Faísca Studio

Founded and led by Natalia González and Catalina Viera in Santiago, Chile, Pupi Club is a micro-publisher and a risography studio that emerged in 2016, as a way of working with friends and experimenting in the fanzine format. Social, feminine and political themes are addressed in the publications, by Chilean and Latin American artists. Pupi Club has already participated in fairs in its country of origin, in Argentina and in Brazil.

This essay constitutes an attempt to sketch the social and technological contexts in which the Risograph evolved. To do so, John Z. Komurki starts with the story of the mimeograph, the technology that preceded it. In fact, a premise of this essay is that the one machine cannot be considered in isolation from the other — more than two discrete inventions, they represent two overlapping phases in the elaboration of the same technological principle, namely, stencil duplicating. Alongside this, the two can be triangulated with the Xerox, the originary photocopying process, thereby developing a unitary conceptualization of the three techniques. Finally, the Risograph is briefly considered in relation to notions of obsolescence, as well as its application as a tool for ‘alternative’ or non-commercial printmaking.

Ediciones el Fuerte is a small independent press from Buenos Aires that publishes fanzines and posters printed in Riso. Based on drawing, graphic narratives, collection of stories, abstraction, and concepts about science, travel, the cosmos, cultures or obsessions, they make fanzines and graphic work investigating different printing techniques, where the analog and the manual are protagonists. El Fuerte is formed by Sofia Noceti and Juan Casal, who are both designers and illustrators.

Helen Murta and Jão talk about the program of Magical Riso IV, which was simultaneously translated into Portuguese by Faísca, in addition to showing pages of the book Magical Octopus, which guided the activities of the conference.

This discussion of Faísca’s program is about the artists’ books and we have special guests: Amir Brito Cadôr (Andante / UFMG), Astrid Florentinus (Knust), Jo Frenken (Jan van Eyck Academie) and Ricardo Portilho (Entrecampo).

Interview with Ivana Smudja, director of the documentary, and with Ellen Kocken, producer, directly from the Extrapool building, a multidisciplinary art space and Knust headquarters. In this chat with Helen Murta, Faísca’s organizer, the work, the ideas for the doc, the recording period and the results of the film are discussed. The importance of Knust, the processes that Ellen and Ivana shared with the group, the political and cultural contexts of Nimega are also part of the conversation. At the end of the broadcast, Joyce Guley, from Knust, takes a tour through the floors and presents some spaces in the building.