Indie talent in abundance at Better Living Through Xeroxography small press expo

The Lopez Museum in Pasig was brimming with artists and writers, readers and publishers, hobbyists and professionals, and students and teachers on Saturday, December 14. 

 

Their destination: The 4th Better Living Through Xeroxography small press expo, which brought together a goodly number of artsy folk from both the mainstream and indie scenes with the intent of helping them sell the fruits of their labor.
 

“BLTX was conceived as a happening that can ideally be adapted to any given situation or setting, as long as there are writers, artists, musicians...who are marginalized somehow, by choice or by force,” said BLTX founder and organizer Adam David, a bookmaker and layout artist.

 

“The impetus was the disdain I felt for how mainstream publishers and retailers were ruining the art and industry of publishing with their efforts to maintain their respective franchises and monopolies,” he added.

 

“I also believed that a lot of the truly good, truly new works were being produced by people who were left by the wayside. I thought that maybe there's a way to organize most of these people and have their production be available somehow in some way,” he concluded.

 

David’s full reasons for starting BLTX can be found in an essay he wrote.

 

Audience reach, bookshelf woes

 

Getting work out to a wider audience is even more important now, especially since National Bookstore decided to cut down its shelf space for books by 70 percent.

 

“It's a very real threat, set to cripple the book industry in a significant way,” David commented. “Funny thing is, another reason we're doing BLTX is so we can make available to people books and komix and zines that they won't otherwise see in the shelves of places like National Bookstore—well, with National Bookstore cutting down the shelf space, even the mainstream publishers are going to be in that same situation.”

 

Indeed, Nida Ramirez of Visprint Inc. was one of the speakers in a simultaneous afternoon forum about alternative methods of buying and distributing books.

 

“We don't even take up a full shelf (in the Filipiniana section) now,” she lamented.

 

Even so, she acknowledged that one way of improving their situation is finding alternative ways for distribution—something that Visprint, which turned 12 in October, is not new to, as they now offer door-to-door sales via their van. But it's a boat they now share with artists and writers a-plenty.

 

For instance, BLTX participants and sellers included Jason Moss, High Chair, Elbert Or, Kubori Kikiam, Rommel Estanislao, Bomba Press, Rob Cham, and book club Pinoy Reads Pinoy Books, to name just a few (the club sold secondhand books to raise funds for Typhoon Yolanda victims).
 

A few student groups, such as the UP Writers Club and UP GRAIL (Graphic Arts in Literature), also had booths to themselves and sold merchandise they produced and printed themselves. Books for the former, and for the latter, prints, stickers, and comics both in traditional book form and packaged inside diskettes.

 

Also present were groups who operate in a digital medium, such as e-book publisher Flipside Publishing, and gaming app makers Kenneth Yu and Philip Cheang of By Implication, who decided to turn their technical expertise to StoryLark, a website where anyone can upload their comics for free.

Flipside is accepting manuscript submissions while StoryLark's website will go live next year in time for the April Komikon, Cheang said.
 

A funny thing happened on the way to the forum

 

This was the second time the expo was accompanied by a forum, this time about alternate ways to buy and distribute books. The first forum, back in 2011, covered a whole range of topics about publishing in the span of twelve hours.

 

“So far, the topics are chosen based on their relevance with regards to whatever practical publishing concern needs addressing,” said David. “The most recent forum…covered only one topic: Establishing alternative ways of book distribution.”

 

David was happy to announce that some self-publishers and small press outfits already have some solutions for this problem. “We felt it is to everyone's advantage if we shared them to other like-minded individuals and groups,” he stated.

 

Forum speakers were student Wina Puangco of online bookstore and indie publishing house Moar Books!, Mina Esguerra of Bright Girl Books, Flipside general manager Honey de Peralta, Philip Cheang and Kenneth Yu of By Implication, Feliz Perez of small Baguio bookstore Mt. Cloud, and Nida Ramirez of Visprint.

 

Each one talked about their successes and failures in their businesses, however big or small-but always on a positive note.

 

On why there are years when the forum wasn't held, David answered, “The real practical cause for this is the availability of venues that are hip enough to tolerate our demands—little to no cost, big enough to house at least thirty people, can be open the whole day.”

 

He revealed that he and his colleagues are trying to plan it in such a way that there are at least two major expos a year, one with a forum, and another with a workshop.

 

When asked if he thought BLTX has made a dent in the publishing scene, he said, “I can't really say, truth be told. I'm hoping we're somehow setting some sort of example, showing some people that there are other ways to get their words out. We're trying to do out best!”

 

“It's probably safe to say that there are more self-publishers and small press people now than four years ago, but I can't justifiably say that it's all because of BLTX.

There are other, bigger entities that also support independent work, like Komikon, and I can safely say without envy or ache in my heart of hearts that they're far more influential than we are,” he added.

 

“But that's just splitting hairs as our goals are more or less the same and proceeding towards the same general direction.” — JDS, GMA News