Monthly Archives: March 2010

Firebrands: Portraits from the Americas

OUT NOW! Curated by the Justseeds Artists’ Collective, Firebrands is 192 pages of art, world history, and dangerous information. These beautifully illustrated mini-poster pages showcase radicals, dissidents, folk singers, and rabble-rousers, from Emma Goldman to Tupac, Pablo Neruda to Fred Hampton. As say editors Shaun Slifer and Bec Young in the introduction, the book “is especially made for anyone who has sat, trembling with frustration and disappointment in history class, or reading a text book heavily edited of anything interesting or useful. It’s for all our ancestors, especially for the ones left out of or misrepresented in said textbook, because they were too brown, too female, too poor, too queer, too uneducated, too disabled, or because they felt or thought too much.” This is a real people’s history, a book packed with dynamite, desire, and, above all, courage.

Call for Submissions: International Girl Gang Underground

Girl gand undergroundDeadline: May 31st, 2010

THE INTERNATIONAL GIRL GANG UNDERGROUND compilation zine aims to document and dissect how Riot Grrrl’s legacy has manifested twenty years later, as well as provide guidance for those who want to transform “revolution girl style now!” into “REVOLUTION GIRL STYLE FOREVER!”

If Riot Grrrl doesn’t resonate with you or your cause, that’s okay! We also want to know about all the do-it-yourself, grassroots music

movements currently being run by women/girls/trans/genderqueer/

queer folks today.

 

For more info, visit http://girlgangunderground.org or email girlgangunderground@gmail.com!

We want your submissions! Talking points include, but are not limited to:


ESSAYS ON…

  • What would a modern-day “Riot Grrrl manifesta” look like?
  • The successes and failures of Riot Grrrl and what we’ve learned from them
  • Your experience as an immigrant grrrl, genderf**king boy, revolutionary pornographer, Muslimah punk, working class queer, etc


REPORTS ON…

  • What was your experience as a Riot Grrrl in the ’90s?
  • What’s going on in your community that supports feminist & queer DIY musicians today?
  • Scene reports from regional DIY music scenes that traditionally are lady- and queer-friendly (London, Berlin, NYC, or your town)
  • Individuals who are making a difference–musicians, activists, writers, whomever!
  • “Where are they now?” (Riot Grrrl edition)

HOW-TO…

  • “Get off the Internet and meet in the street”
  • Reclaim feminism for the 4th wave
  • Organize conferences, protests, benefits, etc
  • Combat the “dude-first” mentality of your music scene
  • Use new technologies to organize effectively
  • Start a band/go on tour/create a zine/etc
  • Create spaces for working class, POC, international and rural women and queers

BAND/ZINE/COLLECTIVE/ACTIVIST GROUP INFO…

  • We’re creating a directory for the International Girl Gang Underground–send along info on your project to be included!

ART…

  • Print, digital, audio, video, whatever–so long as it’s in an easily rendered format for a black & white zine or can be included on an accompanying CD-R for distribution, we want it!

 

In solidarity,

Stacy K. & KW

Co-editors

International Girl Gang Underground Zine

http://girlgangunderground.org

99 Zines By Women for the 99th International Women’s Day

IWD march in iranToday is the 99th annual International Women’s Day.  I figured what better way than to make a list of 99 of my favorite zines written or edited by women (that are still in print).  When I started, I thought it would be hard to come up with 99 of them.  I quickly had a list well over 100 and it was hard to edit it down.  This is far from an exhaustive list of great zines by women, but I hope you find it’s a good place to start.  These zines are in no order other than in the order they came to mind.  What are some of your favorite zines by women?

