Publishing Artist Book / Catalogue
Book publishers use the term “artist monograph” to indicate books dealing with a single artist, as opposed to broader surveys of art subjects.
As far as we know, very few Irish publishers take on artist monographs, aside from instances where the practice is of art historical interest. Most publishers and academic presses in Ireland are rather conservative.
It is much more common for artist monographs to be published by institutions/galleries/museums on the occasion of high profile solo exhibitions/retrospectives.
If you have a forthcoming solo show with a public institution, I would recommend discussing your book proposal with them. They might cover some of the costs, or agree for you to use some of your artists’ fee towards production costs. This is generally a good option, as you will have the prestige of being published by an institution – however, it is still a very costly undertaking.
Beyond that, self-publishing is probably the only other option, but you will need to do extensive research regarding designers and printers. There are lots of designers who work on artist monographs – it’s worth asking around, or looking on the dust sleeves of books by other artists. In terms of printers, Print Plus in Dublin often work with artists on small print-runs.
Additional costs would including hiring a photographer to produce print quality documentation of your work; commissioning catalogue texts from writers in response to your work; and appointing an editor to oversee the project. All in all, you can expect to pay anything from 3-5k for an artist’s monograph, depending on your design and print spec. You’ll need to think about whether you can expect to recoup some of your costs through subsequent sales.
If you are thinking about a smaller print run, you may also want to research other options of self publishing or creating a photo book of images of your work. Read That Image is an award winning photo book design collective based in Dublin, Ireland. They are a collaborative group of photographers and designers dedicated to the creation of photo books and self-publishing. Read That Image host a variety of workshops from show and tell events to dummy bookmaking workshops, and cover all aspects from concept and design to bookbinding and construction.