The zine librarian led me down into the basement. Jenna Freedman and I had swapped zines in the mail over the past couple years. Now I was finally getting the chance to meet her in-person and visit the institution of zine-learning she’s built over the past two decades: the Barnard Zine Library in New York City.
Zines are one of the ephemeral parts of culture that often don’t make it into the official historical record. They’re perfect for impatient artists like me, who want to make something, release it into the world immediately, and then move onto the next project. Like listening to live music, dancing at a great house party, or biting into a delicious sandwich, reading a zine can be a special and powerful moment that’s hard to capture. Zines spread information and ideas but often literally dissolve or disappear before anyone thinks to collect them in a more permanent format. But for twenty years, Jenna has been collecting and curating these snapshots of our culture. When the university library wants a zine, they buy two copies—one to put out on the shelves for students to read, and one to live in the archive. That’s where we were heading, down a fluorescent-lit stairwell to the climate-controlled archive room. Inside, Jenna turned the crank on a huge handle. Two bookshelves slid apart, revealing rows and rows of labeled cardboard boxes. Inside each box was a zine or artifact of zine-culture. I opened a box and found a zine about Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I opened another and discovered a mitten embroidered with the logo of K Records.
Jenna scanned a row of boxes, reading the labels aloud, until she found the one she was looking for. She pulled it out and handed it to me. Inside were two of my own zines.
To me, these zines felt like artifacts from another world. I had written them all alone in my house during the early months of the pandemic to process feelings of despair. And now here they were, two years later, thousands of miles away in a university archive in Manhattan. It’s often hard for me to remember that my work matters. I usually feel like I’m writing and drawing things and then just releasing them into the void. Who knows what impact they have? Holding my zines in the archive made me feel like the things I scribble down are worth preserving; they’re documenting how at least one person feels about the world right now. I said hello to the zines. And then I slid them back into their box, for future historians to read.
Upcoming Events
Make Your Own Bolo Tie Workshop and Kits - I get compliments on my colored pencil bolo tie literally every time I wear it. Many people have asked how to make their own, so I put together these handy make your own bolo tie kits and I’m organizing this make your own bolo tie craft night where I’m providing all the materials to make your own colored pencil bolo ties (plus free wine because why not). November 16, 6-8pm, Grover’s Curiosity Shop (SE 14th and Clinton)
Short Run Comics Fest - I’m tabling at my favorite comics festival in November: Short Run in Seattle. Reasons it’s the best: It’s free. It’s all the coolest Pacific Northwest artists. And it’s only one day. November 5th, 11am - 6pm, Seattle Center, free
Stuff I Made
Ojai Jail Graffiti Zine - A group of artists in my hometown made art about the old jail that’s in the middle of a downtown park. I made a collaborative zine about the 50-year-old graffiti inside the jail. I took photos of the graffiti, hired an artist to redraw it, then snail-mailed the graffiti to people currently incarcerated in California and asked them to respond to it. You can download the zine for free here.
Stickers! I made some new stickers because I can’t stop designing and printing stickers. Here is a sticker on my cat.
Cool episode art. In my day job, I art direct illustrations for Reveal. I especially love this podcast illustration by Molly Mendoza, which is an idea I thought of months ago and had to wait for the right moment to publish.
Stuff I Love
A Casual Office Pennant - This perfect pennant hand-painted by artist Kaitlin Martin now hangs in my garden-shed-turned-office so that it’s visible during every Zoom meeting.
Wearing Green for Abortion Rights - I’m interviewing a bunch of inspiring abortion rights activists for an upcoming comic about how green became the color of reproductive rights in Latin America. The “green wave” of abortion activism spread across Argentina, Chile, Mexico, and Colombia—and now, post-Roe, organizers in the U.S. are looking to Latin America for guidance on tactics and strategies. This comic will be in the upcoming “Color” issue of The Nib, and if you want your own green handkerchief to show support for abortion rights, you can get one here or here.
Halloween Crop Tops - Yes, I did buy not one but two crop tops from Portland designer Copper Union because I absolutely needed this glow-in-dark skull-and-bones number!
Icicle Tricycles is the local company that built the zine bike for me… and then completely rebuilt it for free after it was stolen and given a nonconsensual paint job. You can see me riding the fresh, new zine bike here.
Rent a Butch - I just love this company that does odd jobs for queer people in Portland. And I love their bumper stickers.
Flower Bulbs - For some people, it’s decorative gourd season. For me, tis the season of acquiring a potentially ludicrous amount of flower bulbs, which you plant in the late fall to bloom in spring. Just a little gift for my future self.
Queer Toronto Zine - I did a snail-mail zine exchange with artist Caley Brock and got this super cute zine about queer Toronto things! I love the cut-out cover.
Klaus Nomi Zine - I’m excited for this zine project that’s creating a graphic biography for German musician and art weirdo Klaus Nomi. Snag a copy!
Actually Helpful Voting Guides - Election day is coming up and in addition to the national midterms, there are important local races in pretty much every city. If you’re in Portland, check out the Portland Mercury’s voting guide. Also, I’m hosting a small voting party on Thursday—if you want to come hang out at a bar and fill out your ballot, reply to this email and I’ll send you the time and place!
What I’m Reading
We Have Always Been Here - The blurb on the cover of this memoir by queer Muslim photographer Samra Habib says it’s “as vital and bright as a match being struck” and I can’t agree more. Habib’s words light up the page. After growing up in Pakistan and then getting asylum with her family in Canada as a teen, Habib learns a lot about herself through travel. She writes, “Visiting different parts of myself in those places made me love myself, my body, and my life even more.”
Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands - Cartoonists Kate Beaton is well-known for her hilarious comics spoofing history, literature, and ponies. But her new book Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands is different and powerful. It documents her experiences in her early twenties working in Canada’s oil fields, grappling with environmental degredation, sexual assault and harassment, and the economic forces that control her life. I would pair it with Joe Sacco’s book Paying the Land.
It Won’t Always Be Like This - Malaka Gharib is one of my favorite zinesters and comics journalists. Her wonderful new graphic memoir is about spending summers in Egypt while growing up and coming to understand each person in her family on their own terms.
Kisses for Jet - I met cartoonist Joris Bas Backer years ago at a comics festival in Berlin, so it was a thrill to run into him again at the Small Press Expo in Washington, DC this September. I picked up a copy of his beautiful new book, Kisses for Jet: A Coming-of-age Gender Story, about a teenager in 1999 who is slowly realizing they’re trans.
Something to Do
Get boosted and spend an entire day watching TV.
I got my bivalent booster shot on Friday and was knocked out for a whole day, which is how I watched the entire third season of Los Espookys. Comedians Julio Torres, Ana Fabrega, and Fred Armisen collaborate on this absurd, wild, and very funny Spanish-language show about a group of Mexican friends who run a business setting up spooky special effects for people who need some real-life scares. The third season (out now on HBO) is probably my favorite. The costumes alone are amazing—I mean, look at how they style the U.S. ambassador and Secretary of State. Also this staircase hat. Incredible. Anyway. You can find a vaccine site near you using this website.