Event Reportback: Los Angeles Anarchist Bookfair
For your reading pleasure: a joint reportback from the two AK collective members who went down to the Los Angeles Anarchist Bookfair last weekend.
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Macio: Last Sunday, January 24th, AK Press attended the 2nd Annual Los Angeles Anarchist Bookfair. Suzanne and I were the collective members tasked with hauling the books and ourselves down to L.A. for the weekend.
Suzanne: I was happy to be able to attend again, as I’d had the pleasure of going down to the first L.A. Anarchist Bookfair last year and been super impressed with the way the organizers had pulled things together. I was actually so excited to go that I volunteered to split the driving duties with Macio (and I hate driving).
Macio: The bookfair was held at Barnsdall Art Park in North Hollywood. Other vendors and comrades who were present included Critical Resistance (L.A), Earth First! Journal, South Central Farmers, Modesto Anarcho, Skylight Books, L.A. Anarchist Black Cross Federation, and lots more.
Suzanne: This space was amazing—much more spacious than last year’s bookfair—and it was pretty packed the whole time. Besides the folks Macio mentioned, I was also glad to see folks from Semiotext(e), Taala Hooghan Infoshop in Flagstaff, and Revolutionary Autonomous Communities (RAC)—plus there was a good crowd of folks down from the Bay Area including the Friendly Fire Collective (our tabling neighbors and also sort of my actual neighbors!), UA in the Bay, PM Press, and lots of other familiar faces.
Macio: The event was opened up by traditional Aztec dancers and drummers. What followed was an exciting day of selling books. The AK table was packed pretty consistently with curious minds. Luckily the water fountain was located nearby so Suzanne could take frequent sips for hydration. I, on the other hand, found my calm on the balcony where the children’s day care area was set up. From what we could tell the organizers of the bookfair did a great job of scheduling engaging workshops and author panels. AK was not able to attend any of the activities but the schedule listed workshops on Indigenous Resistance, Anarchist Urban Planning Theory, Student Occupations, Bike Kitchen Mobile, and Political Prisoners, to name a few. There were also short films showing throughout the day. Although we weren’t able to check out any workshops, we definitely took advantage of all the wonderful food being offered. In addition to Food Not Bombs there were a few other independent vendors providing food and drink for a small price. One particular vendor served delicious vegan tacos and nachos with a homemade “cheese” sauce. So Good! And I scored some great t-shirts from Mass Media Distro.
Suzanne: The great thing about working at events like this is getting to talk to so many folks who come up to our table looking for particular books (odds are, we’ve got em!), or looking for recommendations, or just being generally curious about anarchism or some aspect of radical politics or AK Press itself. The one unfortunate thing is that this all keeps us so busy that, unless we can figure out how to clone ourselves (we haven’t yet), we will always have a hard time getting away from the tables long enough to check out the other stuff that’s going on. But it did look like there was some really great talks and panels lined up. (Oh, and Macio is right, the food was delicious.) The other highlight was that Macio’s mom came and hung out at the table with us.
Macio: The bookfair started at 11am and went on until 8 or so. We were pretty much selling through our stock the whole time. We sold several copies of our latest book, Come Hell or High Water, as well as lots of classics… All in all, AK had a great time attending the L.A Anarchist Bookfair. We thank the organizers for the invite, and look forward to the next one!
Suzanne: Before we wrap this up, there’s one serious thing that we need to mention, which is that on his way home from speaking at the bookfair, Ojore Lutalo (anarchist and longtime Black Liberation political prisoner, just released in August) was arrested on an Amtrak train in Colorado and charged with “endangering public transportation,” supposedly because of a political conversation he was having on a personal phone call. He is now out on bail but in need of support (and donations). Read more about his arrest here (and click links at the end of the article for more recent updates).
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| Suzanne setting up the AK table | A thing of beauty! |