Is it really him, or another ruse? Tell us what you think. In the meantime, explore more anti-establishment fun with Poster Boy: The War of Art. Available now, mass nerders!

Dutch art gallery West is putting on Carry-on, the first European solo show of photographer David Horvitz. Carry-on documents an art project organized by Horvitz in which he literally carried on pieces of fellow artists’ work in his luggage, and then transported them to The Hague. Collaboration with many people–including strangers–is central to Horvitz’s art, and was an integral part of the two book projects he’s done with MBP, Xiu Xiu and the forthcoming Everything that Can Happen in a Day. In Xiu Xiu, Horvitz accepted boxes of Polaroid film from fans of the band Xiu Xiu and then, while touring with the band, used it to make photographs. He then returned the pictures to the person who gave the box. Everything that Can Happen in a Day is the outcome of a yearlong project during which Horvitz used the Internet to disseminate instructions that anyone could follow. People worldwide did, and uploaded the results (see, for instance, what people did when instructed to photograph themselves with their head in a freezer and then share the photo with the tag “241543903″). Carry-on opens Saturday, September 4th, at the main gallery of West, Groenewegje 136, The Hague, Netherlands.

From their corner of the interwebs, Electric Literature has put out another animated short, using the first sentence of Patrick deWitt’s story “The Bastard.” The animation this time around was done by MBP author Joanna Neborsky, whose book Illustrated Three-Line Novels lands on bookstores’ shelves in the next couple of weeks. Check out the short: it’s Neborsky’s signature style electrified and brought to kinetic life, dancing along to music by Lewis Pesacov. The sentence ain’t half bad either.

Join Mark Batty Publisher and the *Poster Boy Collective* on August 28 · 6:00pm – 8:00pm at four different parties on the same night to launch K.A.R.A.T.E. (Kids Are Rallying Against The Empire), a legal defense fund for artists, and celebrate the release of POSTER BOY: THE WAR OF ART.

- Poster Boy will be signing books at all four locations.

- Signed books and limited edition prints available

- A portion of book, art, food and beverage sales will go to K.A.R.A.T.E.

* * *

*THE EVENTS*

NEW YORK CITY
Frost Gallery
17 Frost Street
Brooklyn, NY 11211

LOS ANGELES
Carmichael Gallery
http://www.carmichaelgallery.com/
5795 Washington Blvd.
Culver City, CA 90232

MIAMI
AE District Gallery
http://www.aedistrict.com/
3852 N. Miami Ave.
Miami, FL 33137

LONDON
Pure Evil Gallery
www.pureevil.me
108 Leonard St.
London EC2A4XS

* * *

ABOUT THE BOOK

Dubbed by the New York Times as an “anti-consumerist Zorro with a razor blade, a sense of humor and a talent for collage,” Poster Boy deftly rearranges the text and images of subway posters, reclaiming walls from the ad industry one slice of vinyl at a time. This artful and clever repurposing of advertising has been hailed by the Guardian UK as “witty, web-savvy and economical… the only materials it requires are chutzpah, imagination and a 50-cent blade,” and, though the work exists only in New York City, Poster Boy has garnered a worldwide following.

“Poster Boy: The War of Art” is the first book to feature Poster Boy’s renegade mashups—corporate copy slashed and re-pasted as sharp, playful puns and turns of phrase rich with innuendo and political punch. Under the edge of Poster Boy’s blade, beautiful models turn ghastly and iconic spokespeople become mouthpieces for guerrilla slogans.

Poster Boy proves no ad is safe from art’s incisive interventions.

The much-praised illustration collective behind upcoming MBP books LE GUN 1-3 and LE GUN 4, LE GUN, is putting together a massive illustration project at the Convulsive Architecture exhibition at the Barbican gallery in London tonight from 7:00 to 10:00 p.m. The drawing–which is sure to be gigantic in more ways than one–is inspired by Facteur Cheval’s Palais Idéal and will be done with help from the audience. Musical accompaniment will be provided by The Rubbish Men, and there will be screenings of multiple films. If you find yourself in London, treat yourself and take part in some art-making. It’s the perfect way to tide yourself over till January, when the books will hit the shelves.

But Retrofonts gives readers more than fonts on the page — the book includes a CD with 222 copyright-free fonts, making it an invaluable tool for graphic designers, typographers and art directors. The professional-quality fonts given away in Retrofonts can be used in myriad ways, while also informing and inspiring readers.

Side by side with the type specimens, examples of the fonts in use demonstrate the aesthetic sensibilities of bygone eras. From 1950s brush scripts to the collage-inspired letterforms of the 1980s and beyond, the fonts author Gregor Stawinski examines exemplify decade-defining design trends, helping today’s readers refine their understanding of what was in style, when.

As Stawinski notes, “Typographical time travel succeeds when, as in this book, the most popular typographical trends of different periods in high, low and mass culture are brought together in a vivid presentation. Only then will a review of the exciting history of typography in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries provide thrilling discoveries, forge informative connections or simply entertain.”

About Gregor Stawinksi

Gregor Stawinski is a graphic designer based in Munich, Germany.

