Free and open to the public, Printed Matter’s LA Art Book Fair is a unique event for artists’ books, catalogs, monographs, periodicals, and zines presented by more than 300 presses, antiquarians, artists, and independent publishers from over 20 countries.

The LA Art Book Fair is the companion fair to the NY Art Book Fair, held every fall in New York City. Over 35,000 artists, book buyers, collectors, dealers, curators, independent publishers, and other enthusiasts attended the NY Art Book Fair in 2015.

THE LA ART BOOK FAIR PREVIEWJoin us on Thursday, February 11, from 6 to 9 pm, at The Geffen Contemporary for a three-hour opening night preview, with special musical performances by MOON UTERUS (Devendra Banhart, Amy von Harrington, Mel Shimkovitz) and CHRISTEENE.

Entry to the Preview costs $10 ($5 for Printed Matter Members), with proceeds going to support LAABF16. The first 2,000 visitors to pre-pay online or to pay at the door (while supplies last) will receive an enamel pin set ticket edition by artist Sigrid Calon (variations pictured left). Purchase your preview ticket here.

Contemporary Artists’ Books Conference (CABC)The third annual LA Contemporary Artists’ Books Conference presents two days of conversations on emerging practices and issues within art-book culture, organized by a national group of art library professionals. This year’s conference features a keynote address by Experimental Jetset, the small, independent, Amsterdam-based graphic design studio, founded in 1997 by (and still consisting of) Marieke Stolk, Erwin Brinkers and Danny van den Dungen. Focusing on printed matter and site-specific installations, EJS will discuss their practice of “turning language into objects,” moderated by Mark Owens.

Additional Conference sessions include panel discussions focusing on: artist recordings, esoteric imagery and its impact on printed materials, and the challenges and pleasures of publishing sexually explicit materials. This year also welcomes IMMATERIALS AND PROPOSALS: A collaborative reading of artworks that exist in description only. Presented by Project X and X-TRA, a group of artists and writers will select and present other artists’ written outlines, descriptions and proposals for art and exhibitions that are never intended to be or never will be realized in other forms. Followed by a panel discussion. The full Conference schedule is available here.

Admission is free for all sessions, but space is limited. General admission is first-come-first-seated.

Additional On-Site Programming brought to you by Frieze Magazine, For Your Art, and others.

The ClassroomBack for its third trip to the West Coast for LAABF16, the Classroom is a curated series of conversations, workshops, readings and other artist-led programs, and an informal venue for artists, writers and publishers to feature new releases and present their publications. This year’s Classroom, organized by David Senior of The Museum of Modern Art Library, includes events featuring Juli Susin, Ewa Wojciak, V. Vale, Brian and Nikki Tucker, Nicola Tyson, Jan Tumlir and Shannon Ebner. The full classroom schedule is available here.

(XE)ROX & PAPER + SCISSORSA super-sized subsection of the LA Art Book Fair; (XE)ROX & PAPER + SCISSORS takes over the Geffen annex once again with more than 100 international artists, zinesters, and small presses, offering a survey of independent publishing at its most innovative and affordable. Select exhibitors include: WSSF (Los Angeles), Sean Maung (New York), LAND AND SEA (Oakland), Original Plumbing (New York), HEINZFELLER NEILISIST (New York), among many others.

Friendly FireA diverse group of politically-minded artists and collectives focused on the intersection of art and activism, this section includes: Women’s Center for Creative Work (Los Angeles), Justseeds (New York), Guerrilla Girls (New York), Visual AIDS (New York) and others.

Focus: PhotographyA curated cross-section of photo-based books and magazines, this year’s Focus: Photography has expanded, and includes: Akio Nagasawa (Japan); Trolley Books (UK); RVB Books (France); Snöar (UK); and Aperture (New York): Edition Patrick Frey (Switzerland) and others.

ATLAS FOCUS: SPAINA project by Libros Mutantes and La Casa Encendida Curated by Libros Mutantes Supported by AC/E Acción Cultural Española

A curated selection of contemporary artist’s book publishers from Spain, exhibitors include: Bandiz Studio, Belleza Infinita, Dalpine, Kitchic, Libros Mutantes, Terranova, and Tunica. See Spain Focus related programs here. Exhibitor Project Spaces 303inprint releases Richard Prince's record Loud Song, a signed limited vinyl edition with folded poster and cover art by Kim Gordon. Sleeve Paintings by Richard Prince and original record cover art by Kim Gordon. "Loud Song was self-recorded in 1985 in Venice California. My band at the time, “Him,” played once in 1980 at Jenny Holzer’s loft at one of her “band parties.” By the time I had recorded “Loud Song” in 1985 I had reduced the members of Him to one. By 1986 I reduced the only remaining member to no one." - Richard Prince

