Guy Schraenen

Guy Schraenen (born in London on 1941-05-05, died in Paris on 2018-11-09) was a Belgian publisher, collector and curator. Father of Vital Schraenen (born 5 November 1969) and artist Stéphane Schraenen (born 19 September 1971). Between 1965 and 1978, Schraenen ran Galerie Kontakt in Antwerp (Belgium), also working as a publisher of sound and visual poetry. In 1973 he founded Guy Schraenen Éditeur, which published multimedia Revue AXE and other publications. In 1974, he created with his wife Anne Marsily the Archive For Small Press And Communication (ASPC) which is now the research Centre For Artists’ Publications or Zentrum Für Künstlerpublikationen at Neues Museum Weserburg Bremen. With approximate 80.000 publications from all around the world it is the largest collection of published artworks in Europe, including artists’ books, multiples and book objects, artists’ newspapers and magazines, ephemera designed by artists, photographs, postcards, artists’ stamps, and stickers, graphic works, xerox copies, sound art on records, radio art, multimedia edition, videos and films, plus secondary literature and documentation material... In 1989 Guy Schraenen became founding curator of the artists' book collection A Museum Within A Museum at the Museum Weserburg Bremen, the first autonomous department of its kind. Schraenen also worked as a radio producer in Belgium and Spain and also ran the Archive Space in Antwerp. Since then, his personal collection of artists' multiples ("records by artists" and "artists on records") has been exhibited in many museums and venues across Europe. In 2005 he published the book Vinyl Records And Covers By Artists (A Survey) (digitized by the Internet Archive in 2011 with funding from The Archive Of Contemporary Music).