 

  1. Doris
  2. Ker-Bloom
  3. Counterbalance
  4. So What
  5. Krazy Kat Lady
  6. Spread
  7. Just So You Know
  8. New Orleans… My Love
  9. List
  10. On Being Hard Femme
  11. The F-Word
  12. Beyond Gallery Walls and Dead White Men
  13. Dames on Frames
  14. Reclaiming Our Ancient Wisdom
  15. Moments of Struggle
  16. Hot Pantz
  17. HPV
  18. Guerilla Greywater Girls
  19. Take Back Your Life
  20. What The Ladies Have To Say
  21. Radical Pet
  22. Frugal Vegan
  23. We Need To Eat!
  24. Barefoot and In The Kitchen
  25. Nine Gallons
  26. You Don’t Get There From Here
  27. Galatea’s Pants
  28. Support
  29. Crescent City Stories
  30. Adventures in Menstruating
  31. Invincible Summer
  32. Greenblooded
  33. Not Your Mother’s Meatloaf
  34. Work Funnies
  35. Booty
  36. Shithole
  37. Girls Are Not Chicks
  38. My Every Single Thought
  39. Hey, Four-Eyes
  40. Jumbly Junkery
  41. Estrus Comics
  42. The Womanifesto for the Categorical New Freedom Lady
  43. Milkyboots
  44. Easy Village Inky
  45. My Brain Hurts
  46. I Hate My Mom’s Cat
  47. Sourpuss
  48. Slave to the Needles
  49. Here It Is
  50. The Color of Dissent
  51. Matching Jackets
  52. Ring of Fire
  53. Beer, Bikes, and Bridges: Notes on Portland, Oregon
  54. Tenacious
  55. Punx Is Ladies
  56. The Adventures of Loneberry
  57. Cuntastic
  58. New To Everything
  59. Angry Violist
  60. The Rag
  61. Refuge Zine
  62. The Rainbow Connection
  63. When Language Runs Dry
  64. Greenwoman
  65. DIY or Don’t We?: A Zine About Community
  66. Learning Good Consent
  67. Rigor Mortis
  68. Fireweed: A Zine of Grassroots Radical Herbalism and Wild Foods Connecting With Kids and Family Life
  69. Harlot, RN
  70. Etiquette
  71. Morgenmuffel
  72. She Must Be Having A Bad Day: The Cult of the Female Food Service Worker
  73. Broken Hipster
  74. Figure 8
  75. Really Gay!
  76. Re:productive
  77. 7 Minutes in Heaven
  78. Caboose
  79. Scrabble Freaks
  80. Mamaphiles
  81. Shotgun Seamstress
  82. Rocket Queen
  83. Identity Crisis
  84. I Was A Teenage Mormon
  85. La-La Theory
  86. Keep Loving, Keep Fighting
  87. Nuns I’ve Known
  88. Jane Zine
  89. Long Walk Back To Myself
  90. It’s Not Just Boys Fun
  91. Free To Choose
  92. Mark of Cain
  93. Xtra Tuff
  94. Citizeen
  95. Emergency
  96. Let It Be Known
  97. Ask First
  98. Chainbreaker
  99. Anti-Immigrant Hypocrisy 

 

 

Q and A with Chicago Zine Fest Organizers!

We had a chance to catch up with the very busy people organizing this year’s Chicago Zine Fest, which will be held March 12th-13th at some great places all over Chicago.  Check out chicagozinefest.org for all the information.  They were nice enough to answer some questions for our Blogifesto!  Take it away folks….

So, what’s the Chicago Zine Fest all about? How did you get involved in organizing the fest? When was the last Chicago Zine Fest?


 Leslie: The Chicago Zine Fest is an opportunity for self-publishers to gather together and showcase their work.  Our goal is to make zine-making accessible, highlight the talents of self-published artists, and give independent artists a chance to interact, and swap skills through tabling, lectures, and workshops.  We tried to create a more interactive fest; including a reading, an art show, a film fest and the exhibiting. We are hoping people will talk and invest time in getting to know one another and what their zines are all about.

I got involved with organizing the Chicago Zine Fest the same way all four of us did–we just decided to make it happen!  Ramsey, Matt, Neil and I all traveled up to and tabled together at the Milwaukee Zine Fest.  On the drive back to Chicago we all collectively decided it was our calling to make this happen in Chicago.

 A fellow Chicago zinester Michelle Aiello organized a smaller DIY centered event called the Ephemera Festival, which took place from 2005-2009.  Overall though, for the huge city we live in and the amount of people making zines here, there hasn’t been a festival of this design in a very long time or possibly ever.

What’s the first zine you ever read, where did you get it?

