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THE ZINE SCENE
The cut-and-paste media revolution is back and fiercer than ever
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Lately, all things '90s have been making a resurgence, and just like babydoll dresses, zines are no exception. In New York, trendsetters are going to
zine nights
where, over a few beers, they can trade their homemade media for someone else's. Meanwhile, London-based contemporary zine archive
Zineswap
invites zine editors to send in three copies of their publication - two for their archives and one to be traded randomly with another zine creator's print baby. In fact, zines are so popular right now that the
Chicago Underground Library
has taken on the task of cataloguing and archiving them for public use. With all of this interest in zines, here are three whose creators are risking paper cuts and glue stains to bring us quality media:
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Unemployment
: Admittedly, we've been fans of
Aaron Lake Smith
's Big Hands zine series for a while now, harboring secret crushes on this writer-slash-journalist who made a fan zine about our heroine Joan Didion. In this latest work, he chronicles his descent into unemployment and the ensuing emotional struggle, highlighting the feelings of inadequacy, freedom, determination, and anxiety that unemployment can bestow upon even the most optimistic soul. But he doesn't stop at exploring his own feelings of relief, boredom, and the endless hours of Craigslist gig searching. Rather, he uses his experience to question a society where our profession defines our feelings of self-worth. If you're one of the many subsisting off those government checks right now, Unemployment is an inspiring reminder that you're not alone.
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Standpunkte
:
Most zines start in a bedroom where the closest thing to an advisory board is the creator's iChat list. This Swiss zine, incubated to "promote dialogue and critical exchange among emerging voices in architecture and its related fields," has the illustrious distinction of having great minds like architect
Jürgen Mayer H.
and curator
Philip Ursprung
behind it. While at first glance it may seem unreadable, don't mistake it for another boring journal. Once you make use of your iPhone's QR code reader, a
dedicated website
will reveal itself to you. The website contains a manifesto, intended to be read alongside the zine, in which its writers expound on the necessity of a symbiotic relationship between old and new media. Next time someone tries to tell you print is dead, send them here.
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Hip Hop Mixtape
: As it turns out, some zines are made to be heard as well as read. New York artist
Brian Faucette
created this "audio zine," which recently sold at Chinatown pop-up shop
Two Bridges Trading
. Hip-hop lovers who subscribe to Faucette's limited edition series will receive a monthly mix CD featuring unique music, such as a single Philip Glass piece played three times by different ensembles and mashed with Drake's "Successful." Each mix is accompanied by supplementary material, which may include anything from a traditional printed zine to a Magnum condom - certainly better swag than that day planner our last magazine subscription yielded.
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* trendcentral articles are designed to be trend reports, not endorsements * The Intelligence Group is a trend-forecasting and marketing Consultancy focused on Gen X, Gen Y and Tweens. For more information on our services, or to subscribe to our syndicated studies, The Cassandra Report, Tween Intelligence, Latino Intelligence, and Mom Intelligence, contact Alina Goncalves at 212-277-5299 or via email at agoncalves@intelg.com.
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