Thursday 28 February 2013

Laydeez do comics - COTL talk



Laydeez do Comics, Leeds

Monday 25th March 2012
Starts 6.30pm Ends 9.30 pm (approx)
£1.50 All welcome (mixed event)


Speakers:

Melanie Maddison of   ‘Colouring Outside The Lines’ – a zine featuring interviews with contemporary female artists http://cotlzine.blogspot.co.uk/

Adam Cadwell Artist –Web comic ‘The Everyday’ now published by Great Beast books, which he co-founded. Adam is also in the several anthologies including Nelson. www.adamcadwell.com

Dr Mel Gibson – Academic – Northumbria University. What became of Bunty? - The lost history of British comics for girls. www.dr-mel-comics.co.uk


Laydeez do Comics is the UK’s first women’s led comics forum, that focuses on autobiographical comics and dramas of the everyday. It was started by illustrator Nicola Streeten & artist Sarah Lightman in London in 2009. Illustrator Louise Crosby & academic Helen Iball set up Laydeez do Comics in Leeds in 2012.


At:
Wharf Chambers
23-25 Wharf Street, Leeds, LS2 7EQ
Wheelchair accessible
http://www.wharfchambers.org/



(MM: Please ignore the bit on the flier where it refers to me as being an 'Artist' - this is a mistake)

Troublemakers - Durham - latest info



Troublemakers #1
at The Empty Shop, 35c Framwellgate Bridge Durham City, DH1 4SJ
Friday 15 March,
6pm – 9pm
Free entry

(Image of Bikini Kill by Lucy Thane)

Panel discussion Producing DIY Feminist Cultural Activisms: The role of zines, art & music.
Kate Wadkins, Melanie Maddison & Julia Downes
This panel will discuss DIY feminist cultural production as a vital, albeit marginalised, arena of feminist activisms.
Kate will discuss the role of zines as both an indispensable tool for sustainable community-building and empowerment, as well as a form of democratic art, in various New York City subcultures. Zines have functioned as provocative political and artistic tools for centuries. Essential to communication in the riot grrrl movement of the 1990s (as well as numerous political movements before it), zines continue to play a crucial role in communications between activists and artists today.

Melanie will discuss the role, importance, and act of creative sociopolitical history projects in relation to her collaborative radical art project ‘Shape & Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women’ that will also be on show. Melanie will also explore further other examples of art that engages with the politics of memory and socio-political history, in the context of the importance of us documenting, analysing, and publishing our own cultural and community histories.
EDIT/PROVISO: Melanie -- I'm not an academic; my inarticulation will make this very apparent when you see me on a 'panel' for my first time! I am however super passionate about cultural activism, despite my non-academic credentials - I hope that shines through my tongue-tied ness and lack of fancy language!!

Julia will discuss how DIY music offers a distinctive set of strategies with which participants can construct subversive genders, sexualities and feminisms. Using examples from riot grrrl and queer feminist music cultures DIY music is theorised as part of an enduring historical continuation of radical world-making carried out by diverse groups including non-white, working-class, feminine and non-heterosexual (or queer) subject positions.

Live music
Onsind is an acoustic pop-punk band from Pity Me, Durham made up of Nathan and Daniel. They have been playing shows together since 2007, developing a peculiarly North Eastern brand of energetic, melodic, acoustic pop-music coupled with uncompromisingly political lyrics. Onsind have releases on legendary US DIY punk label Plan-it-X Records (Andrew Jackson Jihad, Heathers, Antsy Pants), as well as Durham's very own Discount Horse records (The Middle Ones, Ace Bushy Striptease, Colour Me Wednesday). Recommended If You Like: Against Me! The Beautiful South, RVIVR.
http://onsind.bandcamp.com


Andrew Lips is a queer song-writer who has been releasing albums endlessly since 2006. Blending together auto-biographical tales from sexuality, travelling, home life to sexual assault and body issues while delivering them in a catchy up-beat fashion. Not a political singer, just a nerd trying to work through their personal hang ups in life. Andrew has self-released several of hir albums and also worked with Plan-It-X Records. People who enjoy making out, having big crushes and crying into their pillows will like this. Fans of Your Heart Breaks and Kimya Dawson will dig this too. http://andrewlips.bandcamp.com

Zines & Books
Pop-up zine library, bookstall & distro by BRAIN WAVES, The People’s Bookshop, Newcastle Nerd Punx & The Canny Little Library (tbc) http://brainwaveszines.tumblr.com http://peoplesbookshop.co.uk http://newcastlenerdpunx.com

Exhibition of Shape & Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women
Shape & Situate is a zine of posters made by artists and DIY creative folk from within Europe, each poster highlighting the (often hidden) history and lives of radical inspirational women and collectives from Europe, as a way of connecting us with the past and the present through a dynamic cultural (re-)articulation of these women’s lives. The zine aims to activate feminist cultural memory, to inspire in the present, and to visually bring women’s social and political history to life and into view. http://remember-who-you-are.blogspot.co.uk

Further information about the Troublemakers event
This is a launch event for Troublemakers: Queer//Feminist Academic-Activists in Cultural Theory & Activism. A new network for activists, academics, researchers, queers, feminists and misfits to change the way we write, tell, and make histories from zines, to academia, to the culture at large.

