Sally Alatalo’s Du Da (variously also titled Chicago Dada, DoDa, doo da, do dah, and Duz) was a (loosely) tri-quarterly publication which ran from the late 1980s to early 1990s. Du Da was, in Alatalo’s words, “a place to play” for artists interested in book art or mail art. Issues often included collaborative projects with (often pseudonymous) artists, and throughout its history Du Da experimented with different formats.

This issue of Du Da celebrates the melodramatic and the cheap. Bits of text from pulp fiction novels are interspersed with cropped images from their covers, the printing method visible as a dot matrix. Seen up close, they form dynamic patterns of lurid color; from a distance, they form scenes of a man’s hand clutching at a woman’s thigh, a dead body splayed on the ground, and a leering grin positioned over a woman’s hiked skirt.