Ramsey: The first zine I ever read was a photo zine called Worthless. I got it at a Catch 22 show, haha, in 1999 or 2000 probably. The guy who was selling merch for them was also selling his zine. I specifically remember asking him what it was and he said ‘oh, it’s just a collection of my photos put together, like a little magazine.’ I was 14, from a small town, just getting into punk and had never heard of zines at that time so I didn’t know what he was talking about, but he said it would help him buy a Pepsi. Inside was a compelling photo essay about a mom who lived in a van with her daughter in New Jersey. It wasn’t until a few years later, when I had learned about zines and started reading them, that I realized that guy, had sold me a zine a few years prior. That zine stayed with me for a long time, even though I didn’t really know what it was or why that guy put it together.

What’s so great about zines, why have a fest celebrating them, and what does the future of zines look like?

Neil: The micro-budgets most zines exist in give authors the freedom to say whatever is on their mind. If I want to say something, there’s no reason not to. For the consumer of a zine, beyond the ability to stock up on some heavy reading for cheap, the appeal is the direct connection between you and author.  You get to read their inner thoughts, having never met them, and you can write directly back to them.

Celebrations like the Chicago Zine Fest are important because it allows zinesters to increase that connection between the reader and the author.  There are very few forms of art in which the audience can interact so directly with a creator as with zines, and a major vehicle for that is sticking the author behind a table for six hours. A complete novice can walk into a fest, and not only be exposed to hundreds of different zines that range in subject matter and form, but they can put a human face to a somewhat quirky medium.

The future of zines and other DIY media looks great!  We’re currently facing two quite different trends in media, the first is the consolidation of major media among just a few companies, the second is the increased popularity of “user generated content.”   Zines have always been about publishing the ideas deemed unmarketable by those who control the reigns of publishing. With fewer companies controlling major media, the output has become more uniform, which is only going to cause more people to turn to their own form of media making. Blogs, podcasts, twitter and youtube are making the idea of self-publishing far less fringe. Locally, we’re seeing institutions such as Chicago Public Radio devoting major resources to user generated content. They’ve created Vocalo, a station broadcasting from Chesterton, Indiana that allows anyone to contribute content.  A lot of people are worried that new media is going to hurt print, but it seems like if anything, the new media is going to be supportive of the ideas behind zines, breed more zinesters, and allow folks to connect with them with greater ease.

What has the response been so far about the Chicago Zine Fest?

Leslie: The response has been overwhelming and amazing!  We never dreamed when we were sitting around saying there should be a zine fest in Chicago that just months later we would have people from all across the country and Canada coming. It has been awesome to have our dream list of sponsors all agree to support us as well as our dream list of readers and participants.  We are really thankful and humbled by the response we have gotten from everyone wanting to participate in all aspects of the fest.

What are the resources in Chicago for zinesters?

You can buy or read zines at all of these places, be sure to check out some of them if you come to town! Ask any of us with a “staff” button. We’ll be very glad to give you directions:

Quimby’s Bookstore

No Coast

Spudnik Press

Lichen Lending Library and Spiritual Archives

Chicago Comics

Third Coast Comics

Women and Children First

Comix Revolution

Chicago Underground Library

Brainstorm

Comix Revolution

Depaul University Library Zine Collection

Golden Age

Renegade Handmade

If you were stranded on an island and could only take one zine, one book, one album, and one food– what would they be?

Matt: some Anthony Marvullo joint, Robinson Crusoe, The Band by The Band, and Pizza.

Leslie: Every Single Word by Corrine Mucha would seem fitting, Nine Stories by Salinger, 9 to 5 by Dolly Parton to get me up and going every morning, and probably vegan pizza as well.

Ramsey: an Invincible Summer/Clutch split, 100 Years of Solitude, it’s a toss up between the Red Walls and Fall Out Boy (actually,that’s a silly joke. my real answer is Luiz Bonfa), and quinoa! The only way I can get a complete protein in one food, as a vegan.

Neil: Paper Cutter #5, A Child’s Christmas in Whales by Dylan Thomas, Miscellaneous T by They Might Be Giants, and grapes.

If Chicago (as a city) were stranded on an island and could only take one zine, one book, one album, and one food–what would they be?

Anything by Al Burian, DIY Boatbuilding, something by Alkaline Trio, and Chicago Pizza or Chicago style hot dogs (celery salt, peppers, tomatoes and pickles!).