Membership to The Ephemera Society is on my list for when finances allow, but you can visit the fairs in general, either way. Being a zine creator and library type, with virtually her own archive/museum at home, it would be really useful and interesting to join up.
The Ephemera Society's annual bazaars and fairs are always full of merry artefacts. If you have any curiosity about paper articles that are snapshots in time, if you like the visual aspect of ephemera like postcards, photos, magazines, adverts, curios, and so on, it's good fun to take a look around the stalls of this fair. Membership to The Ephemera Society is on my list for when finances allow, but you can visit the fairs in general, either way. Being a zine creator and library type, with virtually her own archive/museum at home, it would be really useful and interesting to join up. I went to last year's ephemera fair and bought some amusing magazines, like the 1940s/1950s origin Lilliput, with its bizarre array of stories, adverts, and photo captions. I could be in danger of becoming a collector of this, as it's written in the kind of style and tone that the modern day Clod magazine seems to satirise. To whit: The Feathers Bumper Book for Boys and Girls was an entertaining oddity that I ended up buying for fun too: I love the drama and silliness of how this story opens: Sinister sheep in frocks, at teatime: It's all the sort of bizarre surrealness that appeals for reappropriating in a 'zine, and it's also just amusing, quirky stuff. Funny to read the tone of articles and stories, and see how things were presented and how people amused themselves in the 40s and 50s − not often you get access to such stuff, and there aren't enough museums to keep it all in, sadly.
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London College of Communication in south east London houses a long-running zine library. By coincidence it was during International Zine Month, and on zine library celebration day, that I went to access the collection. I've long been donating my work to the collection, but never made it over to visit properly till July. I was glad I did. The collection comprises thousands of individual zines, all boxed up in special archives - available to users of the library - including the general public, if you contact them in advance. You'll see from the above that the zine library is now 5 years old - so Happy Birthday to it! Athemaura zine turned 5 years old a couple of months ago, too, but I kept forgetting to make mention of that on here.
I'll recommend an indie pop fanzine called Whoosh. It boasted risograph print in bright colours typical of indie fanzines of the 80s and early 90s. References to Horlicks and sleepiness in relation to Galaxie 50. An early interview with my Bloody Valentine - which felt a bit of a privilege to pore over even if I'm not such a fan. I looked at a bunch of other music fanzines from the 80s and 90s, enjoying the transportation to other eras, and how many of the writers of music fanzines were freely critical and vitriolic, plus many titles were so scattershot in look, cramming as much in as possible - not conscientious or clearcut in design or in delivery, which was good to escape into. I recall a cartoon of John Peel upside down riding a skateboard. I hardly scratched the surface of the collection, since there are over a thousand individual zines in the collection, across various topics and eras. Also enjoyed reading and raiding from the bookshelves, a fair few books that collected zine works, such as the personal zine Doris, Savage Messiah (which provides healthy critique of gentrification of London), and the most famous fanzine of them all, Sniffin' Glue. Zines on display in glass cases in the library:
July 2nd: Read the above mini zines on the way to work. Returned to filing my zine collection in their new home. Had phone conversation and sent emails to a few people about possible future zine events. All whilst having copious hayfevery sneezing fits. Old music zines in their lovely snug new home. The first zine I ever bought was A Chance to Shine, a zine about Morrissey - in 1995. Apart from two or three losses, and maybe a handful of swaps, I have hung onto every zine I've ever bought/been given, over the years. They're definitely one of the things I most cherish if I had to name possessions.
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AthemauraEnthusiastic about 'zines, libraries, gardening in the city, independent book shops/record shops/cafes, vegetarian and vegan, London in all its variety, local living/community. Archives
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