This event has been made free and accessible to the public with support from the Centre for Sex, Gender and Sexualities and St. Aidans College at Durham University. www.dur.ac.uk/csgs www.dur.ac.uk/st-aidans.college

The Empty Shop is a non-profit arts organisation in the North East of England and based in Durham City. Since 2008 The Empty Shop provides a much needed and accessible platform for artists of all levels and backgrounds to produce exhibit and engage with art.  http://emptyshop.org
 

About the panel speakers

Kate Wadkins is a Brooklyn-based writer and artist. Of late, she is working in social media, assisting on "The Punk Singer," a documentary about Kathleen Hanna, and thinking about creative ways to approach Hurricane Sandy Relief. She writes about feminist cultural production, primarily in punk scenes. In December, Kate published "Freakin' Out: Remaking Masculinity through Punk Rock in Detroit," an article in "Punk Anteriors," a special double issue of Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory. Ever a zine enthusiast, she curates BRAIN WAVES: a zine and print collection, and co-edited International Girl Gang Underground, a compilation zine about reverberations of the riot grrrl movement in the wake of its legacy. Kate is a founding member of For the Birds Collective as well as a classic virgo, coffee enthusiast, bass player, and rabble rouser.

Melanie Maddison (Leeds, UK) collates the zine, ‘Shape & Situate: Posters Of Inspirational European Women’ (4 issues, 2010-2012). Melanie has also produced/created the zines ‘Colouring Outside the Lines’ - a zine featuring interviews with contemporary female artists, 'Taking Cultural Production Into Our Own Hands', 'Reassess Your Weapons', 'With Arms Outstretched', 'UK Ladyfest Artwork Zine', and 'I'm Not Waiting: Doing It Yrself Now', as well as writing for Pikaland and Aorta magazine (USA). She has curated and been involved with many zine-related art exhibitions including ones at The Women’s Library, London; Gallery II, Bradford; Space Station 65, London; Ladyfest Leeds; Victoria Baths, Manchester; and The New Museum, New York. She is also a regular contributor to various UK-based zine fairs and events. Melanie is currently working on a zine project, ‘Remembering Who We Are’, alongside Lindsay Starbuck. The project is looking at individual’s personal histories to see how we come to be the people that we are, with the politics that we have. It looks at social and political history on a personal level; things that individuals have experienced in their lifetime that have influenced and activated them, or formative events that have made people think about the world in a different way – collating stepping stones for inspiration and encouragement. The project aims to challenge the myth of the ‘perfect’ activist who comes to their work fully actualised; and aims to remember some of where we've come from in order to show how our unique experiences have led us to work to create change in the ways that we do.


Julia Downes is a Research Associate in the School of Applied Social Sciences at Durham University where she is currently working on a project on domestic violence. Julia's writing and research has also focused on riot grrrl, queer feminist communities, cultural activism and all-girl bands. She has lectured on popular music and society, feminist cultural activism and queer girl cultures at the University of Leeds, University of Derby, University of Birmingham and Durham University. Julia has been active in DIY queer feminist cultural activism for over 10 years within Manifesta, Ladyfest Leeds, Ladies Rock UK, Star and Shadow Cinema and even clean hands cause damage and as a drummer in the bands The Holy Terror, Fake Tan, Vile Vile Creatures and the Physicists.


Thursday 21 February 2013

some upcoming UK zine events

Sheffield Zine Fest
16 March 2013
http://sheffieldzinefest.wordpress.com/

Shipley's First Zine Fest
16 March 2013, 1-4pm
at: Shipley Underground Market."Come along to Shipley's First Zinefest - buy Zines from our Zine stalls, browse our Zine Library and have a go at making your own at Photocopy Club! This free event brings together Zinesters local and from across the country so pop in whether you are a seasoned Zinester or interested in finding out more about the art of Zines. The stalls will be situated in empty stalls in the market :)"
http://www.facebook.com/events/526766210696711/?ref=3  


DIY Cultures: Zines, Artists Books and Comics 
DIY Cultures will be taking place on Sunday 7th April at the Rich Mix in East London. In addition to a zine fair, there will be talks and workshops throughout the day celebrating the spirit of DIY. Tables are a mere five pounds but spaces are limited.
Stall booking details are here: www.diycultures.tumblr.com
 
