I wonder, could you talk about the process of getting this published? Was this your first book, did you have a pre-existing relationship with the publisher?
She’s a designer / writer / teacher / curator who wrote and designed some amazing books including Thinking With Type. I did one of the things she suggests, make a sample chapter that would be indicative both of the writing and design: https://ericschrijver.nl/assets/legal_advice_for_artists_sam...
Of course that’s a lot of work, I did have some funding for this stage as part of a talent development grant of the Cultural Industries Fund NL. I could have sent the proposal to many publishers but I soon tried with Onomatopee. They’re quite a small outfit but they have a good reputation for visual art and graphic design books. With publishing getting easier, I feel both shops, critics and the public rely even more on the reputation of publishers, record labels etc. as a proxy for quality.
That’s a bit ironic, but it also makes sense, because you need all the help you can get if you want to somehow sift through the wealth of material that’s being published each day.
Working with a small publisher, I figured it would be easier to get the book out without too much compromises. My hunch was that a large publisher might be scared of having a CC license, using repurposed images etcetera. I haven’t tried so I don’t know! I tend to think one of the advantages of a mainstream publisher would be that they can devote more resources to press (there wasn’t so much for this book). But my publisher has proven really effective in getting it into specialist bookshops so I’m quite happy.
PS: they also didn’t require copyright transfer, which is great! Money-wise, each project they do starts with a big spreadsheet to see what is possible. Of course you want to have an affordable price, a nice printing, solid copy editing, decent remuneration for the author, but it can be difficult to have everything at once so you start tweaking variables until you have something where your break even point seems attainable. I managed the collaboration with the copy editor, designer and printer myself. I’m a designer too so it felt good to have this control. This might be unusual in larger publishing houses but in the world of art book publishing I think it’s not uncommon.
She’s a designer / writer / teacher / curator who wrote and designed some amazing books including Thinking With Type. I did one of the things she suggests, make a sample chapter that would be indicative both of the writing and design: https://ericschrijver.nl/assets/legal_advice_for_artists_sam...
Of course that’s a lot of work, I did have some funding for this stage as part of a talent development grant of the Cultural Industries Fund NL. I could have sent the proposal to many publishers but I soon tried with Onomatopee. They’re quite a small outfit but they have a good reputation for visual art and graphic design books. With publishing getting easier, I feel both shops, critics and the public rely even more on the reputation of publishers, record labels etc. as a proxy for quality.
That’s a bit ironic, but it also makes sense, because you need all the help you can get if you want to somehow sift through the wealth of material that’s being published each day.
Working with a small publisher, I figured it would be easier to get the book out without too much compromises. My hunch was that a large publisher might be scared of having a CC license, using repurposed images etcetera. I haven’t tried so I don’t know! I tend to think one of the advantages of a mainstream publisher would be that they can devote more resources to press (there wasn’t so much for this book). But my publisher has proven really effective in getting it into specialist bookshops so I’m quite happy.
PS: they also didn’t require copyright transfer, which is great! Money-wise, each project they do starts with a big spreadsheet to see what is possible. Of course you want to have an affordable price, a nice printing, solid copy editing, decent remuneration for the author, but it can be difficult to have everything at once so you start tweaking variables until you have something where your break even point seems attainable. I managed the collaboration with the copy editor, designer and printer myself. I’m a designer too so it felt good to have this control. This might be unusual in larger publishing houses but in the world of art book publishing I think it’s not uncommon.