Buffalo Culture: The publication is anonymous, but the performers aren’t

By Charlie Bergeron 

A new space in Buffalo is providing artists with an unconventional opportunity — the potential to be featured in an anonymous art newspaper.

Chris Fritton, founder of Lake Rats Dispatch and former Studio Director of the Western New York Book Arts Center and founder of the Buffalo Small Press Book Fair, has opened up Lake Rats Dispatch, an art space at 67 Elmwood Ave. 

Lake Rats Dispatch is primarily a “publishing house” where the anonymous art magazine, also titled The Lake Rats Dispatch, is available (it is printed at PM Graphics, just outside of Cleveland, Ohio). But he space holds an antique Chandler & Price printing press, with which they plan to print covers for chapbooks, posters, postcards, among other things. 

Lake Rats Dispatch has printed three previous editions and has held two previous events which featured local writers, artists, and musicians. They plan to have their third event Saturday (Nov. 14) at the 67 Elmwood site. The fourth edition of Lake Rats Dispatch will be available.

Saturday’s event will feature a reading form novelist Alex Rost, artwork from Quincy Koczka, a chapbook by Aaron Lowinger and music by Ronnie Mae Valentine. The event will take place from 7 to 10 p.m. 

Quincy Koczka is a Buffalo-based artist who was recently a part of the Hunt Gallery Residency. He is a woodworker and woodturner by trade, but has worked with Fritton to create large-scale prints of those woodcuts.

Aaron Lowinger is a longstanding presence in Buffalo who has a new chapbook on the Lake Rats Dispatch imprint , “Keeper of Days.” It was produced in a limited edition of 50 hand-bound copies.

Alex Rost is described as “a blue-collar scholar.” He’ll read from his short novel “Lazy Suicide” and from He’ll read from that work as parts of a novel that he’s turned into a series of poetry collections.

Ronnie Mae Valentine is a singer songwriter who identifies on her Bandcamp page as “antifolk.”

Meanwhile, Fritton’s anonymous art newspaper isn’t a new idea, however it is Buffalo’s only publication of that nature. 

“The publication is based on old dada periodicals from the early 1900s, where visually challenging work from multiple artists was often presented as a single unit. It also takes cues (and its name) from an intermittent publication by a printer-scholar named Harry Oliver, the ‘Desert Rat Scrap Book,’” Fritton said. 

The idea for the paper draws not only from this art movement of the past, but also Fritton’s own experience as an artist. 

“I’ve always been involved in street art, so I’ve gotten to experience the freedom and ego obliteration that comes with the territory,” Fritton said “I do believe the anonymity often frees contributors up to submit things they normally wouldn’t: things that are out of their wheelhouse, or in another medium/genre, one they might not normally be comfortable exploring (or sharing with others).”

The space itself is not only for printing, publishing, displaying works and holding events, but also for artists to seek advice and collaboration, as well as uphold and support the artistic community of Buffalo. 

“There’s a very scrappy DIY community here that sustains our subcultures and counter-culture, and I’ve been a part of it for a long time,” Fritton said, “I thought it would be good to establish a place where other, younger contributors could toss around ideas, explore new projects and get advice on how to execute them — print-based or otherwise.”

Fritton also sees the space as a potential correction to a dilemma many artists face. 

“Often, when people leave institutions (like colleges and universities), they also leave behind resources (both physical and psychological) and that can make it challenging to keep creating. I was hoping to counteract that to some degree – to date, it’s worked out well, and I’m looking forward to what people bring to the table in the future,” Fritton said. 

Lake Rats Dispatch events coincide with the release of their anonymous art newspaper. The paper is released quarterly, and so far there have been two papers released, and two events held. 

Each event has a similar structure, including the release of a new limited edition chapbook printed at Lake Rats Dispatch, an exhibition by a local artist and a performance by a local musician. 

“The only thing new about Event No. 3 is that for the first time ever, we’re featuring a fiction writer, Alex Rost, who isn’t on the LRD imprint. He’s release a fantastic debut novel called ‘Lazy Suicide’ that’s on Back Patio Press,” Fritton said. 

The event is free, and the Lake Rats Dispatch anonymous art newspaper is free to take where you may find one. The paper is distributed to many local businesses, as well as businesses and spaces throughout the Great Lakes region, including Cleveland, Erie, Detroit and Milwaukee. 

There is a print run of 2,000 for the newspaper. The Lake Rats Dispatch studio also features a poster wall, a small gallery for print-based artists, a t-shirt rack and hard-to-find magazines.

Fritton encouraged those who would like to be featured in the Lake Rats Dispatch to send a pitch to lakeratsdispatch@gmail.com.