Sang Bleu was very happy to  recently have been featured as a part of Facing Pages. Facing Pages is Europe’s biggest event on independent magazines which was held from the 20th until the 22nd of April in Arnhem, the Netherlands. The weekend explored unique magazines and featured renowned magazine makers giving lectures.

The event itself takes on the form of a magazine, and shows which part the independent magazine currently plays in the development of our visual culture. The organizer of this event is the Arnhem-based O.K. Lab, which over the last few years has developed itself into a center of the independent magazine world.

For a list of some of the other excellent magazines exhibited look here

Facing Pages are in the process of touring the exhibition around other areas of Europe so check out their website here:

http://www.facingpages.org/

is being shown in the Quinsy Gario – Bart Groenendaal – Stefan Ruitenbeek exhibition form April 15 to June 3 at Stedelijk Museum Bureau in Amsterdam.

Independently of each other the three approaches all scrutinize aspects of Dutch culture and confront cultural classifications and their seeming certainties.

TRAILER HERE

Our dear friend, fabulous tattooist & shaman Jondix is featured in the new issue of Tattoo Artist Magazine. I guess the insanity of the cover he designed says it all.

Yesterday, Publish and Be Damned presented a new edition of their fairs, displaying an impressing declension of artist-led and self-published magazines, journals, periodicals and other printed format experimentations… Mountains and mountains of them. Too much. So much, I suspect ICA went way beyond their maximum visitors allowances during the afternoon as between 3 and 6, waves of people were coming in and only very few coming out, not to mention the fact that this is a sunny Spring saturday in London we’re talking about.

Paper hustle and paper chaos, fingers looking for change (only cash in that market place, of course) in addition to the frenetic insecurity of most of the artists, publishers, writers, etc. on spot, us, our usual mad scramble for status, position, affirmation, and attention. On top of it all, add in the tekila shots drinking that started at 6pm…

What are some tropes we’re tired of as publishers? Things we wish we’d see more often as editors? Things we wish our readers would see more often? Are conceptual poems and flash political manifestos scrutinized differently when submitted? Yesterday was an intense attempt to (briefly, of course) characterize the landscape of contemporary independent publishing and share advice.

More details here.