Kaye was invited out to Berlin to represent Kickstarter at Re:Publica alongside long-time collaborator Jessica Guy. We presented a session on Money, Skills and Work - showcasing the breadth of the Distributed Design community and the synergies between the Kickstarter and the Distributed Design communities. We also shared top crowdfunding tips for launching a Design and Tech project on Kickstarter.
re:publica is a conference in Europe that deals with the Web 2.0, especially blogs, social media and information society. It annually takes place in May in Berlin. During three days talks and workshops about various topics are held, ranging from media and culture over politics and technology to entertainment.
While in Berlin, Kaye and Jess recorded an episode of Future Talks together, Fab Lab Barcelona’s regular podcast.
Kaye also presented a session at Motion:Lab Berlin as part of their Investor Readiness Summit to support their members on their start-up journey.
Glasgow Print Fair 2022
We cannot tell you how thrilled we were to be able to have an in-person Glasgow Print Fair again - you can see a full list of artists on our website.
With our co-organisers Maraid Design, we invited over 50 artists and printmakers together for a day of printmaking fun at The Lighthouse - a venue that had been closed since lockdown. We brought with us yummy food and drinks from Us V Them Coffee and Big Bear Bakery.
We were back at pre-pandemic levels with our counters topping out at over 2000 visitors and more than 70% of our stallholders making over £1000 on the day!
We also received sponsorship from Kickstarter to help make our billboard dreams come true with Build Hollywood as we took over 6 locations in Glasgow with our bright colourful billboards that celebrated our print artists.
We were featured in Creative Boom, The List Magazine, The Metro and took over the middle pages of The Skinny! What an absolute joy running Glasgow Print Fair is.
Six ways artists can set up a successful stall at an art fair
We were so pleased to put together this little article for Creative Boom sharing tips for artists and printmakers from Glasgow Print Fair favourites Yuk Fun, Lizzie Lomax, Alan Campbell and Max Machen on how to set up a successful stall at their next print fair.
Comics and Crowdfunding
Detail from variant cover art by Mark Brooks for BRZRKR #1, Keanu Reeves’s comic. Photograph: Mark Brooks/Boom!
2020 was a bumper year for crowdfunded comics, and 2021 has continued to see this success across platforms.
”By October [2020] backers had pledged $22m (£16.5m) to comics projects, up from $17m by the same point in 2019. Since the platform began in 2009, Kickstarter has funded 10,000 comic book projects, to the tune of $127m. With Marvel and DC putting out around 850 individual issues this year between them, that makes Kickstarter far and away the single most prolific publishing platform for comics in the world.“ - David Barnett, for The Guardian
Which is why we were delighted to be invited along to Creative Scotland’s inaugural ‘In the Frame’ to discuss crowdfunding as an alternative funding route for creators. The day is designed to demystify routes to funding, publication and distribution, the free online event is produced by Creative Scotland in partnership with industry specialists Hannah Berry, Nyla Ahmad, and Woodrow Phoenix and backed by the Society of Authors.