Since 2012, Compound Press has published literature and art from Aotearoa New Zealand that reflects sustained attention to craft, form, and history. We are compelled by writers whose work moves at the same time as repaying close reading, by artists whose practice engages with the structural possibilities of politics as much as their medium. We covet work that operates with intelligence, precision, concern, and force.
Chris Holdaway co-founded Compound Press and Minarets journal separately in 2012 and brought them together in 2013. Like most independent publishing, the press was established to advocate for areas of creative production not served by existing projects and institutions. Our publications began as hand-assembled booklets, often produced with salvaged materials and appropriated equipment, outside traditional funding structures. Compound Press and Minarets journal also developed a reputation during the 2010s for energetic readings and happenings in vibrant artist-run and unorthodox event spaces particularly in Tāmaki Makaurau / Auckland and Te Whanganui-a-Tara / Wellington.
Starting in 2019, Compound Press produced its first full-length collections of poetry, still using hand-bound methods, with the cover card salvaged from green filing cabinet folders. The immediate critical and commercial successes of titles such as I am a human being and A bathful of kawakawa and hot water gave the impetus and resources to begin commercially printing substantial runs. Director Chris Holdaway worked with notable arts printing exponent Stuart Shepherd at Soar Print and later INC Productions to develop the literature series’ signature green cover house style that honours the hand-made legacy.
Our books are conceived as complete objects in which the art, writing, design, and materials all function together. We are dedicated to formal intensity, critical thought, indigenous Pacific substance, and queer ideas. We are international in scope, and intend to give a world-class home to writing and art that is rigorous, alert to context, and made with care.
Our literature catalogue includes critically acclaimed, award-winning, and best-selling titles. I am a human being by Always Becominging won the Best First Book of Poetry prize at the 2021 New Zealand Book Awards. The critical success of A bathful of kawakawa and hot water by Hana Pera Aoake has seen it reprinted six times, with a UK edition published by Broken Sleep Books. The collections Bird Collector and Slanted by Alison Glenny were both nominated for Best Book of Poetry at the 2022 and 2025 New Zealand Book Awards respectively. We have also published books by many-time New Zealand Book Award finalist Murray Edmond, known for his dramaturgy work with major theatre company Indian Ink.
Minarets journal has served as an early publishing venue for now established writers such as Hera Lindsay Bird, whose self-titled collection including poems originally appearing in Minarets went on to be published in the UK by Penguin, Gregory Kan who now has three collections with Auckland University Press, and Zarah Butcher-McGunnigle who now has three books with acclaimed Australian press Giramondo. The journal has also featured major writers from around the world including Lisa Samuels (NZ/US), Murray Edmond (NZ), essa may ranapiri (NZ), Stephanie Burt (USA), Toby Fitch (Aus), Michael Farrell (Aus), and Pam Brown (Aus).
After a pair of initial photography booklets, in 2025 the press introduced a line of art monographs directed by photographer Chris Corson-Scott, beginning with The Tranquility of Solitude by Australian-based New Zealand photographer Derek Henderson. The series is committed to art in a critical context, artists with significant careers who haven’t yet been served by the nation’s publishing, as well as reissuing significant titles now out of print.
Our art catalogue features titles such as the 20th anniversary reissue the acclaimed The Terrible Boredom of Paradise by Derek Henderson, long out of print and sought-after, regularly fetching high prices at auctions. Other titles include John Miller’s blend of art and documentary photography in The 1981 Springbok Tour, an expanded edition of the major Cook Sites project from photographer Mark Adams and anthropologist Nicholas Thomas, and Nova Paul’s uniquely toi Māori approaches to experimental filmmaking in Wā Pokere.
founder & director
Poet, publisher, and translator. Author of Gorse Poems (Titus Books, 2022) and HIGH-TENSION/FASHION (Greying Ghost, 2018). Founding editor of Minarets journal. Translator of poetry from Spanish, French, and German.
Editor of Art Books
His photography is in collections including Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, The Chartwell Collection, and Christchurch Art Gallery Te Puna o Waiwhetū.
chriscorsonscott.com
Creative Director
Formerly a designer at AGM Publishing, New Zealand’s industry-leading Architecture publisher. Experience in art publishing as the brand lead for Webb’s, New Zealand’s largest auction house, and for Bowerbank Ninow, a leading contemporary gallery.
Emeritus
Samuel Carey Co-founder of Compound Press. Author of A draft of Feltland (Compound, 2013) and Crystal Cosmetic/Enduser (Compound, 2012). Based in Sweden.
Lauren Strain Co-founding editor of Minarets journal. Based in London.
press contact
For inquiries and press requests email: press@compoundpress.org
New Zealand distribution
International distribution
We have key international relationships, including co-publishing select photography titles with Daylight Books in New York City, and affiliate programmes with Daylight Books and Mexican-American press Los Sumergidos to represent titles on each other’s catalogues and at book fairs around the world.