Why Publish?

Why Publish? is a joint research between AND Publishing and Central Saint Martins MA Fine Art students to collectively explore the pedagogical, creative and critical spaces of publishing.

What are the possibilities and limitations of existing institutions and publishing structures? How is value created and for whom? Who enjoys visibility and why? What is the value of archiving – for example at the Feminist Library, where knowledge is produced through trans-generational transmission of memory of feminist activists’ life? Can we think of activists’ archives as place for alternative distribution? What are the acquisition politics of special collections, libraries and public archives? How do books get in the bookshops?

Through site visits, seminars, workshops and making we will explore the ways to circulate students’ work in order to create sustainable networks and relevant debates.

Initiated by Eva Weinmayr (AND/CSM), Luisa Minkin (CSM) and Alex Schady (CSM). Funded by Curriculum Development Funding, Student Enterprise and Employability (SEE), University of the Arts, London.

 

13 February 2015
Visit to Chelsea Special Collections
big thanks to Gustavo Grandal Montero

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17 February 2015
Visit at the British Library
with the amazing Julian Walker

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4 -6 March 2015
Why Publish? Workshop at MayDay Room
In March we visit MayDay Rooms, founded as a safe haven for historical material linked to social movements, experimental culture and the radical expression of marginalised figures and groups. We unwrap three selected archives, including Jo Spence, East London Big Flame and British Poster Film Collective. We discuss the relevance of these specific archives for us today and respond to them by developing a set of posters, articulating our current dilemmas, propositions and visions. We screen print the posters on site, building our own silkscreens and making paper stencils.

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With big thanks to Anthony Davies for showing us the archives, to Frauke Zabel for taking pictures and to all participants: Alex Dipple, Catarina Costa Cubelo Morais, Frauke Zabel, Johanna Klingler, Judith Neunhäuserer, Harley Price, Karen Di Franco, Kristina Schmidt, Liane Klingler, Nicola Lorini, Rachel Pafe, Rosalie Schweiker, Sakina Dhif.

Here is Rachel Pafe’s and Sakina Dhif’s account of the event.

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Why Publish? Study day at Chelsea College of Art and Design
8 July 2015, 12 – 5 pm

This study day brings together the recent research projects of AND Publishing: Why Publish? and Afterall and CHELSEA Space’s project exploring the role of the University Gallery. Both projects have a shared interest in testing the possibilities and limitations of existing structures for exhibiting, publishing and dissemination within the institution as well as the acquisition politics of special collections, libraries and public archives. Please join us for a day of conversations with:

Sarah Kember (Professor of New Technologies of Communication at Goldsmiths, University of London) on  her plans to set up an alternative Academic Publishing Press introducing female citation policies. Karen Fletcher (Fine Art Librarian at Central Saint Martins, University of the Arts London) on acquisition and cataloguing politics at the University. Sophie Hope (Manual Labours, lecturer in Arts Management Film, Media & Cultural Studies, Birkbeck) about her practice and the politics of socially engaged art.