Performative Publishing: Dot Dot Dot 15
After publishing 13 issues of Dot Dot Dot from its home in the Netherlands the publication relocated to the US where the benefits of government art funding could no longer support the production costs. This has had the editors look to new opportunities to support the production. So when, prior to issue 15, they were invited to be part of an exhibition in Geneva they decided the money, time and space provided would become the money, time and space they would use to produce Dot Dot Dot 15 from editing to printing and binding.
If this is performative or performance, it’s in many ways improvisational as it hasn’t been planned or rehearsed. It’s real work and printing in real time. It’s appealing in that the seemingly mundane process of digital printing is being presented within a context of art, but devoid of aesthetic. It becomes a transparent look at a way of print publishing that affords less waste and more control.
From an interview with one of the editors regarding this project:
“The issue will be printed on two very particular machines transported from a arts community centre called Extrapool in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. They are portable, cheap, and we can operate them ourselves in the space. It’s a very explicit, visible example of collapsing all aspects of production into one time and space. The idea is that one group makes everything and everyone has equal responsibility and interest.”
You can learn more about Dot Dot Dot’s “just-in-time” on-demand publishing counterpart at Dexter Sinister and you can see video of the digital duplicators in action here.
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