London Zine Symposium 2005

Happened at The Institute for Autonomy (an occupied social centre) at 76 Gower Street on April 19th 2005

Sometime in February a new social centre was opened on Gower Street in Central London. A few days later an individual was visiting Portland Zine Symposium website, and bitterly lamenting that no-one did something equivalent in the UK. Remembering the adage ‘If not you then who?’ the individual swiftly spoke to friends and co-conspirators in other projects and a London Zine Symposium collective was born.

On Saturday April 16th 2005 London held its first annual Zine Symposium. The idea behind the day in London was much the same; to highlight zine culture, and to create a day where zinesters could meet up with people, who otherwise they may have only met through ink on paper. Plus there was cake - so if nothing else people were going to get a sugar fix. It was a really successful day - with (we think) around 400 people appearing, which was much more than we expected - and hopefully highlighted the beauty of DIY organisation and culture.

Down in the basement two large rooms were used to host the twelve or so different stalls from various zine distros from around the UK. A diverse range of genres were represented ranging from the cute, personal zines to riot grrrl, music, politics, art and lots of other things in between. The rooms with zine stalls in were heaving from opening time, until at least 5pm, with all the stalls doing swift trade, with some items (Alex Wrekk’s ‘Stolen Sharpie Revolution’ for example) selling out in literally ten minutes. There was also a separate exhibition space which featured a large collection of zine front covers, from as many genres as could be found, mounted to the wall. They were accompanied by a thumbnail of an example of inside page from the zine as well as a short piece of text and blurb on each particular zine. The zines selected for display were culled from the organisers personal collections and chosen to help reflect as best as possible a cross section of recent or current zines, ranging from different styles, genres and designs. On the fourth wall of the room a collection of live punk and hardcore music photographs were displayed.

Upstairs there was the Infoshop, which is a regular feature of the building and has a variety of things available to buy as well as a small free library/reading space. Three films/ documentaries were screened throughout the day in the projector room, including $100 and a T-shirt. This is a collection of interviews with zinesters and those interested in zines based in NW USA. The room was packed throughout the docu, and everyone seemed to love it. Throughout the day workshops were also running that aimed to consider or give advice about different elements of DIY lifestyle. Anyone who was present at these workshops can undoubtedly attest to the fact that they weren’t amazingly organised. All the same it seemed some mutual information sharing happened, and people seemed to enjoy them - except for the kid who thought that zines should be about competing with NME and Kerrang! and almost ended up in a shouting match with a member of the Last Hours team. People were also invited to submit pages for a zine of the day to be collated later on by the organisers. A handful of pages were handed with a group of people meeting later in the day - towards the end of the event - in the café to destroy typewriters, and to illustrate and write across pieces of paper.

Throughout the day food was also being served as well as the aforementioned cake - which went ridiculously quickly (you gannets!). Overall the day ran far more smoothly than anyone had dared hope, and more smoothly than most events that the individuals doing it have done, with people enjoying themselves and having a great time. Next year’s event is already in the pipeline, and will hopefully be even bigger and better by expanding on what we learnt this year, if you’d like to get involved with helped us organise next year’s then please get in touch, otherwise see ya next April!

Photos

They exist somewhere, we’ll try and put them up soon!