From 2014 to 2019, Kelvin embarked on a personal journey to document the shorelines of his hometown, Labuan, driven by a desire to preserve his memories of the landscape.
The project was sparked by the 2012 election promise of a proposed bridge linking the island to mainland Sabah—a development that stirred both anticipation and apprehension among the people of Labuan.
While the bridge remains unbuilt, this evocative series stands as a tribute to a time and place that shaped him as an artist, reflecting his enduring bond with home even as life carries him elsewhere.
(2) Guam Life
Internet Animals Can Heal Your Soul is a mini zine born from the artist’s personal experience of coping with burnout and depression—thanks, in part, to the cute and funny animal images circulating on social media. Blending emotional honesty, meme culture, and bold, vibrant colors, the zine playfully explores how “internet cuteness” can offer unexpected comfort. Featuring a cast of lovable and whimsical animals, it delivers small moments of joy and lightness—a soft pause in the midst of a hectic day. Warm, humorous, and emotionally resonant, this compact risograph zine is a heartfelt celebration of digital-era empathy and the strange healing power of scrolling through cuteness.
Guam Life is an illustrated zine compiling a series of drawings based on the artist’s travel memories in Guam. From sitting on a paddleboard gazing out at the sea, to underwater scenes while snorkeling, to rowing beneath the setting sun—each moment is captured as a vivid, standalone panel. Rendered in a limited palette of fluorescent pink, yellow, green, and black, the series conveys the sensations and emotions of a getaway with clarity and brightness. Told visually without text, this zine is both a personal travel journal and a quiet, emotional sketch diary—like flipping through small fragments of summer memories.
In a world where we are swamped with images and words, how important is it to preserve our unique identity and culture? Whether you just sing in the shower or create mind-bending art installations, you’ve got a role to play. Come find out more about Seni Untuk Semua, an advocacy campaign by the grassroots arts coalition ReformARTsi, and what you can do to ensure the future of Malaysian artists and our artistic heritage.
( How to Avoid Being a Wizard ) ?
“( How to Avoid Being a Wizard ) ?” follows a girl struggling to avoid becoming a wizard in a world where anyone who remains a virgin until 25 transforms into one. The tale unfolds as a reflection on how specialness stems from exceptionality, marginality, and uniqueness, exploring its dual nature and the balance of authenticity within the world, from childhood’s omnipotence to maturity and the rediscovery of self.
If you’ve ever wondered why people keep talking about Palestine, or the point of keeping up with a long-drawn conflict in the Middle East and what difference you could possibly make, this panel discussion is for you. From a Singaporean perspective, political analyst, podcaster and author of Why Palestine? Walid Jumblatt Abdullah takes on questions often raised about Palestine, laying out answers that clarify and inform.
Moderated by Azmil Tayeb, the conversation will also illuminate how the Muslim communities in Malaysia and Singapore compare and differ in their responses to the humanitarian crisis.
Shivram Gopinath’s Dey is a cross-genre, multi-tongued celebration of diasporic desire, complaint and joy stretching what poetry can be. Part translation, illustration, verse, Dey is a love child of hopes and dreams, of Tamil cinema tropes and themes.
homesick is multidisciplinary artist nor’s electrifying poetry collection, an ode to the growing pains of every 20-something’s search for love and belonging. Spurred by desire, the journey to belonging unfolds against the backdrop of the heartbreaking now—shaped by the fantasies of pop culture and the State.
Their worlds collide into a kaleidoscope of languages and metaphors, punctuated by reading and performance.
(2) Mindful Eater
Childfree Neighbor
With rising living costs, mental health awareness, and environmental concerns, more Southeast Asians are reconsidering parenthood, while others still dream of having large families despite the challenges. This issue delves into what it means to be childfree in a region where parenthood is often considered a must—and examines the ripple effects on families, society, and even businesses.
Mindful Eater
For generations, local dishes have been rich in flavor, rooted in tradition, and naturally nourishing. They just haven’t been labeled healthy. Now, with modern influence and global attention, these traditions are evolving and ready to be seen in a new light. From ethical ingredient sourcing to daily habits, we look at how culture, community, and heritage shape the way we eat.