Gagosian Gallery presents: Design Office — Kim Gordon in collaboration with Feeding Tube Records; "Living on the Edge of Obscurity." Feeding Tube Records, which once moved off the main drag in Florence, Massachusetts due to too many people knowing its location, is iconic in its resistance to the status quo—it is a petri dish for the inversion of pop culture pathology. In a celebration of the righteously avant-garde, Kim Gordon and Feeding Tube Records are sponging the essence of the seminal shop and wringing it out over the Gagosian Gallery booth. In addition to a vinyl listening station, limited edition records, and print ephemera created specifically for the fair, the space will include top-shelf items curated from Feeding Tube's own inventory by the most discerning ears and eyes.

David Zwirner Books will present Perfect World, a reprint of a rare book of drawings by Jason Rhoades produced exclusively for the LAABF, along with a series of new limited-edition posters by Jordan Wolfson. David Zwirner Books will also feature a wide range of books and monographs related to the David Zwirner exhibition program.

Harper’s Books will present artwork and a special zine by Ross Simonini with Carroll Dunham, and new drawings by Harmony Korine.

From the Archive of Unknown Poetry and the gallery of Marc Selwyn Fine Art, comes a new edition of Allen Ruppersberg’s EL SEGUNDO RECORD CLUB! A selection of small treasures brought to new life from an archive of recorded American artifacts spanning multiple decades of the 20th Century. Another example of who remembers what.

Additional project rooms at this year’s LAABF will be presented by KARMA and Werkplaats Typografie.

SPECIAL EXHIBITIONSAlden Projects™ presents The Bus Is Back: Mason Williams in Los Angeles, a special exhibition exploring the far-flung legacy of artist, musician, writer, producer, screenwriter Mason Williams during his years in Los Angeles in the 1960s. Highlights include Bus (1967), the artist’s legendary but rarely seen icon of California Conceptualism: a 37 foot long screen print of a Greyhound bus, originally exhibited at the Pasadena Museum of Art in 1967 and The Museum of Modern Art, New York, the following year. Accompanied by copious archival documentation, this exhibition also unpacks other off-the-beaten track vehicles by Mason Williams that were similarly destined for unconventional spaces, including billboards, advertisements, and an array of artist’s publications that were more numerous than the better known counterparts by his sometimes collaborator, sometimes roommate, and lifetime friend, Ed Ruscha. This exhibition is supported by Art Los Angeles Contemporary, Printed Matter, Inc., and Alden Projects™.

Arthur Fournier presents FER YOUz, a landmark exhibition of the Los Angeles hardcore punk photo fanzine published by Brian Tucker and Nikki Tucker from 1981 to 1983. For the first time ever, all sixteen of the original full-color FER YOUz publication maquettes will be on display alongside vintage black & white copies of the underground broadside. The installation will also include displays of the Tucker's hardcore-era manuscript, textile, and ephemera collections, as well as a carousel slide show curated from the monumental Kodachrome image bank at the heart of the FER YOUz archive. Instigated in 1980 as a scholarly research initiative under the tutelage of UCLA art historian Arnold Rubin, the Tuckers' expansive documentation of the L.A. hardcore scene both recorded and helped define one of the most explosively creative eras in the history of Southern California counterculture, with an indelible soundtrack provided by Fear, The Circle Jerks, Black Flag, Saccharine Trust, The Adolescents, and others.

Onestar press and OSMOS will feature a curated project of books and editions with artists. The special project for LAABF16 is conceived within the framework of Richard Bell's EMBASSY (2013 - 2016), a sculpture and platform reimagined to pay homage to the Aboriginal Tent Embassy protest first assembled by activists in 1972 on the lawn of Australia’s Parliament House, where it continues to this day.

AT THE PRINTED MATTER BOOTH (C01)Thursday, February 11, 8:00 pm Following a screening of two short films in the Classroom, Printed Matter hosts a signing with Fiona Banner for her new artists' book Heart of Darkness, co-published by her imprint The Vanity Press and Four Corners Books. This new publication of Joseph Conrad’s novella takes the form of a luxury magazine, using newly commissioned images by Paolo Pellegrin that capture various conflicts in London.

Saturday, February 13, 1:00 pmSigning and launch of Jason Polan’s new book Every Person in New York. Jason will be personalizing each book sold and inserting a special bootleg zine titled People I like in LA, Taco Bell refreshments will be served.