- Restaurants |
- Nightlife |
- Shopping |
- Movies |
- All
Printed Matter
Categories: Shopping Books, Mags, Music and Video Bookstores Arts & Entertainment Art Galleries Shopping Art Galleries Bookstores, Art Galleries [Edit]
195 10th Ave(between 21st St & 22nd St)
New York, NY 10011
Neighborhood: Chelsea
(212) 925-0325
- Nearest Transit:
-
23 St (A, C, E)
14 St (A, C, E)
- Hours:
Tue-Wed 11 am - 6 pm
Thu-Sat 11 am - 7 pm
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Good for Kids:
- No
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- No
Philip R. said: "I've used Adorama on several occasions and on the whole need to raise my initial review from 3 to a 4. Equipment, staff and service are all really solid and its hard to fault the occasional slip. Some of the equipment is quite well…" read more »
24 reviews for Printed Matter
Review Highlights
"then there are the limited edition artist books and zines."
(in 6 reviews)
"self publishing, small press, artist book mecca."
(in 4 reviews)
"A haven for graphic designers and book artists."
(in 9 reviews)
Loading...
24 reviews in English
-
Review from lindsay h.
New Orleans, LA
12/8/2011 1 Check-in Here
Such a neat bookstore. I've never seen anything quite like it and wish we had one in New Orleans. These art books are little more like pamphlets than actual books, but the subject matter is delightful. For example, one book was "bite marks" and was a whole book of images of bite marks on paper. Have you ever seen a book like that? If I lived in NYC, this would be my go to place for gifts for quirky friends with a sense of humor. My only complaint is that it's too crowded to really peruse the books. Hopefully one day they can expand.
Listed in: My NYC Must Spots
-
Review from Angel H.
Queens, NY
Sort of like the belated SeeHear fanzine store (business during the 80s/90s, East Village area), only more fine art oriented.
Currently on display: in the window, signs from the Occupy Wall Street movement. Inside, posters and adverts for various early 80s underground events, like Beth B film showings.
Something for everyone, especially for the subversive art nerd.Listed in: C for Chelsea
-
Review from Matt C.
Brooklyn, NY
9/14/2007
Oh, my little white books. My nameless, faceles little white books. Most people dont even know what you are, let alone where to get you. But I do.
Collecting Artists' books is an unhealthy and often expensive habit. You can spend months or years searching for the one you need to complete a set, or worse yet, walk in to a place like Printed Matter and splurge on 20 that youve never even seen before. Wait. No. Thats not true. You cant walk in to a place like Printed Matter and buy 20 artists books that youve never seen before because there is nowhere else in the world that would have that many of these treasures in one place. And theyve got WAY more than 20.
Granted, you cant walk in and pick up a Ruscha 1st or rare Lewitt or something.. but thats not really what Printed Matter is about. These days, the high end stuff has all made its way in to private collections or dealers' hands and is priced through the roof. You can go to Borders or something and buy a $40 glossy hardcover monster book about Thomas Kinkade or you can go to PM and buy a $3 flip book of Jesus' face made out of barcodes.. its up to you.
Need the newest Prince book? They'll have it. Nieves? They have it! No shipping from BFE, either! Maybe you just want some inspiration or a book filled with 200 pages of the same word typed over and over and over and over again. Got it. My strategy is to walk in and start from the back and work forward. I pull any book that is completely blank or white on the outside first. Then I pull books that have nothing on the spines. I then go through my pile and weed out the ones I already have and usually buy the rest. A few newbies and straglers make it in on occasion as well. And I always put everything back where I got it from, too! So there! You buy books for your reasons, I buy them for mine.
Also, they have very nice bags. Buy something.. you get one for free. -
Review from Keejoo L.
9/16/2010
Oh printed matter how I have wasted so much money here on things that I just dont need but really want. haha
Whether its just fancy pancy paper...or picking up ANOTHER sketchbook and portfolio I just cant let myself go here too often or id be even more poor than I am already. -
Review from Heath R.
