Tony White’s website is named after Piece of Paper Press, an artists’ book project that White founded in 1994, and which continues to this day.

Tony White’s deliberately lo-fi and generous-spirited Piece of Paper Press. (Times Literary Supplement)

Piece of Paper Press was designed as a lo-tech, sustainable publishing platform used to commission and publish new writings, visual and graphic works by artists and writers. Each book is made from a single A4 sheet that is printed on both sides, and then folded, stapled, and trimmed by hand to create the book. There is no schedule; titles are published when they are ready.

Piece of Paper Press titles are usually produced in a limited edition of 150. The books are always distributed free, either by post and/or at an event, or as a larger run inserted into a magazine.

Fifty copies are given away by each contributor, and around a hundred of each title to the press’s slowly evolving mailing list, which is gradually displaced by past contributors. Thus each title takes the press to a wave of new readers, but each title is also incrementally rarer than the last.

It is not possible to subscribe, nor to buy copies. Any remaining copy or copies of each title are added to the project’s archive.

Accessible collections holding Piece of Paper Press titles include Arnolfini archive, Bristol; Chelsea School of Art Library; Live Art Development Agency study room; and UCL Small Press Collections, London (see below).

Piece of Paper Press titles have been variously reviewed in the TLS, Art Monthly and elsewhere, and many of the early titles are included in the updated second edition of Stephen Bury’s Artists’ books: the book as a work of art, 1963-2000 (London, Bernard Quaritch Ltd, 2015). Here’s the blurb:

The history of artists’ involvement with the book format between 1963 and 2000 includes a fascinating range of artists and movements from Mallarmé to the Piece of Paper Press via Cubism, Futurism, Dada, Fluxus and conceptual art.

Read a short post about Piece of Paper Press here.

A display, ‘Tony White’s Piece of Paper Press: artworks and ephemera 1994–2017’ took place in the Project Space of Site Gallery, Sheffield, October 2018, as part of Strong Language, curated by Tim Etchells for Sheffield’s Off the Shelf Festival of Books. See more of Chris Saunders’ photos of the Site Gallery display here.

Piece of Paper Press titles, 1994–present

Where marked, certain titles are accessible (subject to the respective institutional regulations) in the following collections: Arnolfini archive, Bristol (*); Chelsea School of Art Library (†); Live Art Development Agency study room (‡); and UCL Small Press Collections, London (§) – with thanks to the various donors, librarians and archivists. (Other titles currently in process of acquisition/cataloguing, TBC.)

POPP.001—Tony White, Title Track §
POPP.002—Stephanie Fawbert, Glancing §, †
POPP.003—Jane Gifford, Dream Journal §, †
POPP.004—Tim Etchells, About Lisa: a small bad story in twelve good parts §, †
POPP.005—Penny McCarthy, Bedrooms §, †
POPP.006—Peter Bunting, Seven Views of Geneva §
POPP.007—Mikey Cuddihy, untitled §, †
POPP.008—Gordana Stanišić, On Moles §, †
POPP.009—Artist/Writer, Default 1
POPP.010—Rose Frain, Between 12 Noon and 2 PM †
POPP.011—James Pyman, The Adventures of Lionel Through the Moon †
POPP.012—Tony White, A0 †,
POPP.013—Suzanne Treister, Vibrators from the House of Brodsky †
POPP.014—Pavel Büchler, Good Guys †
POPP.015—Elizabeth Magill
POPP.016—Christopher Hewitt, Hollywood Leather
POPP.017—Borivoj Radaković, Posjetiteljeva Knjiga (Visitor’s Book)
POPP.018—Bruce Gilchrist, Drawing from Perplexity §
POPP.019—Alison Turnbull, Black Borders 1994-2006 *
POPP.020—James Pyman, The Adventures of Lionel: The Book of Hours *, §
POPP.021—Stevie Deas, Cleanskins *
POPP.022—Halford + Beard, Czar 52 Crash *
POPP.023—Tony White, London Palm *
POPP.024—Barbara Campbell, News Haiku *
POPP.025—Liliane Lijn, ATOMANOTES
POPP.026—Tony White, A Porky Prime Cut
POPP.027—Michael Moorcock, A Twist in the Lines
POPP.028—Tony White, The Holborn Cenotaph
POPP.029—Joanna Walsh, Shklovsky’s Zoo
POPP.030—Steven Hull, CARNEVIL
POPP.031—Ian Bourn, Subjective Interfaces
POPP.032—Susana Medina, The Bowie Neurotransmitter
POPP.033—Sheena Rose, HOME IS ON MY MIND…
POPP.034—Joolz Denby, Dandelion ‡
POPP.035—M John Harrison, Real Dreams ‡
POPP.036—Courttia Newland, That Small Death ‡
POPP.037—Selina Thompson, 12 Race Card Answers ‡
POPP.038—Leaving Present Prototype (for Jane Rolo). (NB edition limited to a single unmade book)
POPP.039—Vanishing History Dub
POPP.040—David Hayden, Good Pizza
POPP.041—Sharon Kivland, THE INCORRUPTIBLE
POPP.042—Andrea Mason, BOOK DRAWINGS #1–12
POPP.043—Tim Etchells, Coronation Day: a short just story in 15 good parts