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courtesy of michael shores and angela mark |
Wanted: pen, plain old paper, imagination
The Web hasn't killed the zine, say some artists. In fact, it may be driving interest in the ultimate staple of DIY culture.
from the December 14, 2007 edition
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Many zines arrive in envelopes gleefully decorated with stamps and stickers. Inside, you'll find hand-sewn bindings and glued-on colored paper. Creator Jennie Hinchcliff says she and collaborator Carolee Gilligan Wheeler "bring our fine-art perspective to it." (Ms. Hinchcliff teaches book arts at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco.)
Still, despite the craftsmanship, Hinchcliff sees her work as zine-centric, not the more elevated and respected "artist books." The key difference is personal content.
For instance, the zine "Kimagure na Dowa no Hon" is based on travel sketchbooks. Sampson divides her work into zines or artist books depending, her Website says, on whether or not she cares if you understand her. Reading a zine, you identify with the creator, Hinchcliff says. "The story was your story, too."
"The connections you make with people are really amazing," Mr. Shores says.
He and Mark are still friends with people they met at a Minneapolis zine fair in 1985. Falco used to get three or four daily letters from readers who wrote to order zines, comment on zines, or send her theirs. "A publication is usually a pretty one-sided communication," she says. "It became very interactive."
One might think that the Internet would step in to fill this lust for communication. But Shores thinks zines are now "a reaction" to the Internet. Zinesters love "the tactile experience of reading and creating something," says Freedman. "There's really something nice about getting something in the mail that's ... made by hand," Falco says.
Digital graphic-design technology continues to drive the trend. Many art zines now "have higher production values," Thomas says via e-mail. Mark and Shores went from mimeograph to copiers to laser printers, which allow finer work.
New zinesters are still joining the, well, fold. When Falco dips her toe back in and looks at zine catalogs, she finds "very few people that I know."
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