About this project

10 March 2012: Check out the new rewards! See our latest update for details.

Occuprint is a volunteer-run collaborative project that curates, collects, prints and distributes posters and graphics produced by and for the global Occupy movement. In the Fall, Occuprint launched with an all-poster newspaper, published in collaboration with the Occupied Wall Street Journal.  Since then, we’ve been sending the paper across the globe as a freely distributed tool to keep the #occupy movement as visible as possible, as beautiful as possible, and in as many places as possible.

The response has been overwhelming. Since the newspaper was released, we’ve received hundreds of poster submissions from all over the world—many of which we’ve archived on our website: 

occuprint.org

Now, we want to start getting these images out beyond the internet: into the streets and into the homes, offices, and schools of #occupy supporters worldwide.

We’re raising money for two reasons:

1. So we can print posters—tens of thousands of posters—and start distributing them anywhere there are #occupy supporters.

2. So we can print a limited edition portfolio of screen printed images, which will ultimately live in the permanent collections of museums, libraries, and other arts institutions.

The Posters

(These are the first two posters we're printing - this week! (March 13th) - with the funds raised by kickstarter. The first is by Molly Crabapple, the second is by Josh MacPhee. We've been so successful that we're able to print 5000 of each! - we added both of them to new rewards for those interested.)

(This is the first poster we've massed produced - by Alexandra Clotfelter - and we're offering it as one of our rewards.  The images we print in 2012 will be just as amazing!)

While we screen print ourselves, for larger runs of posters we work with union print shops—one here in Queens, NY and another in Detroit, MI. We have budgeted into this proposal:

$1,800: Two thousand (2,000) copies of a 24” x 36” poster (this includes printing and an estimate of our distribution costs—postage and packaging).

$6,000: Twenty thousand (20,000) copies of a broadsheet:, poster on one side, short articles and other information on the back (again, includes printing and distribution costs).

$2,000: Three thousand (3,000) copies of an 18” x 24” poster, with articles printed on the back.

$2,000: Three thousand (3,000) copies of a second 18” x 24” poster, with articles printed on the back.

TOTAL: $11,800

The specifics of what we print might vary slightly. If we receive more money, either our print runs will increase or we will print additional materials. Occuprint is a volunteer, activist project—all of the money we raise goes directly to printing and shipping.

The Portfolio

The Occuprint portfolio will consist of thirty poster images from our website. We’ve had help choosing the images from members of Occupy the Hood, Occupy Together, and the Occupied Wall Street Journal. We are working with a number of different printers to make this happen, from members of the OWS Screenprinting Guild to a Do- It-Yourself printshop in Nashville.

We will produce an edition of 100 portfolios, and that’s it. That means these are going to be super rare. — 35 are reserved for artists and printers, 30 more are being offered to libraries and educational institutions across the country, and then Occuprint will keep 10 portfolios to lend out for events and exhibitions. That leaves 25 portfolios, which we are offering to YOU, our Kickstarter supporters, to help us make all of this possible.

All of the prints in the portfolio are numbered and initialed by the printer, then stamped with the Occuprint seal. There is a front sheet, the “calaphon,” which offers a short explanation of the project, and lists all the artists and printers as well as the major donors (over 1000$). Finally, all the prints are packaged together into a presentation folio, printed with Occuprint’s seal.

Here's a selection of images that will be included:

The costs for printing this portfolio include paper, ink, shop fees, the presentation folio, and compensating the printers for their work.

They are estimated as follows:

$3,000: Paper (including the portfolio itself)

$2,000: Shop fees and printing supplies

$8,000: Printing Labor

$2,000: Shipping

[Sub-total: $15,000, minus income from institutional sales : $10,000]

TOTAL needed from Kickstarter for portfolios: $5,000

TOTAL NEEDED FOR BOTH PROJECTS = $16,800

# # # # #  # #  PROJECT FAQ # # # # # # # #

We've had a couple people ask about the rewards that involve portfolio prints.  It says "our choice" which has made people worry that we might choose prints they don't want - which is a fair concern.  Here is what we will do: after the kickstarter is over, we will email all the people who chose rewards that involve portfolio prints, asking them to list their top 5 choices (top 10 if your reward is for 5 prints). Once we have all these responses, we will go through and make sure everyone gets their first or second choice (hopefully everyone gets their first choice - it just depends on how diverse your tastes are!).  The process will work like this:

top available choice for each reward, 

then 5 print rewards get their second available print choice

then each reward gets their next available print choice (reverse order as round 1)

then the 5 print rewards get their 4th and 5th available choices

When we curated the portfolio we had such a wide range of interest in different prints, that I'm really not worried about people getting the prints they want. I suppose you can't be certain, but hopefully you all at least know the process now!

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