Stolen Sharpie Revolution

-If you missed the L.A. Zine fest or you would just like to check out how awesome it was you can visit this Flckr pool of photos.

-Andrea shared with me the lovely drawing which  includes Stolen Sharpie Revolution that she added in this blog post about zines.  In the post she included a link to this video talking about the awesome-ness of zines.

-Another article talking about how blogs almost killed zines but there has been a resurgence. It seems like there is an article written about this every year.  I say that if you think zines died then it was probably you who walked away from them. There has been a vibrant and thriving zine culture just under your radar for decades.

-An article from the Chicago Tribune about zines and how if you don’t like someone’s blog you can’t rip it up and that blogs foster real community….and fleas.

The Chicago Zine Fest is next weekend! They have released their table chart and workshop schedule.

-The Denver Zine Library made their goal of raising $5,000! I was going to make a video for their video campaign. I was going to be filled with excuses as to why the video took so long that included getting this site up and running, working on my new zine, all my shelves falling off the wall in my office and making it a disaster, getting some larger button orders in, and preparing for the LA zine fest and Chicago Zine Fest. But, I didn’t get around to. I’m glad they made their funds!

I’m leaving for Chicago on Wednesday and it looks like my new zine will be dine! Brainscan #29 will be available at the Chicago Zine Fest. I’ll post more when I get back home.

Greetings! I am now back in rainy cold Portland after spending almost a week in sunny southern California. I’m hoping I can head to a warmer climate for Presidents Day next year. You folks taking about the Hawaii zine fest, I’m looking at you!

L.A. was great! I got to meet lots of new and old zine friends. The space was awesome, on the second floor of a book shop, and the turn out was incredible! Seriously, the place was packed with people all absorbing the print goodness. There was lots of press leading up to the event and this is an interesting piece about the V.Vale and Henry Rollins talk that happened after the actual zine fest. You should read it.

The 2011 Revenge of print was so successful that they fine folks at Atomic Books are gonna do it again! Check out .

This weekend is the 1st NYC Feminist Zine Fest and I’m super bummed that I can’t be there. But, You can read articles here and here about it.

We have final confirmation on ZOE (Zine Organizers Event) This is an even that will take place the day after the Chicago Zine Fest. We are inviting zine event organizers and those that would like to start zine events to come and chat and learn from each other. It should be a great time.

The Portland Zine Symposium has extended their submission deadline for the 2012 artwork to February 27th. Read more here including the new tabling policy.

Zine Fests This weekend:

NYC Feminist Zine Fest  (New York, New York, USA)

Tooting Zine Fair (London, UK)

Book Arts Fayre (Cardiff, Wales, UK)

In zines we trust,

Alex Wrekk

Greetings from sunny Southern California. I’m down here for the LA Zine Fest . The sun is bright and I, as a Portlander, had to buy some sunglasses! What is the crazy bright ball in the sky!

Ok, here’s some zine news:

-My friends and fellow Portland Zine Symposium organizers edit a monthly anthology/comp zine called, Stumptown Underground. It is a curated and themed monthly and they have just extended their submissions for this month. The theme is memories and we all have those, right? Why not submit something for consideration?

-Speaking of submitting… The Portland Zine Symposium is looking for artwork for this year. Guidelines can be found on the webiste. The theme this year is “Sea Of Zines”! Please make us something like a shark fighting a giant squid for zines or a pirate treasure chest filled with zines!

-Chicago Zine Fest has announced the line up of zine readers. Check it out! It includes my housemate, and Zine Thug creator, Marc Parker.  I sure hope he gets his zine done in time!

-Also in Chicago: Quimby’s is hosting the Zine Olympics at the Chicago Zine Fest. Have you been training?

-And another thing in Chicago: Sunday after the Chicago Zine Fest will be ZOE, the Zine Organizers Event. It will be a day long event for people who organize and want to start organizing zine events. We will workshop and network and talk shop. More details to come.

-In sad zine news, Profane Existence will shut down its print operation.

-In odd UK fanzine news, fanzines were seized at a football match.

Zine Events this weekend:

18 – Feria de Fanzines (Santiago, Chile)

19 - LA Zine Fest (Los Angeles, California, USA)

I’ll be at the L.A. Zine Fest on Sunday, stop by and say hi! I’ll have some flyers for this site and lots of other stuff!

P.S. in internet land a meme has been going around about occupations and what people think they are vs. what they really are. My friend, Tara, created this one for zines.

We have been live for a week now and in that time I have added a few new distros and some new shops that sell zines.  Hooray!

I thought I would use this space to mention a few things in zine land that have come across my desk.

-Spill The Zines, a UK based zine blog, posted a great article by Lizzy of Marching Stars Zine Distro. The article is about how to approach working with a zine distro and it has a lot of good information in it. Check it out.

-The Denver Zine Library has launched a fundraising campaign. Check it out here and donate. They are also launching a really cute ad campaign by zinesters to talk about the zine library. Check out some of the videos here
 or read about them in Denver’s Westwood.  Also, I was asked to do one but I don’t know what to do!

-The L.A. Zine Fest made an awesome video. Check it out . And if you are going to the L.A on February 19 stop by and say hello, I’ll be there.

-We are considering adding a messageboard to StolenSharpieRevolution.org. Would that be of interest to you? It would be a space that we hope would be used for more than just promotion and that it would be a bit more of a community to talk about zine things and also non zine related things with a core group of moderators to help keep things respectful.

And, last but not least, if you make zines you need to see this video!

In Zines We Trust, Alex Wrekk