Inventory Press (Los Angeles, CA) publishes books on topics in art, architecture, design, and music, with an emphasis on subcultures, minor histories, and the sociopolitical aspects of material culture. Haymarket Books has been a partner of the A.R.T. Library Program since 2015.

A.R.T. Library Program Questionnaire gathers insights from librarians and publishers within the Program's distribution network to reconsider and reflect on what it means to make art books public today.

• How do you characterize the books that you publish?

We publish books on topics in art, architecture, design, and music, with an emphasis on subcultures, minor histories, and the sociopolitical aspects of material culture.

• How would you define the audience for your books?

Broad! We always aim to make books that are affordable, accessible, and well-produced. Our readers are intellectual, visual, and curious. Some books are aimed at specific audiences (Jordan Peele’s Get Out and Us for example) while others are focused on crossing-over audience boundaries, for instance, Susan Buck-Morss, Kevin McCaughey, and Adam Michael’s Seeing <—> Making Room for Thought.

• Has the way books are distributed changed in the last five years? (If so, how does it affect what or how you publish?)

Yes, it is changing. We’ve seen lots of store closures, but also here in Los Angeles, we’ve noticed book stores are becoming increasingly specialized. We’ve now published over 70 books and in the past couple of years have seen a significant increase in direct engagement via our website, which I suspect may have something to do with people not getting out to physical stores as much, as well as increased interest in supporting publishers and projects directly.

We’ve increasingly looked to co-publishing as a way to reach new audiences and readers, which extends our reach into additional events, talks, performances, and physical settings

• When did you start participating in A.R.T.'s Poulin Project?

Since 2015, shortly after we started publishing.

• How do you decide what to donate to the program?

We aim to share books that we think are relevant to the A.R.T audience. We tend to produce books in relatively small runs for small, art-focused audiences, but even a small run takes a few years to sell through, which requires long-term storage. While we try to keep a book in print as long as possible, we sometimes overprint and find ourselves with excess copies. We try not to remainder our books (or do any kind of inventory destruction) if at all possible. While fairly standard in the US publishing industry, these practices are wasteful, and after putting so many resources and so much time and care into something, it’s sort of unfathomable to send it to the shredder!

• How does the A.R.T. Library Program complement your distribution strategies?

We distribute through D.A.P., which allows our books to reach audiences via museums and bookstores. We appreciate the extended book flow that A.R.T. provides to libraries, ensuring that our books aren’t just sitting in storage, going unread.