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My buddy at the coffee shop said my zine was too clean
I was at this little spot in Portland last Tuesday, showing my latest zine to a friend who runs a record store. He flipped through it for a minute, then handed it back and said "this looks like a brochure from a dentist office." I laughed but it stung. He was right though - I had spent 4 hours fixing the margins on my computer before printing it at the library. All my favorite zines have smudged ink, uneven staples, handwritten notes in the margins. Mine looked like it came off an assembly line. So I went home and purposely messed up the binding on 10 copies, spilled some coffee on 3 of them, and drew little doodles in the corners. They still feel wrong but at least they don't feel fake. Has anyone else had to unlearn being too perfect with their zines?
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hollym124mo ago
John Waters said something once about how imperfection is what makes art feel alive, and your coffee spill idea reminded me of that. Making those little mistakes on purpose is a good first step, but maybe try just letting the process be a bit sloppy from the start instead of fixing it after. A zine should feel like a conversation, not a presentation.
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