Since 1980 Hubert Kret­sch­mer has collec­ted, archi­ved and docu­men­ted artist publi­ca­ti­ons for his archive artist publi­ca­ti­ons: news­pa­pers, fly­ers, artist books, zines, mul­ti­ples, pos­ters and many more. This Inde­pen­dent Archive Pro­ject was foun­ded in Munich by the publis­her, artist and art edu­ca­tor Hubert Kret­sch­mer.

It all began with three exhi­bits on artist books in the Pro­du­zen­ten­ga­le­rie Adel­gun­den­straße in 1979. It was the trig­ger for the foun­ding of Ver­lag & Dis­tri­bu­tion Hubert Kret­sch­mer [Publis­her & Dis­tri­bu­tion Hubert Kret­sch­mer]. His aim was to make it pos­si­ble for artist-produced media to have a pre­sence on an inter­na­tio­nal plat­form.
Whe­ther at the Frank­fur­ter Buch­messe, the Mini­pres­sen­messe in Mainz, the Gegen­Buch­messe in Frank­furt, the Art Basel, Art Colo­gne, Art Frank­furt, Art Mul­ti­ple in Dus­sel­dorf or the Ger­man Book Fair in New York – for many years the publis­her was rep­re­sen­ted the world over, which led to the pheno­mena Kunst­ler­Pu­bli­ka­tio­nen= Artists Publi­ca­ti­ons beco­m­ing so well known.
A net­work deve­l­o­ped from the per­so­nal rela­ti­onships with artists, inter­na­tio­nal pri­vate collec­tors, book and art dea­lers as well as libra­ries, enab­ling Hubert Kret­sch­mer to fur­ther enlarge his com­pre­hen­sive archive. Today it com­pri­ses circa 40,000 items of vary­ing media, its main empha­sis on the 1980s. Of these more than 17,500 are publi­cly acces­si­ble in the online cata­lo­gue.

In con­trast to clas­sic book art collec­tions, the archive artist publi­ca­ti­ons is not geared toward valu­ably ador­ned biblio­phile objects, but rather towards publi­ca­ti­ons that were pro­du­ced with the sim­plest mate­ri­als, like fly­ers, copied or sten­ci­led maga­zi­nes, edi­ti­ons in small num­bers and simi­lar items. As so-called “grey lite­ra­ture”, such publi­ca­ti­ons are usually not collec­ted by public libra­ries, des­pite pos­ses­sing a high docu­men­ta­tio­nal value. Publi­ca­ti­ons by artists with a limited audi­ence and those which are not archi­ved per­man­ently or in any cen­tral archive are the most com­mon. The archive artist publi­ca­ti­ons would like to con­tri­bute to making this signi­fi­cant field of artistic pro­duc­tion per­man­ently and publi­cly acces­si­ble.

The collec­tion encom­pas­ses mul­ti­ples, pos­ters, invi­ta­ti­ons, various recor­ding, pho­to­co­pies, stamps, videos, zines, CDs, cata­lo­gues, news­pa­pers, web­sites, secon­dary lite­ra­ture and exhi­bit cata­lo­gues, which reflect the art trends of the past 35 years up to today: the off­shoots of Flu­xus, of hap­pe­nings and per­for­mance art, mail art, stamp art, the Neue Wilde, con­crete and visual poe­try, Con­cep­tual art, appro­pria­tion art and copy art. To a limited extent, the collec­tion also inten­tio­nally inclu­des ever­y­day publi­ca­ti­ons, like mail-order cata­lo­gues and fashion or life­style maga­zi­nes, in order to cap­ture the zeit­geist. (mai 2016)

Archive view
Archive view
© Archive Artist Publications
Homepage www.artistbooks.de
Homepage www.artistbooks.de
© Archive Artist Publications
Various magazines
Various magazines
© Archive Artist Publicatio

The archive artist publi­ca­ti­ons is con­ve­ni­ently loca­ted in the Munich Kunst­areal [art district], 250 meters north of the Brand­horst Museum.
The collec­tion can be viewed anytime by appoint­ment.
We are plea­sed to pro­vide exhi­bit items for events and exhibits.

 

Hubert Kretschmer
Archive Artist Publications
Türkenstraße 60 UG
80799 München
Germany
fon +49 (0)89 12345 30
mobil +49 (0)172 85 125 88 
mail(at)artistbooks.de
www.artistbooks.de

Verlag Hubert Kretschmer