Features This year’s edition of the annual Printed Matter show unearths and remixes historical media, collapsing time and giving the past new relevance.

Wendy Yao in the Emily’s Sassy Lime Archives at the 2026 LA Art Book Fair (all photos Matt Stromberg/ Hyperallergic )

PASADENA — Printed Matter’s Los Angeles Art Book Fair returned to the Art Center College of Design last night with over 250 exhibitors — slightly scaled back from over 300 last year — roughly a fifth of whom were at the fair for the first time. Among the lavish monographs and eye-popping, risograph-printed zines, the archive was a common thread. Publications excavated and remixed appropriated media, collapsing time and giving historical ephemera contemporary relevance across the fair’s 13th edition, which runs through the weekend.

“Clothe All Animals for the Sake of Decency!” declared a sign worn by David Senior, a librarian at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, who stood at the entrance to the fair on opening day, Thursday, May 7.…