Alexandria Deters On Finding Love: “Shop ‘Til You Drop at Printed Matter’s Book Fair”

Although I always go to Printed Matter’s NY Art Book Fair, this year was especially auspicious as I attended the opening. I had heard Johannah Herr and writer Cara Marsh Sheffler would be doing readings with their new tarot card deck and wanted one. Their take on U.S. politics and history—on a constant decline and marked by collusion—is absolutely fascinating. If you like learning about the crazy, real history of governments and the organizations they run, read their latest book Collateral Magic: How the CIA Conjured Democracy from the Cold War to the Forever Wars (2025). The new deck fittingly dons world leaders, politicians, and historical spectacles. As for my reading, I opted not to ask about global peace but instead a (hopefully easier) question: Would I find love? Sheffler’s cards, guided by popes and tyrants, revealed that I would and that a benefactor would be coming my way.

Until that benefactor arrives, I happily succumbed to acquisitions within my price range. We live in a time when everything feels unaffordable and out of reach, but at this fair, I can be a collector of objects and words of unique value on my own (poverty-stricken artist) dime. The some 50 art book publications, galleries, and artists who gathered at MoMA PS1 had everything from beautiful to weird on offer. Proving my point, as one of the first few hundred to arrive at the fair, I was given a limited edition metal bookmark (Lyric Sheen’s Hazel, 2025, edition of 500) for free. I slipped it into my tote and thought how much I love this fair as my collecting senses started tingling.

Honoring all types of printed matter, the fair has a zine tent—dedicated to the self-published and DIY formats—where I saw many friends. Among them, the talented artist Carlos Quispe, was representing World War 3 Illustrated, one of the first U.S. magazines that saw the value of comics as a vehicle for social commentary and journalism. Founded in 1979, during the Reagan era, by artists, it has consistently published left-wing, sometimes anti-establishment, political commentary. Continuing my browsing, I said hello to one of my favorite artists, Heather Benjamin, and purchased one of her stickers for my collection. What kept me sane was just letting my eyes wander and not letting myself feel pressured to see every object and booth, but instead naturally gravitating to the booths that caught my attention.

Earlier during the day, as I always do, I had watched the 9/11 Memorial’s broadcast reading of the names of those. I cried and was saddened further when someone who read a section of names stated their love of Trump and our current administration. Of course, September 11 has become a politically charged day that panders to nationalist sentiment. Michalis Pichler’s NEW YORK POST Flag Profile (2017) captures that perfectly. It is an 88-page newspaper whose inside pages consist of floating U.S. flags. Pichler has cut out all the U.S. flags from New York Post‘s first anniversary issue of the September 11 terror attacks in 2002 and glued them back on empty pages. Centering the redactionism of remembrance. In my own work, Gonzalez: Yes dear, I’m here where I am embroidering the 83-page audio transcript of the FAA and NORAD Response to 9/11 as published by the Rutgers Law Review in 2011, is a similar critique and attempts to remove politics from remembrance. It felt extremely appropriate to see Pichler’s work on this day, and I bought a copy.

Leaving the zine tent, I entered the building, on the 2nd Floor, Room T I found Archives Yan Morvan, and saw their latest issue on Northern Ireland in 1981—the year IRA member Bobby Sands died in prison on hunger strike. Beautiful and haunting. Also in the room was Bad Student, where I found a piece for ‘my small art object’ collection: a photobook keychain of pictures of artist Felize Camille’s furry cat Nido. I remember having small photobook keychains like this one growing up. My nostalgic glee was obvious as I showed off my new purchase tu anyone interested. Kyle Quinn who was at his booth, RAW MEAT, an independent LGBTQ+ Brooklyn-based publishing house. I loved his latest publication New York Classifieds by Brad Hoseley, which is an evocative and eerie book of the long-time New Yorker and Brooklyn-based artist Hoseley’s collection of personal advertisements from classified sections of newspapers and magazines, mapping New Yorkers’ desires and quest for love, pre-internet dating—a zine documenting the city.

In our digital age, printed matter might be considered superfluous, so visitors can already be seen to lean into material indulgences as they peruse through the paper arts. Many exhibitors sell more than paper-centric creations; what hurt is one more object of technological obsolescence? For example, cassette tapes, I haven’t used one in decades but when I saw the collection of tapes and CDs available by Orange Radio & Homebody, based out of Alhambra, CA, I impulsively bought one. How could I resist when it was the soundtrack to the infamous New York City movie Kids? Whatever your future has in store, I hope ‘shop ‘til you drop’ at Printed Matter is in your cards this weekend. Now, I just need to buy a cassette player.

NY Printed Matter Art Book Fair is open through Sunday, September 14 at MoMA PS1, 22-25 Jackson Ave, Queens, New York 11101.

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