The launch was a BIG success. A huge turnout, and we have sold out of brochures! And we placed orders for the second printing! The exhibition of posters printed on the Big Fag looks fantastic.

Our mascot, Faggot Rooster, was there, and fended off a challenge from Boomi for the title of Sydney’s Biggest Fag. Here they are trying to make Mickie not feel like such a lil leprechaun:

The exhibition will continue to be on display at SYDNEY each Saturday until May 31, from Noon until 6pm. We will have a “closing” on Saturday evening May 31 from 6pm, watch this space for more details.

The much sought after poster can be seen here, freshly printed, as photographed by Deborah Kelly:

Meanwhile, the brochure is online page by page as images here. Click on each page to advance forward.

BIG FAG PRESS presents the launch of its special edition, collectable, snazzy, BIG FAG PRESS BROCHURE as BIG POSTER

To be opened by Glenn Barkley, curator at the MCA and one of the most prominent collectors of zine, posters and art ephemera.

BIG FAG PRESS is a collectively owned, ethically operated, non-profit community printing press. No other such organisation has existed in Sydney for many years. Whilst much publicity and communication activity for community groups and artists has shifted its focus to an online environment, there is clearly still a need for physical, enduring documents which are, importantly, artworks in themselves.

The gala event will launch a BIG FAG PRESS brochure that folds out to a massive A1+ poster, showing what the press is capable of. A collection of the press’ output to-date will also be on exhibition.

The launch will also be the chance for the collective to introduce its latest development, THE ACQUISITION OF A RISO MACHINE!, (to be called Fagette - Little sister of the Big Fag!) therefore expanding the facilities of the press and giving an extra needed push to Sydney’s independent media.

This project was assisted by a grant from Arts NSW, an agency of the New South Wales Government, through a program administered by the National Association for the Visual Arts (NAVA)

[Above: stencil poster produced by Street Art Workers of San Francisco].

On January 28th, 2008, Claude Moller came and gave a talk at Sydney, an event co-presented by Big Fag Press.

Claude is an artist from San Francisco, and he spoke about the
Street Art Workers (SAW) ) and their Land and Globalization poster campaign. His presentation involved a provocative discussion about how we might judge “quality” in poster aesthetics. We also debated the effectiveness of art as activism (and vice versa).

A founding member of SAW, Claude presented the DIY entrepreneurial strategies employed by the group, and showed slides documenting their large scale international poster project.

More about SAW:

Established in the U.S. in 2001, SAW is a global network of artists who use graphic art to support social change. SAW makes and distributes posters internationally to publicize the work of local grassroots activism. The group relies on street art to take back cities and towns from the businessmen, cops, and politicians who
define public space for their own benefit. Since 2001, SAW projects have talked about prisons, the mass media, and utopian ideas for the future.

SAW’s latest campaign, Land and Globalization, looks at how corporate globalization has affected our world, how it has impacted the land, and how people are fighting back. This series includes 25 posters representing artists from 10 different countries and over 20 different cities. These posters illustrate specific struggles in countries like Brazil and the United States, and they also tackle international issues around poverty and gentrification. Along with a strong critique of imperialism, the posters show how communities throughout the world are resisting corporate power for a more just and sustainable world.

Claude’s work has been featured in numerous magazines and books, including Stencil Pirates, The Interventionists and Peace Signs.

Back in 2004, when Mickie went to auction to bid on the Big Fag Press, no-one else wanted it and so we got it for a song! One ole timer printing fella shuffled over to him, sized him up, and said “I guess we’re gonna see your handy work on telegraph poles around town then, eh?”

At the time, we would have said yes. But strangely, this poster by James Dodds is the first that has been designed specifically with poles in mind. Here he is, in the photo above, showing the print that he produced on the press (later to be guillotined in half of course). Note its three colour design: two colours off metal plates, and the third colour produced using hand-cut “ruby”, thus keeping the cost down! The gap at the bottom of the poster is for him to insert info about his upcoming events, whatever they might be, using a fat marker pen.

Notice the scratches on the right hand poster James is holding up? Well, in the process of handling the fragile metal plate, James put a scratch on it. Naturally that small scratch shows up in the print. So rather than throw in the towel, or a tantrum, he went along with it, using sandpaper to enhance the scratch effect and make it part of his overall design.

There has been a request for clear info about how to prepare your file for print. Here is a basic set of instructions.

1. If you are working with scanned images, scan them at the highest resolution. The images should be at at least 300dpi at the final size they will be printed. That is, if the original image is 10cm high, but you are intending to print it at 20cm high, then you should scan it at 600dpi minimum.

2. If your print is more than one colour, perform the colour separations on the image. Follow the tutorial linked here.

3. Prepare your print in Illustrator or Quark or similar programme, if you need to add text or vector graphics or combine images etc. Set the document up as CMYK not RGB. Set the size of the document - the maximum printable area of the press is 1000X700mm - but if you can, make it smaller. This size is slightly larger than A1. Remember to consider what paper you will be printing on. Is the available paper at a corresponding size to your print image?

