AAAinA was thrilled to announce our summer open house collaboration with Small Editions. This event featured short presentations by the following independent presses: Small Editions, lucky risograph, Superblooom*, and Calipso Press. Each of the selected independent presses approaches publishing at varying scales and utilizes a variety of print and production methods to realize their projects. Thank you for joining us to learn more about these exciting artist books and zine makers and engage with their recently published materials. 

Ice cream made by Hannah Pierce, Small Editions!

Participant Bios

Small Editions is a graphic design studio, print consultant, and artist book publisher led by Hannah Yukiko Pierce and Isobel Chiang. Our studio also hosts educational events and workshops on print and publishing-related topics throughout the year.

Our work aims to center the book as a form of art, rather than a vehicle for art. Projects begin from a thoughtful engagement with source content, and are informed by our ongoing research and experimentation in print, materiality, and fabrication.

Small Editions’ books are held in publicly accessible collections at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, The Whitney Museum of American Art, the Brooklyn Museum, The Walker Art Center, Harvard University, Yale University, RISD, and MICA, among others.

Superblooom* (stylized with three o’s and an asterisk) is a Vietnamese multimedia collective of Vietnamese-Americans helping to foster a dialogue on the Vietnamese/Asian diaspora and the Global South through photography, text, mixed media, and design. Through this collective, we are cutting through the media, the noise, the lies, the myths, and adding to the conversation of Southeast Asian artistry. We are here to connect, create, and inspire a superblooom.

Calipso Press is a risograph studio, publishing platform, and artistic collective founded by Eva Parra and Camilo Otero. Established in 2015 in Cali, Colombia and currently based between Cali and New York, Calipso explores publishing as a site for research, collaboration, and critical imagination.

Calipso’s practice centers on the book as a space for experimentation and conversation, treating printed matter not only as a format but as a methodology. From 2015 to 2022, Calipso hosted a residency program dedicated to expanded publishing and print-based inquiry, welcoming artists, writers, and researchers to develop projects that blur the boundaries between disciplines, formats, and geographies.

Calipso Press has participated in international art book fairs including the New York Art Book Fair, UNFOLD Shanghai, Libros Mutantes Madrid, and Rrreplica México, and has curated contemporary art and publishing projects such as Post-Digital Mimeography (Colombia Biennial, 2016), No Room for Books (Brazil, 2017), and soft [cover] revolution (Madrid, 2014).

Lucky Risograph is an Asian and Hispanic-owned print press and design studio based in DUMBO, Brooklyn. Since our establishment in 2019, we have continued incorporating the eco-conscious, accessible, and affordable nature of risograph printing into our everyday practice.

AAAinA’s general programming and operations are funded in part by the New York State Council on the Arts, the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs in partnership with the City Council, the Vilcek Foundation, and other foundations and individuals.