We are looking for volunteers!

We’re really excited for our events this summer, like our upcoming collaborative zinemaking workshop at Pop Hop, and we’d love an extra pair of hands during these events. We can always use people to help us do things like loading and unloading workshop supplies, helping with setup, and other general tasks.  If you’d like to give us a couple hours, we would really appreciate your help!

We’re always excited to meet people who are interested in helping us strengthen LA’s great DIY community one zine at a time. We’ve been so lucky with previous volunteers and are looking forward to meeting more good people!

For more information, send LA Zine Fest a Facebook message!

Mark Your Calendars: May 18 is Riverside DIY Printfest!!

Riverside Print Fest is back and I am so happy to see it! Zinesters will have their wares on display, and there will be workshops and readings for you to attend throughout the day. Don’t forget to stop by the zine library, too!  Exhibitors include a lot of titles that are new (and exciting) to me, plus former LAZF tablers like She’s Not A Morning Person, Double Fur Press, Pimpkillah, and Seite Books.

BONUS: just after the Fest, there will be a screening of DIY: We’re Doin’ It, a short documentary about women in DIY culture–artists, zinesters, musicians–that stars two amazing ladies from Zineworks, Annie Knight and Angela Asbell. Can’t wait to check this one out!

Our friend, Daniel

Daniel Rolnik, known around Los Angeles as the most enthusiastic art writer/appreciator in town, gave us the heads-up on his latest project: limited edition screenprints for the Venice Art Walk.  This video features a look at the prints done by local artist Gary Siff; future printmakers include Gary Baseman, Christine Wu, and Bob Dob.

I don’t get west of Western very often, so I’m really grateful for videos like this one. For more information on this project, go to http://intellectualpropertyprints.tumblr.com/

How To Make A Zine: Video Edition

Almost definitely going to use this with my students next week.

via Fly Away Zine Mobile’s tumblr

Great Scott!: time travelin’ zinesters

Q: If you could time travel back to issue 1 and say anything to the Ayun of that era, what would it be? Actually, what FIVE things would you say?

1. Move to Brooklyn immediately and figure out a way to buy a building. It will involve lots of boring numbers and require you to fill out forms and be organized in a way that does not come naturally, but I think in 15 years (or less!) you will be very glad you did.

2. Enjoy the culture books and newspapers and personal letters, for soon a pernicious and addictive phenomenon known as social media will sweep the land.

3. Quit dicking around.

4. Since you get such pleasure from comics and graphic novels, why not render the zine in that kind of format? You could go to comics festivals and have entree into a whole scene populated with people you could enjoy as actual friends, rather than just authors to be admired or envied.

5. When you find yourself approaching issue 37, be forewarned that that middle school you think is so wonderful is not what it appears to be. I know it doesn’t feel like you’re wearing blinkers, but that’s the Kool-Aid you drunk talking.

In keeping with the NYC kick I’ve been on since returning, here’s a cool interview including lots of going-back-in-time-to-advise-yourself-and-others-type questions with East Village Inky‘s Ayun Halliday.  The interview was done after her publishing of the 51st issue of the EVI.  As a person who struggles to get one zine a year done, I am totally in awe of her for hitting this milestone and being under 70 years old. Recalls Ker-bloom!’s 100th issue celebration, too.

Denny, Wolfe, Bag! Relive the magic six times

The videos are up! See what you missed or remember the hits from their headlining talk at LA Zine Fest 2013.  And yes, it includes their anthem of support for Pussy Riot.  Six videos of pure inspiration (to knit a balaclava)…

NYC, you lucky dogs…

Our friends over at the Brooklyn Zine Fest are putting on a great event this coming weekend that combines zines, food, and collaborating with strangers.  Why am I not there right now? Woe.  Says BZF:

..we’ll be putting together a community-sourced food & cookbook zine as part of the Brooklyn Museum‘s First Saturdays. From 8 pm to 10 pm in the Cantor Auditorium on the 3rd Floor, you’ll be able to stop by and share your favorite family recipe, the tale of your most amazing food experience, write about the worst thing you ever ate, or anything else food-related!

Start brainstorming your recipes and food tales now, and get ready to either write them out on our page templates at the event, or bring them printed out in half-page (5×5″ wide by 8.5″ tall) format. For more info, see The Runcible Spoon‘s latest post.

We’ll have tons of foodie collage and decorating materials available to customize your page, and the finished zine will be available on the Museum’s site a few weeks later.

Also presented by The East Village Inky and I Love Bad Movies, this is a pre-zine fest event too delicious to miss!

Having just returned from my first trip to New York City and Brooklyn, I am imagining this workshop will produce pages of heirloom bagel recipes, pizza crust tips from the old country, and the secret to keeping your plantains from getting rock-hard and inedible instead of mushy and delicious.  If you are within the area at all, you’d be smart to head over!

A Community Cookbook-Making Event
The Brooklyn Museum
200 Eastern Parkway
Brooklyn, New York 11238
April 6
8 pm – 10 pm
Free + all ages

April 27: Claremont Zine Fest!

So proud of my alma mater getting together a Zine Fest!  Hopefully I’ll be having so much fun tabling and meeting people that I won’t have time to feel old as dirt back in a college setting.  Taking full advantage of the luxury that is the California climate, this will be an outdoor Fest, so bring a hat!

If you’re interested, check out their Facebook page and look over their registration (world’s shortest EVER) here.