4. Export the file to a PDF - if your PDF is in CMYK, that’s fine. The platemaker will divide the CMYK image into four plates (or fewer plates if there are less than 4 colours).

5. If you are having troubles, email info@bigfagpress.org making sure you leave plenty of time for troubleshooting before your deadline.

[NB: Mickie has made some addenda below in the comments!]

The following message comes through from Dave, one of the FagPress Mavens. Above is a photo of him with his amazing lo-fi 2 colour poster, which we printed up a few weeks back. The great thing about this poster was that we made the plates ourselves, from transparencies Dave got made up during a recent trip to Indonesia. Anyway, read on, you could participate in our first ever magazine project, and thus be part of BIG FAG history! But remember, to contribute, artwork deadline is Friday, the 3rd of August.

Dear FAGs and Friends,

We are compiling a project which requires the input of a bunch of you “artist” types.

Myself and H. Shimada are co-editing a collection of work to be included in a print run of a small booklet (much the same format as a classic comic book) to be printed on the FAGpress in August.

We are offering (22) places, each a page of it’s own, of the dimensions 170mm wide by 260mm high. There is also one double-page in the centre (available by request).

Your contribution can be writings, drawings, collage, photograph, an advirtisement, a blank page with a
sticker or panel you provide us with 100 of…

Please, use your imagination!

We want this to be FABULOUS!

There will be two catagories, with one being printed in black (monochrome) and the other in red and blue (duo-tone). Blue and Red produces an excellent “fake” full-colour, and together mimic black quite well: very handsome.

There are an equal number of Mono and Duo pages, but once One fills up, you’re submission is stuck in The Other. People who wish to have their work printed in
Duotone will need to consult with me unless they are able to do the separations themselves.

There is a tutorial for colour separation on the website

www.bigfagpress.org

Shortly there will be an FAQ, examples of work and a downloadable template. [ download template from:
http://lucazoid.com/documents/BIGFAG01_single_template.pdf
]

The cover will be a four-colour screenprint, with an introduction inside the front cover and credits, etc. inside the back cover. There also will be a sash around the book and a three-colour pull-out centrefold.

The places are strictly limited, and will be accepted in order of receipt, with prefrences going to those who’ve slogged under the FAG. Just so it is implicitly stated, decisions regarding the booklet will be made by the editors.

The cost of inclusion is $25. This will cover the cost of the plate and printing (hopefully!). We are going to do an edition on 100 and each “artist” will recieve 2 copies of the finished work. The rest will be sold to raise money for future endevours on the FAG. This could be for you!

BIG FAG #01 is (hopefully) the first of a series of similar works to be produced on the press, with the possibility of being designed and compiled by an individual artist, or small groups, or like this one again! So set your thinking-caps to STUN!

This is a test, in many respects, so you should be aware that it may not ALL come out as you (and we!) expect it to. You understanding in this regard is greatly appreciated.

Please post original artwork, or a compact disc of your shit to:

The Barn
11 Collins St
Beaconsfield
NSW 2015

Artwork Deadline is the Friday, the 3rd of August.

Looking forward to hear from youse.

David Harris
(toecutter@squatspace.com)

P.S. Please feel free to forward this to any interested parties, however, this is a Sydney based project so Jeff Koons and co. can go and get fucked.
(sorry, read that as “Did I forget anyone?”)

Maricor, a designer who found us through our website, commissioned the Big Fag Press to print a beautiful drawing. It’s a very fine lined pen and ink drawing, and will be displayed in the glass case outside the Kinokuniya bookshop in Sydney city.

Maricor mentioned that previously she has experimented with giclee printing techniques, but they had not given her the level of fine detail she needed for reproducing her drawings. She was very satisfied with the result from the Big Fag Press.

another photo here.

Our latest printing job: Punks against the Gold Mine. This one was done in a run of a couple of hundred, on fairly lightweight paper which was specially sourced recycled stock. the poster is a 2-sider, designed to be freely distributed and pasted up at will.

This photo is from the second run of these posters. Another pic of the printing in process here.

June 2007: our latest job:

Lucazoid recently ran off a couple of hundred copies of this map, and a cover page for his Petersham blog print out for an exhibition at Artspace. You can see photos of the book in the exhibition here.

BigFag Press was established with the help of Jens, a printer from a company called Technocolour, who advised us showed us the ropes. Jens also donated much of the equipment, inks and papers that have helped us get up and running at low cost. To date, we have used high quality papers which we haven’t had to buy. However, the day will come when these papers will run out, and we will be forced to make some serious choices about paper stock. Inspired by the Footprint Press in the UK, we’re looking into getting some environmentally friendly papers to print with.

In Australia, here are a few leads to follow:
http://www.rainforestinfo.org.au/good_wood/envf_pap.htm
http://www.australianpaper.forests.org.au/docs/WHATYOUCANDO.htm
http://www.blackrainbow.com.au/
http://www.abc.net.au/landline/stories/s924420.htm

Please get in touch if you have any suggestions! We’re also currently using horridly toxic inks (which were also donated to us) and it’d be great to find out if we could get the machine functioning well with something better for our own occupational health and safety.