Making Zines Together…online!

On February 27, the Interference Archive Education Working Group hosted a virtual workshop, “Valen-zines: Making Zines with Radical Love.” We gathered online, considered the meaning of radical love, and thought collaboratively about what zines can be.

Here is the collective definition we came up with on a shared Jamboard:

We dove into making our own zines, using a free, shared template in Google Slides to turn 8.5 x 11 sheets of paper into 8 page zines. Folks used personal writing and imagery, materials from the archive’s own collection, and images available from other online libraries. As we wrapped up, we shared our work and reflected on the importance of carving out time for personal creative practices. 

If you’d like to make your own zine at home, here are some of the resources we used: 

• We started with this zine template to set up eight pages for printing.
• We used this tool to quickly remove the backgrounds from images of pins, buttons, and other items.
• We played around with this blackout poetry maker to incorporate found and original poetry.
• Some folks used the digital collections of the New York Public Library and the Labadie Collection at the University of Michigan. A reminder came up of the importance of citing any outside sources to give credit to original makers. 

We hope to offer more of these workshops in the future, so keep a lookout on the Interference Archive calendar!