Hello from the team at Occasional Press, the newest venture of the Graphic Research Unit! We have been working since Fall 2021 on developing projects aiming to showcase new forms of creative research in art, design and media from across Emily Carr and the wider community, harnessing the resources and know-how of The Stationery Project . The Press is interested in projects ranging from the more conventional to the more experimental, as well as open access forms of digital and print publication. We are very excited to share this update about a number of projects in the works through our current collaborations! 

To begin with, our inaugural practice-based research journal Occasional Papers (Volume 1) is currently in the design stage. We are very fortunate to have assembled an exceptional series of contributions from a diverse array of faculty and undergraduate and graduate students, and cannot wait until Volume 1 hits the presses. We are hoping to have this out in late spring, so please watch out for updates on instagram. 

Also in the works is a trio of publications around the theme of Place-Based Responsibility, developed in collaboration with Laura Kozak, Jean Chisholm, Meghna Mitra, and Reyhaneh Yazdani. This series of works will be based on a cluster of projects and activities on this theme, including a DESIS Lab series of roundtable talks held in collaboration with the Aboriginal Gathering Place on listening and community action; a collective led by one of the Master of Design student groups who took part in several community-based activities over the summer; and project work emerging from a Social Practice and Community Engagement summer course offering. We are excited to be collaborating on publications that will disseminate the project’s insights into the practice of place-based responsibility, and will share more details on our social as the work progresses.

And finally for now, we are delighted to share that we are working with ECU Professors Randy Lee Cutler and Ingrid Koenig to develop a publication for the Leaning Out of Windows project. This 4-year, SSHRC-funded project examines how creative and scientific ways of knowing – traditionally opposing views – can support each other in understanding the nature of reality. The research team includes members of Emily Carr and TRIUMF, Canada’s particle accelerator centre in Vancouver.

Stay tuned for more information about upcoming projects and events! And as always, if you have a publication project you’d like to discuss, please get in touch.