Text written for the exhibition ‘Forms of Inquiry’, first held at Architectural Association School of Architecture, London, 8–30 October 2007, where some Specter publications were included in ‘Reading Room’ section.
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Specter Press was started in 2005 at Yongin, South Korea, with the desire to achieve organic integration of different processes involved in book-making – from conception to writing, editing and designing – on one hand, and the need of a publishing program focused on collaborations with contemporary Korean artists on the other. As designers, we had been quite intimate with the production of the book both as a cultural artifact and as a physical object. What we wanted with our own imprint was more autonomy and better control over the product as a whole: not only its appearance, but its very reason to exist. In order to achieve this, it was necessary to set up a new framework in which artists, writers, editors and designers could fluidly collaborate, without bothering disciplinary barriers. At the same time, we realized that many contemporary Korean artists were creating works that were essentially ideas and processes rather than physical objects. Thus, Specter Press would be able to function as a channel for them to create more tangible and enduring embodiments of their otherwise transient ideas.
Nine books have been published so far under the Specter Press imprint. Although our original intention was to create works in their own right, rather than mere reproductions of existing works, not all the Specter books were made quite that way: in fact, four of them might be seen as more or less straightforward catalogues or monographs. Even in those cases, however, we wanted each book to be fresh contributions to the artist’ body of work, and the integrative approach to the authoring and production was always maintained.
Specter Press doesn’t have its own press. However, it does share a hands-on, designer-as-maker attitude with the long tradition of workshop-publishers. One can think of William Morris’s Kelmscott Press, and the subsequent ‘private presses’ in Europe and North America in the late 19th and early 20th century. It seems that some designers just can’t stand with the notion of division of labor: the designers who want to decide what is worth publishing in the first place; who actually read texts, committing themselves to ‘silent’ – or, sometimes, not so silent – editing; who would be happy to get their hands dirty, loving the smell of ink and the noise of machinery. Admittedly, we belong to the tribe.
But we should also point out that, unlike many Western designer-artisans, we can’t be nostalgic about any ‘craft ideal’: as far as designing and publishing is concerned, there is simply no ideal to recover. Or, if anything, it’s been lost so completely that any of its claim now seems only mythical. Modernization – Westernization – in Korea has been so radical and ruthless that we don’t seem to have any memory of more organic past (or does this judgment make us radical and ruthless modernists?) The profession of graphic design itself was imported not so long ago, and it shouldn’t be too harsh to say that the model was based on the most banal and stale of the Western culture: the man in black suit working for big corporations. So, it makes us think that what we’re doing with the Specter Press is very new in Korea: based on a very old tradition from the West; but also inspired by more immediate European predecessors such as Revolver in Germany or Roma Publications in the Netherlands.
It should also be noted that all the Specter publications have been subsidized: the press simply cannot sustain itself without external support. And the people who have been involved in the projects – writers, editors, artists, but not printers – have worked with no clear definition of responsibilities and financial rewards. It’s not necessarily a happy state of affairs. Although the spirit of mutual aid and individual goodwill is a welcoming antidote to the largely anonymous nature of contemporary designing and publishing, and the public support still available for the obviously uncommercial activity should be a sign of hope in this increasingly market-driven world, they are a fragile foundation nonetheless.
So far, Specter Press has been preoccupied in production, not distribution, which is another weak spot in its operation. There is no domestic distributor specialized in art publications, and we don’t have capacity to handle the work ourselves. Some of the Specter books have been made available overseas by foreign distributors. But in Korea, ironically, only those willing enough can obtain the copies. A possible way to deal with the problem may be in thinking of alternative distribution methods, perhaps involving the Internet. We love books, but object-fixation should certainly not be our motivation. Recently, there has been some interesting work on distribution by Dexter Sinister in New York, and it seems to suggest a new kind of modus operandi for small-scale publishing.
To us, as designers, one interesting aspect of the Specter project has been that we would feel less obliged to make ‘innovation’ or leave our ‘personal marks’ on the design of the books. One may assume that, with self-initiated projects, you can go as wild as you please: but it’s not been the case with Specter. The form of a book will naturally emerge from the concept and the content, and we don’t feel like ‘pushing’ the design to make our own statements: often the very existence of the book is enough. The fact that we’re taking care of the totality of a publication seems to allow us to be modest as designers. It’s a liberating feeling, and itself a good enough reason to carry on.