Moscow International Book Fair (MIBF) has been held since 1977 in late summer or early fall. Since 2005, there has been an “honorary guest” on it - one of the countries, which is represented by an expanded exhibition. In 2012, the 25th forum of bibliophiles, book publishers and writers began on September 5th. It lasted five days, and this time France was the guest of honor.
MIBF-2012 was held in Pavilion No. 75 of the All-Russian Exhibition Center and gathered 1, 500 exhibitors from 45 countries of the world. They brought to the Russian capital more than two hundred thousand books, and the exhibition of the guest of honor - France - occupied an area of 200 m². The French held several workshops for librarians, writers, and illustrators, and on September 8, a round table was held on the subject of Napoleon in Contemporary French and Russian Culture and Thought. Muscovites were able to talk with Frederick Begbeder and Charles Dansing.
In addition to the guest of honor, the exhibition also had another special status - the “central exhibitor”. It was assigned to Armenia, which celebrates the 500th anniversary of book printing in the country this year, and Yerevan is called UNESCO "World Book Capital 2012". At the Armenian stand, the novelties of national authors were presented, and in the framework of the MIBF events, a meeting of book publishers from Russia and Armenia was held.
The central event for book publishers was the industry conference "Book Market of Russia-2012". It was jointly organized by Rospechat and the Russian Book Union. Important issues were also discussed on the KnightByte digital platform, where professionals talked about intellectual property, copyright and accessibility of network resources that are very relevant for Russia.
In the Russian sections of the exhibition, the organizers devoted several stands to the significant dates celebrated by the country in 2012. Among them were expositions with new materials about the Patriotic War of 1812 and the Battle of Borodino, from which exactly 200 years have passed. Books on the 1150th anniversary of Russian statehood and the 150th anniversary of the birth of Peter Stolypin were presented in separate exhibits.
As part of the MIBF copyright programs, visitors were able to get into creative meetings with Zakhar Prilepin, Tatyana Ustinova, Edward Radzinsky, Mikhail Weller, Larisa Rubalskaya, Alexander Ilichevsky, Vladimir Vishnevsky.