This panel brings together musicians, educators, and grassroots organisers to talk about how music and print can work together to tell stories from communities that are often unheard. From zines to books, we’ll share how publishing can become a tool for compassion, connection, and returning voice to those who’ve been left out.
Making Local Horrors Whimsical: Illustrating and Writing Fantastical Stories Inspired by Malaysians
How does one captivate readers visually? Can you turn a serious horror narrative into a quirky story without corrupting the sentiment behind it?
In this session, Malaysian author and artist Farah Liyana will discuss the intersection of literature and visual arts under the umbrella of Horror, Science Fiction, and other contemporary genres, sharing the significance behind the thought process behind her book illustrations and writing style. Farah will also present several literary stylistic methods that made her books experimental, helping her readers to not only visualize but also interact with her narratives.
The Making of Human Langkawi
Shi Han, author of Human Langkawi and co-founder of Human Edition, shares the three-year journey behind her debut book, from field research and curation to documenting the untold human stories of Langkawi. She will also speak on building an artist-led career through independent publishing, collaboration, and community-driven storytelling.
Drawing from her practice as a storyteller, filmmaker, and media founder, Shi Han offers an honest look at how creatives can carve their own path, define their own “rich,” and create work that uplifts the places and people they care about.
PATHOSFORMELN
PATHOSFORMELN is a COLLAGE (maga)zine created by Michalis Pichler, that builds on previous work by Aby Warburg undertaken in the context of his Atlas/Mnemosyne project.
Warburg had introduced the term Pathosformel to describe expressive gestures of heightened affective intensity, and located these formula mostly throughout art history, but also partly within the vernacular field of advertising.
The editorial lists a variety of PATHOS FORMULAS, from the fields of art history, fashion, statesmen, belief in progress, sports, figures seen from the back, Archive Peter Piller, christianity and porn.
Issue #1 features a sequence of collages, namely Illustrations for the Society of Spectacle from the field of fashion, while issue #2 focuses on money and consumerism, and issue #3 will focus on belief in progress.
Dang Wangi: Documenting the Unpretty Layers
Linked to KL Pretty Zine, this session looks at Dang Wangi beyond its surface image, capturing back lanes, everyday rituals, and forgotten textures often left out of official narratives. Using zine-inspired methods of photography, mapping, and oral fragments, we explore how documentation can reveal tensions between heritage and gentrification, between lived practices and polished urban visions. The discussion repositions Dang Wangi not as a backdrop, but as an unfinished archive of memory, community, and resistance.
Design as Record: Malaysia Design Archive and the Making of Visual Memory
This talk explores how design artefacts, from packaging and propaganda posters to zine act as historical records of Malaysia’s visual culture. Since its founding in 2008, MDA has mapped and document visual materials from colonial to post-independence eras, prompting us to ask: how do visuality shape collective memory? This talk invites you to engage with Malaysia’s visual culture and reflect on MDA’s role in shaping collective memory through design, fostering visual literacy and critical reflection through it’s archival practices.
A Book Impressions Exchange on A Nest of Thoughts
This is a discussion session based on reflections about my book – ‘A Nest of Thoughts’. We’ll begin with a brief introduction to the book, followed by about 10–15 minutes for participants to revisit or read it. After that, we’ll move into a sharing session where everyone can exchange their impressions and imaginations about its content.
(2) What are you looking at from inside the photograph
Neutral Colors Issue #6 features “Stay”
It is not about visiting as a tourist or moving somewhere permanently. It is about the stillness that emerges when you stay in one place for a certain period of time and about the unexpected relationships that form with people beside you. When I stayed at a bookstore for eleven days to make a book, I felt a quiet sense of connection as people of all ages came by to help, working and freely sharing stories about their lives and what they love. It was such a calm and special time. A residence just for myself, created in moments of making things and moments of doing nothing at all. A place to step a little away from the world, to lose myself in something while remaining aware that I will return.