Los Angeles, CA
5/24/2007
When I was involved in punk rock and comic books, I really liked the fanzines and minicomics. Then, in the last few years, minicomics started getting fancy, with people putting out short runs of hand-silkscreened items and other objets d'art that could be more expensive because they were harder to make. Things got a far cry from photocopies.
Printed Matter is that development, only times 10. These are artist's books, even more complex minicomic like small press publications, mysterious artist monographs, and other ephemera. They also sell new issues of arty magazines and journals, and artistic music and spoken word CDs and tapes -- cassettes! -- but it's the shelf running the length of the shop that's most intriguing.
Organized by artist, the books are of different sizes, in different languages, and in different print formats and qualities. You'll find some people you know -- and thousands more you may have never heard of. I'll be sure to return. This is a browser's dream!Listed in: Chelsea, What I See
-
Review from Rufus T. F.
Astoria, NY
5/21/2011
If the phrase "art book" conjures in your mind beautifully printed images in a heavy, well-bound Taschen tome, you need to check out Printed Matter to set yourself straight. The store is chock-a-block full of books as objets d'art, from cheapo 'zines to sketchbooks to hand-bound poetry collections, to small press art comics, and so on. Their collection generates a vicious time vortex, leaving me completely unable to determine how long I've been digging around in the stacks.
-
Review from Trixie J.
San Francisco, CA
6/12/2006 1 photo
THE place to go to for handmade zines, limited edition artist books, rare/recent artist publications and small press art/design books. A haven for graphic designers and book artists. THE PLACE.
Clarification: "artist books" are not "books about famous artists" but some may be inspired by real life and written/made or produced by an "artist."
Printed Matter, Inc. is the world's largest non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion of publications made by artists.
More info and online shopping available: http://printedmatter.org/Listed in: Printed Matter, Artsy Fartsy
-
Review from Gino M.
Brooklyn, NY
9/4/2009
The "Cute Art Guy" was an asshole to me.
and unless you have plenty of free time to spend, you're just kidding yourself.
This place is oozing with hipness it's disgusting....BUT GODDAMN I SAID GODDAMN!
For me, browsing Printed Matter is a Matter of thinking very deeply...otherwise I'm just some douchebag trying to look cool because I know of this place that houses dilettante art.
And Dilettante Art would be the very threat that keeps me awake at night...
10CC said "Art for Art Sake! Money for God's Sake!"
They weren't talking about the stuff at printed matter...however they didn't have to put up with some of the culture that surrounds a place like this.
I rated it 5 stars...OK. I love it. It's makes my nipples firm...OK. I just can't condone slumping on the nearby steps while I smoke homemade fags and polish my v-neck.
THINK DAMMIT THINK. -
Review from Miss M.
New York, NY
12/8/2009
This is one of my favourite shops to pick up interesting art books in NYC! Everytime I'm blown away by the variety of fascinating art books and one of hand made books.
As a curator coming here keeps me up to speed with what's really happening in the art world! -
Review from Rebecca L.
Brooklyn, NY
2/4/2009
There is no point of comparison to this place.
Not to mention that it's conveniently located to the 5 bajillion galleries of Chelsea. -
Review from MIKE L.
NY
4/29/2010
the only bad thing about this place is $100 disappears every time you walk through the door.
self publishing, small press, artist book mecca. the holy grail. massive library from lowbrow to highbrow to nobrow. definitely the best place to lose time and your paycheck. -
Review from Justin C.
Austin, TX
-
Review from chris r.
8/12/2007
a current snapshot of some of the things that make printed matter special:
first there's the show featuring all things from the band the fugs. there are old posters / flyers, records, magazines, articles, and some letters from ed sanders. thanks to the freedom of information act, there's even a page from his old fbi file.
second there's the limited edition screenprinted + one of a kind artist t-shirts that are for sale. they don't have shirts for sale here all the time, these were left over from last weekends event. i didn't make it but i think artists were there silkscreening and there was a dj. sounded fun. chances are if you get one of these you won't run into someone wearing the same one.
then there are the limited edition artist books and zines. they carry stuff books from nieves that are already sold out on the nieves website. they also carry some of luke ramsey's excellent artist residency project islands fold.
the staff here are generally friendly and helpful but this weekend i was a little turned off by the guy behind the counter that was chatting on the telephone and ran to tell his co-worker what happened on the phone rather than ring up the book i wanted to buy. i'm giving him the benefit of the doubt, since either he may have thought i was still browsing, or maybe he had one hell of a thrilling phone call that he had to share. -
Review from Filip T.
