Magical Octopus

Magical Octopus is a collaboration between 20 RISO print lovers: artists, graphic designers, illustrators, printers, publishers, writers, tutors and other professionals from various fields all over the globe. They have been working with the same resource material to produce a wonderful book together from a distance, thus showing their own unique approach in working with the RISO print technique. Each participant designed and printed eight pages in their own studio. The pages travelled by mail to the Jan van Eyck Academie in Maastricht, where the book received a connecting design, was composed and bound.

The material - a collection of photographs, poems, scientific drawings and maps - was created at Knockvologan by Miek. For this project, her work, expeditions and observations of biodiversity in and around the weather-beaten shores of the Atlantic Ocean served as an incentive to find a Risograph approach to wilderness. In Magical Octopus, you will find artists’ reflections on lucidity, fiction, nature preservation, co-existence and other topics, all emerging from the same source.

The book Magical Octopus will be launched during the online Magical RISO 4th edition expert meeting from 1-4 December. The live event regretfully had to be cancelled due to the COVID-19.

Participating are Bananafish, Shanghai, China | Calipso Press, Cali, Colombia | Corners Studio, Seoul, South Korea | Endless Editions, New York, US | Gato Negro Ediciones, Mexico City, Mexico | Hand Saw Press, Tokyo, Japan | Hato Press, London, England | Issue Press, Grand Rapids, US | kabinet.studio, Antwerp, Belgium | Knockvologan Studies, Knockvologan | Scotland | Knust, Nijmegen, The Netherlands | Quintal Éditions, Paris, France | Raum Press, Salamanca, Spain | Risolve, Lancaster, US | Sigrid Calon, Tilburg, The Netherlands | Wobby.club, Tilburg, The Netherlands | Jan van Eyck Academie, Maastricht, The Netherlands

To celebrate this unique collaboration, we have been sharing the process via Instagram.

The book will be the VI publication in the CNP series, a lifelong collaboration with Jo Frenken.

Source material: Miek Zwamborn
Design: Jo Frenken & the collaborating artists/designers/printers
Text editing: Liva Laure
Font: Cochin & a mixed world collection
Paper: 80 & 100 g/m2 Eos 2.0, 60 g/m2 IBO One, 300 g/m2 Munken Pure Rough & a mixed world collection
Binding: Jan van Eyck Academie

Edition: 100 x 2