That time will never come back, yet in front of me sits a stack of paper pages that hold those moments. So we can encounter that time again and again. In every stay, there is a special place and a special time waiting to be found.
Photographer Osamu Matsuo’s photographs and essays on photography. Alongside academic photographic theory, he presents the inherently subjective nature of photography through coolly meticulous documentary images. Why do people take photographs? Why do we instinctively make peace signs? What makes a good photograph… and so on. The poignant photographs from Sasebo, Nagasaki Prefecture—the artist’s roots—leave a strong impression. The inclusion of Japanese, English, and Chinese text throughout the book serves not only as a means of communication but also as an effective graphic design element.
Passing By is a visual journey through the landscapes — a reflection on movement, stillness, and the act of seeing while in motion. Photographed through a car window during a road trip in Iceland, the images were later edited into flowing motion lines, echoing the rhythm of time. Presented as a photobook and art object, the project captures fleeting moments from the road — the blurred, the clear, and everything in between. It invites viewers to slow down, to notice the beauty that surrounds us, and enjoy the journey.
1. Passing By (Flipbook Edition)
A photobook that echoes the rhythm of travel. Each spread pairs a motion-blur photograph on the right with its corresponding still version on the left, framed in white. The flip-through effect mimics the sensation of watching landscapes stream past a car window, while pausing on a spread invites reflection on the stillness behind the motion. Available in horizontal format, designed for both readability and cinematic flow.
2. Passing By. The Mute Landscape (Cassette Concertina Edition)
A self-published visual notebook that reimagines the road trip as a cassette album. Housed in a cassette case, this concertina book unfolds horizontally: one side presents still landscapes, the other reimagined motion-blur versions. When fully opened, it creates a lenticular-like display — stillness on one side, motion on the other. The same view, but seen in two sides.
READING ELSE is a monthly rotating reading room initiated by Suburbia Projects x Else Hotel, Kuala Lumpur. Running from Sept 2025–Jan 2026, the initiative explores curated selections by Asia-Pacific publishers, transforming the room into a hub of regional thoughts, voices and ideas.
Reading Else has featured a gathering of Malaysian architecture books curated by Suburbia Projects (MY) and a selection of independent Indonesian publication gathered by Further Reading Press (ID). The next curations by Slow Burn Books (AUS) & Temporary Press (SG) promise to be equally engaging.
with Lau Wen Huat and Api Husien
Lau Wen Huat is the founder and director of Zontiga, guiding its growth into a hub for photographers and storytellers. Combining strategic insight with creative vision, he has developed Zontiga into a thriving photography space, a respected photo lab, and a curated bookstore and publishing house dedicated to visual storytelling.
Lau also leads the ideation and planning of visual art exhibitions, providing artists with a platform to showcase their work and connect with audiences. Additionally, he oversees the production of photography publications that highlight diverse voices and foster creative expression. His dedication to the visual arts and talent development has been key to Zontiga’s continued growth, fostering a strong sense of community and collaboration.
Under his leadership, Zontiga remains a space where photography and storytelling come together, driven by a focus on creativity, innovation, and artistic growth.
Api Husien is a multifaceted artist who excels in a range of creative disciplines, including poetry, playwriting, acting, directing, and photography. He has authored several books of poetry and photography, and his work has been showcased in exhibitions across both Malaysia and Indonesia.”
The Alphabet A to Z is a funny and honest way for adults to relearn the alphabet. A is no longer for Apple, B is not for Book, but C is still for Cat. In this sharing session, CC Kua and Hsin will talk about how they blend illustration and typography with wittiness, depicting the mundane life of everyday, sad and happy moments, carefree but not careless. With triggers and tickles, let’s make A to Z great again!
Making Mamak is a curatorial workshop developed in collaboration with the Canadian Centre for Architecture during the 2022–23 Emerging Curatorial Residency. It serves as a published blueprint based on five arts collectives, laying the foundation for a workshop model that explores whether arts collectives are truly part of their communities?