Cambridge, MA
2/26/2009
For the 99.9% of us that leave the galleries thinking "wish I could buy some art" as opposed to "people pay money for that?" Anyway, Printed Matter is right around the corner and is worth at least a solid 2 hours of browsing. They sell limited edition prints as well as books that easily fall into the "book arts" category. Really a pleasure for anyone - except kids - and if you are playing tour guide for someone out of town this is a unique stop.
-
Review from agnes b.
Corvallis, OR
10/19/2007
I have sweet sweet dreams of this place and all the artists books and limited edition printed materials that live there. Perhaps I should be a librarian, because I just can't think of many things more wonderful than all the unique books and magazines that come out of this place. No, I should just be a wealthy patron of the arts, then I can collect them all. I'll get right on that.
-
Review from Kat H.
Brooklyn, NY
11/6/2008
As an NYU art student, my opinion about Printed Matter is hardly objective. One of my teachers founded the place, and several of my fellow classmates have interned here! But this amazingly curated store is really for anyone with an interest in beautiful objects, and it's the perfect addition to an afternoon of Chelsea galleries and cupcakes from Billy's Bakery. Limited edition Liam Gillick skateboards, Yoko Ono prints, and Kiki Smith posters are placed next to $1 punk zines and quirky artists' books (I once bought a monograph for my brother that consisted of photographs of real prisoners' last meals...creepy but fascinating nonetheless!). Even if your wallet is light, you can find something in their free section or just flip through everything. Go ahead. They'll only kind of mind.
-
Review from Tamar N.
Astoria, NY
-
Review from Autobob K.
Brooklyn, NY
1/15/2007
A lovely antidote to Barnes and Noble's
-
Review from Alma Z.
9/18/2005
You won't find bestsellers in this bookstore but you will find books and magazines about famous artists. That's about it. Very nice staff.
-
Review from R. M.
Brooklyn, NY
3/24/2011
the best.
-
Review from Sam G.
Philadelphia, PA
7/18/2009
No foray into Chelsea is complete without a stop here. Limited run art books, zines of every flavor, and plenty of cute art boys to flirt with. A membership (which gets you 10% off all purchases plus invitations to special events) is the perfect present for the art geek in your life.
-
Review from Katherine K.
Brooklyn, NY
3/8/2007
This is an amazing, truly unique art bookstore. They have tons of limited edition artists prints as well as small magazines that are hard to find elsewhere. I picked up a signed Kiki Smith print that I adore. Some of the stuff can be too artsy and deep for me to understand, which is a nice feeling compared to regurgitated Taschen books everywhere. Love it.
-
Review from Ruff N.
Los Angeles, CA
8/27/2008
Printed Matter is amazing I spend hours and hours here. There is just so much to see and read. Everything is so interesting and hard to find anywhere else. I don't think there is anywhere you can find more artists books and editions than here and rarely do I actually dislike soemthing. The books, magazines, cds t shirts are all fascinating. Also i love seeing AA walking around the store.
-
Review from jeremiah w.
San Francisco, CA
9/20/2007
the power of the written word is said to be mightier than swords, to blame for loves, wars, suicides, fantasies, and so much more. you sort of get an idea of how freakin' rad books are when you're at a borders or barnes and noble, but nothing compares to an independent print-house/publisher who also has a storefront and workshops. you can find all sorts of books here that you wouldn't be able to find anywhere else, for the most part. printed matter specializes in limited-runs, hard-to-find, independent authors, 'zines, artists' books, portfolios, and manifestos, screenprints, and cutting-edge social magazines. if you're checking out galleries in chelsea, this is a necessary stop in your day. it truly is art in book form and better than many libraries i've been to.
Listed in: jeremiah's new york (so far)