# # #

Retrofonts
By Gregor Stawinski
Page Count: 560 pages
Size: 6.75 x 9.75 inches (17.1 x 24.7 cm)
Format: Color throughout; Casebound w/ CD
Publication Date: August 2010
Price: US $65 UK £43 CA $81
ISBN: 9781935613015

For a review copy, more information, or to schedule an interview with the author, contact Jake Davis, +1 347.830.6271, media@markbattypublisher.com.

Retrofonts will do more than inspire you – the enclosed CD that contains 222 copyright-free fonts will allow you to use these fonts in any way you choose, making this book an invaluable tool for anyone interested in graphic design and typography.

Taken individually, Fénéon’s trenchant, and often bizarre, reports are enigmatic and fragmentary, but taken as a whole they compose a detailed portrait of life in France at the turn of the last century. Fénéon’s news items are populated with opium addicts, prostitutes, drunks, those flattened by trains and carriages, inept and angry thieves, protestors, and simpletons. Neborsky’s artwork brings them and their exploits to life in colorfully deranged glory.

Maira Kalman writes of the work, “These staccato short, short, short stories now live thanks to Joanna Neborsky’s splendid, mysterious drawings and designs. Excelsior!”

Neborsky says of her project, “Fénéon’s nouvelles date to an era that was busy about the future; indeed, in their sharp, modernist, fragmented way, they did their part to herald that future… More than a century has passed since the caped, goateed anarchist-aesthete who befriended Seurat before he un-friended Gauguin wrote about men and women squabbling, stumbling, and injuring one another across France, but I recognize them intimately.”

About Joanna Neborsky

After studying literature at Yale, teaching English in Toulouse, playing drums in a Ronettes tribute band, leading tours in New York Harbor as a park ranger, and living on a horse farm outside Los Angeles, Joanna Neborsky decided all she really wanted to do was draw. She applied to New York’s School of Visual Arts’ MFA Illustration program in 2007; two years later, she had self-published four books and delivered the commencement address at Radio City Music Hall. Her work has been recognized in American Illustration and 3×3 Magazine; her clients include The New York Times, Riverhead Books, and Farrar Straus & Giroux.

About MBP Illustrated Fiction

Crafting compelling narratives by combining inventive prose with provocative imagery, MBP’s Illustrated Fiction titles include A Field Guide to the North American Family, Instructions for the Apocalypse, and The Inner Life of Martin Frost. Writers, visual artists, and designers merge their respective talents to reveal stories that readers won’t soon forget.

About Mark Batty Publisher

Mark Batty Publisher (http://www.markbattypublisher.com) is an independent publisher dedicated to making distinctive books on the visual art of communicating, showcasing the visual power and innovation of contemporary culture in all of its varied poses. Today, the visual comes at us from more places than ever, and its dissemination is faster and more advanced every year. Books from Mark Batty Publisher capture this acceleration on the pages of every book. Affordable, well designed, thoughtfully created, and produced to last, MBP books are artful products that readers want to hold onto forever.

# # #

Illustrated Three-Line Novels: Félix Fénéon
Written by Félix Fénéon; Illustrated by Joanna Neborsky; Translated by Luc Sante
Page Count: 128 pages
Format: Hardcover
Publication Date: September 2010
Price: $24.95
ISBN: 978-0-9841906-6-9 (0-9841906-6-X)

For a review copy, more information, or to schedule an interview with the author, contact +1 347.830.6271 or jake@markbattypublisher.com.

Taken individually, Fénéon’s trenchant, and often bizarre, reports are enigmatic and fragmentary, but taken as a whole they compose a detailed portrait of life in France at the turn of the last century. Fénéon’s news items are populated with opium addicts, prostitutes, drunks, those flattened by trains and carriages, inept and angry thieves, protestors, and simpletons. Neborsky’s artwork brings them and their exploits to life in colorfully deranged glory.

Revelations & the Stupid Creatures is the first in what will be an ongoing series of artists, working in all mediums, responding to the Book of Revelation, the next of which will be Revelations and Dog by Michael Caines.

About John Murphy and Liana Finck

John Murphy is a plush toy artist from Asheville, North Carolina. For seven years he made plush toys for customers all over the world. To date he’s written and co written five books about plush toys, including the bestselling Stupid Sock Creatures and stuffed toy how-to book Closet Monsters, which be released in October of 2010. He was recently interviewed in the plush art trade magazine Stuffed and is a featured designer in Green Design (Mark Batty Publisher) and Dot Dot Dash (Gestalten Books, 2006), and Art Doll Adventures (Li Hertzi, 2007). He currently works for a wilderness therapy camp for at risk teens, and will be taking a residency at the John Michael Kohler Arts Center in Wisconsin this September. Find out more about John and his work at www.stupidcreatures.com

Liana Finck is a graphic novelist and designer based in New York. She graduated from Cooper Union College and is a recipient of a Fulbright Fellowship. Her first graphic novel, Phèdre: A Comic Tragedy, can be downloaded for free from Lulu.com.

# # #

Revelations and the Stupid Creatures
By John Murphy & Liana Finck
Page Count: 48 pages
Size: 9.25 x 11.5 inches (23.5 x 29.2 cm)
Format: Color throughout; Casebound
Publication Date: July 2010
Price: US $34.95 UK £25 CA $47
ISBN: ISBN: 9780982075456

For a review copy, more information, or to schedule an interview with the authors, contact Adri Cowan, +1 347.830.6271, adri@markbattypublisher.com.