271 p.
https://www.printedmatter.org/catalog/35169

"The second edition of Queer Zines includes a new preface by editors Phillip Aarons and AA Bronson, corrections to the first edition, and errata. Queer Zines, the catalogue, collects the variegated practices of zine makers past and present, from North America and Europe, and lists them alphabetically, starting with Toronto’s 88 Chins and ending with the Dean Sameshima zine Young Men at Play. In a riotous assemblage of more than 200 pages, we find comprehensive bibliographies and sinful synopses for more than 120 zines by Alex Gartenfeld, excerpted illustrations and writings by zine makers, reprints of important articles in and about queer zines, a directory of important zine archives, and a list of zine outlets around the world."

I only have the first edition (and first printing) of Queer Zines (there is also now a second volume) but I think these books are a good addition to this list. They include contributions from many of the publishers, including lots of raw photos of these extra sexy publications. Without being an expert in this area, my sense of these compendiums is that they get the spirit of this material right through publications that were made with the participation of the right kind of enthusiasts (and some publishers themselves).

[poiesthesis]

(This thread is coming along so well!)

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Riso Color Sciences Multipack!
Ryan Cecil Smith, Screentone TV, 2016
5.3×7.5" 4 pp. paperback + 6 inserts (risograph 2/3 color + unbound)

1. Zine $12 (currently out of stock, regularly reprinted)
2. Discussion of the project in The Comics Journal

I'm slowly getting into Riso, (still figuring out some booklets to test out different techniques), and there are many, many, many little sample books and booklets from various printers/artists/suppliers. Of the ones I've seen though I really like this one, by Ryan Cecil Smith (who does the Style & Fashion Zine series)—it's a folded manila sheet that houses a bunch of little samples of different printing techniques. Rather than just being an example of colors and paper stocks, this booklet talks about the artist's process experimenting with and figuring out color separations for doing three color process printing. There's also a bit about color profiles for using scans of Copic markers, and a palette card showing how different marker colors are reproduced in three color process.

It gets pretty technical, but is also presented in a friendly way, and the accompanying examples don't showcase abstract examples, but actual mini-prints that employ the techniques described (the sticker on the front of the booklet lists the prints included, and I imagine it gets updated as different prints are thrown into different editions of the pack).

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Ever Evolving Bastion of Freakdom: A Quimby's Bookstore History in Words and Pictures
Keith Helt, Liz Mason & Steven Svymbersky, Quimby's Books, 2016
5.25×8.5" 132 pp. paperback (digital b&w)

1. Zine $7

I paid my first visit to Quimby's a few months ago, and picked this up then—I've only just started reading my way through all the interviews, so I'll let the publisher's description speak for it:

"The story of the early days of Quimby’s up through today. Pictures, graphics, juice from employees, shoppers, consignors and artists that have frequented the store’s hallowed doors. This special 'ashcan edition' is a limited print run zine to celebrate the store’s silver jubilee and documents much of the mirth and mayhem that has made Quimby's the place that it is. We are proud to unveil it."

Looking forward into getting into the things everyone's been posting, especially Paradise was Typeset, that ISBN booklet, Lefebvre's ARTZINES, and going through Queer Zines (hopefully Printed Matter still has some kicking around next time I get a chance to visit). I also updated the Dear Lulu entry with the Blurb and Magclound editions (thanks @billhanscom).

[marcfischer]

@poiesthesis, thanks for continuing to post these!

I second that Quimby's Booklet. My favorite section is where Manager Liz Mason describes a typical day at the store in considerable detail. It's very helpful in conveying a fuller understanding of all of the complexities that go into running a special shop like that. Liz has been a total champ during the COVID-19 pandemic and has figured out some extra smart ways to sustain the place so that we don't lose it. I was happy to pay a quick visit about a week ago (my first trip to a indoor store that wasn't selling food or medicine in about 100 days) and aside from myself and the two employees wearing masks, it was a wonderful dose of normalcy for about 35 minutes. I was the only person in the shop and they are limiting things to about 6 customers at a time. It was heavenly to be back inside that place. They continue stocking new zines and publishing culture is thriving there despite all that is happening.