Designed as a series of workshops for cultural workers, social organizers, and community members, the blueprint encourages locally rooted forms of creating and gathering. It offers a way to test and reflect on relationships with the city—especially in contexts where material resources, funding, and policy support are limited. ERTI Research Collective now uses an evolving framework as an evaluation tool to test the embeddedness of arts festivals, arts collectives and public arts practices
This talk will explore the stories behind two sessions of Making Mamak:one at the Klang River Festival and another at COEX@Kilang Besi. Adapting a tikam-tikam method developed with Ali Alasri, we invoke the audience to write questions, and impose these queries to the art managers of these initiatives. As the workshop evolves, it remains a living resource for our ongoing research into cultural and creative policy through the ERTI Research Collective.
Modern Pangs uncovers how food became a crucible of nation-building in Malaysia’s first post-independence decade, 1957–1969. From the ruins of war and the urgent global spectre of hunger, state planners sought to implement food programs, incite developmental discourses, and encourage productive approaches to remake Malaysia into a food utopia. But state ideas were easier conceived than implemented, for they imposed upon local communities and, at times, needed their buy-in. At the heart of this book were such entanglements. Modern Pangs follows complex encounters between state projects, local food-makers, and the land they lived in, exploring moments of collaboration, friction, and contestation. Malay homemakers learned state discourses of economy while redefining gendered labour; a national dairy economy was, no matter how dubious, was birthed into being; hawkers turned city streets into markets of livelihood and citizenship. Between collaboration and contestation, survival and aspiration, these actors remade the landscape of food itself, testing the state’s ambitions against the stubborn realities of land, labour, and community.
Through vivid archival research, Chin Kar Yern reveals how food was never just sustenance, but a site where Malaysians imagined—and resisted—the futures of their new nation.
After three years of sharing stories online, Wonderwhy took a leap into print in 2024 without any publishing background. From cross-cultural collaborations to budgeting, printing, and distribution, the team found themselves in a new world with unexpected challenges while creating three issues of their cultural documentary magazine.
In this session, the Wonderwhy team shares honest lessons, behind-the-scenes stories, and what they wish they knew before starting. Whether you’re dreaming of your own publication or simply curious about independent publishing, join us for an open conversation on creating and sustaining a print publication in Southeast Asia.
Renatus Wu (Edited HK)
Hung Man Po (Po Hung Design Lab)
Alice Mourou (.Oddity Studio)
KLABF invites three multidisciplinary graphic designers based in Hong Kong to share about the books, projects, and ideas that influence their creative worlds, while tracing the connections between reading and making, linking publishing with design.
This conference is free entry, RSVP only.
A sharing session with case studies, creative processes, and design insights by the three designers, followed by a dialogue exploring contemporary design practices in Japan.
Tickets are limited, RM50/pax.
In this temporary library by RJ Paper showcasing works from their extensive archive of printed matter, visitors are invited to browse this eclectic collection that spans nearly 40 years and contemplate: where does print live in our lives today?
Blending traditional Japanese elements with contemporary sensibilities, the exhibition will showcase award-winning works from the three recipients of the Japan Graphic Design Association Inc. (JAGDA) 2025 New Designer Award across various mediums – posters, packaging, branding and more.
Behind the Design, A Guided Tour on the Emerging Perspectives Exhibition
Follow the three designers on an intimate tour and dive deep into their JAGDA New Designer Award-winning artworks.
Limited slots are available for the guided tour.
The exhibition focuses on Swiss art publishing, bringing together books from 8 Swiss independent art publishers: Boabooks, Ciao Press, Edition Fink, Everyedition, Edition Patrick Frey, Jungle Books, Kodoji Press, and St. Moritz.
The exhibition also specially features works from “The Most Beautiful Swiss Books”, organised by the Swiss Federal Office of Culture.
By merging the tactility of print with the dynamism of media art, IMMERSIOx highlights how traditional and digital mediums can coexist — shaping new ways of reading, seeing, and imagining.
Step in, pose, and take home a tangible memory, a timeless keepsake of your KL Art Book Fair experience. Limited edition exclusive KLABF 2025 edition Polaroid sleeves are available while stocks last.