Today I sent my rubbish newspaper to print and am really looking forward to it being delivered at the end of the week.
It was quite a big moment; the finalising of my rubbish research project by setting it in black and white print. Whilst the blog has been under construction, and may continue to be for a little while longer yet, the newspaper is concrete and now unchangeable. Any mistakes will have to be lived with and the content is finite.
I now have to switch modes completely from gathering phase to analysis phase. There’s been some natural crossover already but the full analysis of the newly-finished newspaper begins in just over a week’s time in Stockholm when I take the newspaper to Supermarket Art Fair with Paper Gallery. I’ll present the newspaper at the fair in Paper Gallery’s booth and hopefully get some feedback directly from the fair-goers.
My budget only stretched to 90 copies so it’s quite a limited edition, and they’re free. I also need to retain some copies so I can’t distribute all 90 at what I expect to be a very busy fair. I think I’ll take 60 copies and distribute 15 each day including the Thursday night preview. Ideally each newspaper will be exchanged for a snippet (or more) of feedback, either at the fair itself or perhaps through follow up email if people are so inclined and don’t just throw it away as soon as they get home – although that’s just as valid. I will have to refrain from being too precious about them.
The pdf version will be online via the blog also, but it’s the newspaper as an object particularly I’m keen to get feedback on – before the throwaway object, almost obsolete in our digital era, becomes the rubbish it features. Perhaps a few copies will end up in archives or libraries but most will likely end up recycled either through other uses or via the recycling bin.
