MEDIA SWAP MEET | OCTOBER 30

MEDIA SWAP MEET @ THE MATTRESS FACTORY

October 30, 2005
6-11 PM, FREE
The Mattress Factory
500 Sampsonia Way
Pittsburgh Pennsylvania
15212.4444
T: 412.231.3169
F: 412.322.2231
E: info@mattress.org

Free parking located in the lot at the corner of Jacksonia and Brighton.

Co-sponsored by projet MOBILIVRE-BOOKMOBILE project and the Mattress Factory. Celebrate independent media at the Mattress Factory! This evening event features local zine-makers, book artists and cartoonists displaying and selling their wares, independent publications in a variety of formats, video animations and a new publication by Paper Rad, film projections, DJs, button-making, screen printing, handmade book-making activities, and more! For more information about the Bookmobile Project, please visit www.mobilivre.org.

Participate in a celebration of independent media at the Mattress Factory!

This event features tours and an artist talk with projet MOBILIVRE/BOOKMOBILE project members, local zine-makers, book artists and cartoonists displaying and selling their wares, and independent publications in a variety of formats.

Activites include: video animations and a new publication by Paper Rad, film projections by Gordon Nelson of Jefferson Presents, DJs David Pohl, Steve Boyle, Castle Castle and Bad Seed, comic books for sale by The Copacetic Comics Company, button-making with MF ARTLab, artist trading card activities with The Pittsburgh Book Arts Collective, bookmark-making with the Art Tech Altered Books Club of Greensburg, screen printing with Artist Image Resource, the Mister Roboto Project zine collection, graphic novels and activities with Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh-TEENS, audio editing with Pittsburgh IndyMedia/Rustbelt Radio, hero/villain mask making with SALT, and more!

Participating artists, projects and collectives include: The Big Idea Bookstore, SALT, Incredibly Thin, Unicorn Mountain, Castle Castle, Enclyclopedia Destructica, Jim Rugg, Mark Zingarelli, Tom Scioli, Jasen Lex, Paulette Poullet, Ed Piskor, Pat Lewis, Etta Cetera, Frank Santoro, Jessica M. Fenlon, Matthew Newton, and Poison Control. Artist David Pohl will play 78 records in the Museum's outdoor Garden during the event, and DJ Bad Seed will spin teenage rebellion records in the Museum Lobby.

projet MOBILIVRE-BOOKMOBILE project is a touring exhibition of artist books, zines, and independent publications. Traveling by way of a vintage Airstream, the BOOKMOBILE visits community centers, schools, libraries, festivals and artist-run centers. projet MOBILIVRE-BOOKMOBILE project explores the long-held tradition of bookmobiles as traveling libraries that promote the distribution of information. A traveling collection of 300 book works ranges from handmade and one-of-a-kind, to photocopied and small press publications. During Media Swap Meet, Bookmobile members will share the history of the project, and will discuss the ways that projet MOBILIVRE-BOOKMOBILE project fulfills its mandate of fusing community organizing and political activism with artistic production.

About some of the participants, activities and featured projects on display and for sale during the event:

Paper Rad

Paper Rad is Jessica Ciocci, her brother Jacob, and their friend Ben Jones. Since the year 2000 they have created a massive catalogue of self-published and self-distributed comics, magazines, videos, cassette tapes, hand-painted t-shirts, stuffed dolls, audio CDs, and records. They present on-line projects through an eye-popping website: www.paperrad.org. Synthesizing and reprogramming popular material from television, video games, and advertising, Paper Rad works in an exuberant, neo-primitivist idiom of their own invention. Paper Rad has exhibited and performed at galleries and museums around the world including the 2004 Liverpool Biennial, Deitch Projects, the Institute of Contemporary Art, London, and The Tate Britain. Most recently, they completed two music videos for Beck and created a massive cardboard castle for Philadelphia’s Space 1026. Earlier this year, Paper Rad was named one of ArtReview’s 25 emerging artists. They are represented by Foxy Production and their video work is available from EAI and Printed Matter. Half art book, half graphic novel, Paper Rad, B.J. and da Dogs intersperses photographs, drawings, prints, comic strips, and junk by Paper Rad with two graphic novellas ("Space Ballz" and "Alfe") by Ben Jones. The two novellas are comically surreal takes on friendship, love, spirituality, and outer space, while the drawings and graphics recall luminous pop icons straight out of a Nintendo game. Printed on three paper stocks in fluorescent inks, this book conveys the energy and invention of one of the most vibrant constellations of artists working today.

Poison Control / Young & Reckless / Matthew Newton

Young & Reckless is an uncoventional anthology of personal essays and outsider art documenting the bygone days of wild and out-of-control youth. Born from the subcultures of skateboarding, hip-hop, graffiti, heavy metal, hardcore, and the like, contributors share tales of theft, vandalism, sex, fistfights, and scrapes with the law— all told from an older and seemingly wiser perspective. Handmade and limited-run, Young & Reckless is the first publication from Poison Control. Edited by Matthew Newton. Poison Control is an independent publisher and production house. Nurturing what some would deem an unhealthy obsession with printed matter and subculture paraphernalia — zines, books, postcards, prints, record sleeves, and stickers just to mention a few — Poison Control's penchant for small press publishing and handmade, limited-run goods prompted its formation in the summer of 2004. With a rabid DIY work ethic and fresh creative approach — representing a raw and candid, outsider's perspective — Poison Control ups the ante in terms of literary and visual aesthetics. And with a diverse roster of projects slated for release in 2006, this bleeding edge operation plans to take full advantage of its insomniac behavior — toiling away while the rest of the world sleeps. For more information, please visit www.poison-control.com

Encyclopedia Destructica

Encyclopedia Destructica is a self-printed, hand-bound zine produced in Pittsburgh that collects work from artists’ and writers’ sketch-books/journals. The goal of Encyclopedia Destructica is to provide a forum for an ever-growing primordial dialogue between artists in Pittsburgh and other cities within the United States and abroad. For more information, please contact zine@encyclopediadestructica.com

Unicorn Mountain

Unicorn Mountain is a comic anthology, a literary journal, and a music compilation debuting August 2005. The first volume focuses on over 70 of Pittsburgh's underground writers, illustrators and bands. In addition to featured contributions from established artists, Unicorn Mountain is a showcase for exciting new talent; submissions are encouraged! For more information, please visit http://www.unicornmountain.com.

Incredibly Thin

Incredibly Thin is a framework, a sort-of glue. Incredibly Thin is a collective, hoping to produce, publish, inspire and expose the work of Pittsburgh artists, to help translate things of the mind into things of the hand. For more information, please visit http://www.incrediblythin.com.

Salt

Salt is a Pittsburgh-based journal that publishes non-fiction articles, comics, and design. Each issue is organized around a theme--past themes include pirates, monsters, robots, and cowboys. The Spy Issue was released in August and plans are underway for the Heroes and Villains Issue. Salt can be found at saltstories.com or send an email to saltstories@hotmail.com