'bring your own book' is a collective that started as a student initiative at the Gerrit Rietveld academie in 2021. Since then we have been working on an interdisciplinary programme around self-publishing, activated through events, lectures, workshops and book fairs.
From posters to books to zines and cards, some serious, some silly, some hard-covered, some soft, and some surprisingly furry; we have created a fair for everyone engaged in diy, self-publishing to show or sell their work.
In the words of Michael Pichler, art book fairs today serve as “periodically recurring meeting places in real time and real space, where people travel to gather together. One could say that art book fairs today serve the function of marketplaces, but not primarily in the economic sense; rather, they are a physical place accessible to the common public, and a public sphere for negotiation and exchange.”
We focus on community building and bringing together works of makers that are present throughout the production process, acting as a source of inspiration, a place for experimentation, and a connective tissue between different practices and people. byob hopes to encourage makers and appreciators of printed matter to seek one another out and to give each other's work some well-deserved attention and appreciation.
We are excited to invite you to participate in the Warehouse Market, a three-day event from 25-27 October in Amsterdam that offers a place for local makers, designers & publishers to share their self-made garments and fashion- or textile related publications, and exchange knowledge about fashion, clothes and textiles in context.
Visit the BYOB table + browse many other publishers during the coming weekend, at Miss Read — the Berlin art book fair & festival for independant publishing.
Friday-Sunday at HKW Haus der Kulturen der Welt.
Exhibition and book launch by Bring Your Own Book @ Plan B.
bring your own book fair is back in town
10th of May 2024
11:00–20:00
Save the date and join us for the fourth edition of the bring your own book fair at Fred. Roeskestraat 96, Amsterdam
We are excited to announce the 4th edition of the bring your own book fair at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. This time around we are staying true to our name! All participants will be given a stand to show, sell, or trade their printed matter.
We are happy to invite you to ‘Be Our Guest! A symposium on publishing’ on the 8th of December at the Fedlev Auditorium together with abC - art book in China, Björn Giesecke, Kristina Stallvik and Ott Metusala. They will hold presentations about their individual and collective publishing practices. The talks will be introduced by byob.
Bring Your Own Book will exhibit and sell the self-published works of over 400 artists, bookmakers, designers, publishers and writers from all over the world in ENTER ENTER, celebrating self-publishing and diy-printed matter in a weekly changing display.
For the duration of the week byob is setting up a publishing station at W139. We publish everyone. You are invited to fill out-in-up the given template, which will be printed on demand and distributed in W139 over the span of the week. The publishing station also serves as a display system for the ongoing research on practices around self-publishing. All the printed work left behind will be bound into a publication on the 16th of September
Goodbyes are hard but a small goodbye snack definitely aids the ache, and fills part of the hole left by our friends over at Snacks Amsterdam.
bring your own book is taking over ENTER ENTER for four weeks from the 15th of September until the 15th of October and we are looking for printed matter made by you, your friends and friends of friends of friends. We are programming a 4-week exhibition, display and fair of diy and self published books and other printed matter. The month will be filled with launches, lectures and workshops!
We are happy to announce workshop ‘Fangirls Workout’: join ROTTING FRUITS on May 26 for a workshop working out and with the books and publications surrounding us at the byobfair.
This mapping session called care in action aims to unpack how care and design are connected as well as an attempt to collectively find out how we can bring more care into the (everyday) practice.
This is a collective mapping workshop hosted by Not Just a Collective and facilitated by Lu Lin and Femke Kersten for this edition. During the workshop, we will explore questions such as "What is publishing?" "What can we do to enrich the realm of publishing?" and "How can we co-exist as self-publishers?" Through group discussions and activities, the workshop aims to generate a collective action plan to redefine publishing practices and provide practical guidance for self-publishers in collaboration with participants. The final result of the workshop will contribute to the second edition of the zine.
bring your own book is taking over the pavilion of the Gerrit Rietveld academy from the 11th until the 26th of May!!
Celebrating, discussing and partaking in diy-book making and publishing, the month will be filled with launches, lectures and workshops ending with a book fair. (for which the open call is still up until the 19th of May).
See the schedule below and save the dates!!!
Find Bring Your Own Book & your books at "It's a book" fair in Leipzig, on April 29!
Bring Your Own Book fair is coming back this spring with its third edition & this is our open call for books & performances!
open call: BYOB fair is looking for new people!
Get your printed matter shown, sold and most definitely appreciated in the Rietveld Pavilion.
Bring Your Own Book fair has a temporary shop! Filled with 40+ student-made publications, zines, books and other objects from our students and alumni. And best of all: All your purchases will go directly to the maker! (ex. shipping costs)
The store is open the entire month of February and shipping will happen in the first week of March.
It’s our pleasure to announce the first edition of the Bring Your Own Book fair! On the 25th & 26th of November there is going to be a book market in the Glass Pavilion where all students will be able to sell, perform, read, show, do or be their printed matter.
2021
We are happy to invite you to ‘Be Our Guest! A symposium on publishing’ on the 8th of December at the Fedlev Auditorium together with abC - art book in China, Björn Giesecke, Kristina Stallvik and Ott Metusala. They will hold presentations about their individual and collective publishing practices. The talks will be introduced by byob.
- Be Our Guest!
- A symposium on publishing
- In the Auditorium of the Fedlev building
- Fred. Roeskestraat 96, 1076 ED, Amsterdam
- December 8, 2023
- 15:00 (GMT+1) – late
There will be biertjes. We start at 15:00
You can also join the event via zoom link.
byob invites:
abC – art book in China is dedicated to promoting local artists’ books and independent publications in China and introducing excellent global publishers and institutions to establish a profound multilateral dialogue. As the most professional exhibition of artist’s books and expo of independent publications, abC Art Book Fair takes place in Beijing and Shanghai respectively. It has been developing a distinct influence in the fields of contemporary art, design, and publishing, welcoming thousands of publishers, media platforms, and visitors around the world.
Björn Giesecke is a designer collaborating with artists, architects, curators, institutions, printers, and friends on books, websites, identities, typefaces, posters, exhibitions, and other works. In September 2023, the studio ran a temporary bookshop focusing on publications which are hard to get, without circulation or representation through a bookshop or gallery, i.e. small print run, no isbns, artist books, good looking books, books with good content.
Kristina Stallvik is an artist and researcher with a dual BA in environmental and gender studies from Swarthmore College (2021). Working at this multidisciplinary intersection, their practice aims to subvert normative understandings of the “natural” and nonhuman ecosystems. As a culmination of their undergraduate studies, Kristina produced two zines: a comprehensive guide to an alternative environmental studies curriculum and an exploration of the emerging field, queer ecology, through speculative fiction. They have previously performed curatorial research for public arts organization, Creative Time, and collaborated on a workshop series with the contemporary art museum, Kunsthall Trondheim. For the whole year 2023 Kristina is a Chancellor Fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation with Art Laboratory Berlin as the host institution. They work alongside ALB to research the collective structures that comprise independent artist book and zine publishing in Berlin.
Ott Metusala is a graphic designer based in Amsterdam. Mainly working on applied and self-initiated projects, he is currently also a workshop manager at the bookbinding workshop of the Gerrit Rietveld Academie. Since 2016, together with Lieven Lahay, publishes as Catalog XYZ.
