Supporters, vendors, and the artists' book community at the 2024 NY Art Book Fair are calling for Printed Matter to join PACBI, the Palestinian Campaign for the Academic and Cultural Boycott of Israel. 

PACBI was formed to address the need for cultural and academic institutions to join BDS, a global movement to withdraw support and investments from Israel in support of Palestinian liberation. The BDS movement challenges the external pressure to "coexist 'normally' and unethically" amid "crime[s] against humanity of apartheid and the dehumanizing conditions of settler colonialism" (source: The BDS Movement’s Anti-Normalization Guidelines Explained).

This petition being circulated during the 2024 NY Art Book Fair serves to challenge the board and director to reconsider Printed Matter's decision against joining PACBI. This petition, created by the larger artists' book community, arose from a desire to amplify the Printed Matter union's demands that were rejected internally in February. At this point, Printed Matter's failure to join the cultural boycott of Israel separates the organization from the global movement of over 100 academic and arts organizations standing with Palestinian liberation and PACBI.

More than enough time has passed for Printed Matter, one of the world's most public-facing artists' book institutions, to take a clear stance against the Israeli system of oppression that has killed and injured an estimated 100,000 Palestinians since October. Printed Matter has a responsibility to its community of artists, vendors, and community supporting the NY Art Book Fair to join PACBI.