 
Victoria Baths Fanzine Fair (Manchester)
Fanzine Fair at Victoria Baths which will take place on Sunday 5th May from 12noon to 4pm. 
We are inviting fanzine-makers, small presses, independent magazine/book publishers, book artists, art and design collectives, small record labels and representatives of university and college art, illustration, design, fashion and photography courses to take a stall to display and sell their work. Stalls cost £10.
We are also looking to hold readings, talks and discussions and are inviting Fanzine makers to offer these to the programme. If you would like to give a talk, run a workshop or give a demonstration, then we may offer you a free stall. We will provide space for people to read from their Fanzines.
www.victoriabaths.org.uk |  gill.wright@victoriabaths.org.uk

Wednesday 20 February 2013

Troublemakers - Durham - 15 March.

Troublemakers #1: DIY Feminist Cultural Activism panel // ONSIND & Andrew Lips // Shape & Situate exhibition // Pop up zine libraries and distros.
 
 
FREE LAUNCH EVENT (donations welcome!) for Troublemakers: Queer//Feminist Academic-Activists in Cultural Theory & Activism. A new network for activists, academics, researchers, queers, feminists and misfits to change the way we write, tell, and make cultural activist histories from zines, to academia, to the culture at large.

at: Empty Shop, Durham, UK
Friday 15th March, 18.00-21.00


with...

// Panel discussion //
Producing DIY Feminist Cultural Activisms: The role of zines, art & music. Kate Wadkins, Melanie Maddison & Julia Downes

This panel will discuss DIY feminist cultural production as a vital, albeit marginalised, arena of feminist activisms.

Kate will discuss the role of zines as both an indispensable tool for sustainable community-building and empowerment, as well as a form of democratic art, in various New York City subcultures. Zines have functioned as provocative political and artistic tools for centuries. Essential to communication in the riot grrrl movement of the 1990s (as well as numerous political movements before it), zines continue to play a crucial role in communications between activists and artists today.

Melanie will discuss the role, importance, and act of creative sociopolitical history projects in relation to her collaborative radical art project ‘Shape & Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women’ that will also be on show. Melanie will also explore further other examples of art that engages with the politics of memory and socio-political history, in the context of the importance of us documenting, analysing, and publishing our own cultural and community histories.

Julia will discuss how DIY music offers a distinctive set of strategies with which participants can construct subversive genders, sexualities and feminisms. Using examples from riot grrrl and queer feminist music cultures DIY music is theorised as part of an enduring historical continuation of radical world-making carried out by diverse groups including non-white, working-class, feminine and non-heterosexual (or queer) subject positions.

// Music //

O n s i n d is an acoustic pop-punk band from Pity Me, Durham made up of Nathan and Daniel. They have been playing shows together since 2007, developing a peculiarly North Eastern brand of energetic, melodic, acoustic pop-music coupled with uncompromisingly political lyrics. Onsind have releases on legendary US DIY punk label Plan-it-X Records (Andrew Jackson Jihad, Heathers, Antsy Pants), as well as Durham's very own Discount Horse records (The Middle Ones, Ace Bushy Striptease, Colour Me Wednesday). Recommended If You Like: Against Me! The Beautiful South, RVIVR.
http://onsind.bandcamp.com/

A n d r e w L i p s is a queer song-writer who has been releasing albums endlessly since 2006. Blending together auto-biographical tales from sexuality, travelling, home life to sexual assault and body issues while delivering them in a catchy up-beat fashion. Not a political singer, just a nerd trying to work through their personal hang ups in life. Andrew has self-released several of hir albums and also worked with Plan-It-X Records. People who enjoy making out, having big crushes and crying into their pillows will like this. Fans of Your Heart Breaks and Kimya Dawson will dig this too.
http://andrewlips.bandcamp.com/

// Zines & Books //

Pop up zine library, bookstall & distro by BRAIN WAVES, The People’s Bookshop (tbc), Newcastle Nerd Punx & The Canny Little Library (tbc)

// Exhibition of Shape & Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women //

Shape & Situate is a zine of posters made by artists and DIY creative folk from within Europe, each poster highlighting the (often hidden) history and lives of radical inspirational women and collectives from Europe, as a way of connecting us with the past and the present through a dynamic cultural (re-)articulation of these women’s lives.
The zine aims to activate feminist cultural memory, to inspire in the present, and to visually bring women’s social and political history to life and into view.
http://remember-who-u-are.blogspot.co.uk/

/// More information about panel speakers ///

Kate Wadkins is a Brooklyn-based writer and artist. Of late, she is working in social media, assisting on "The Punk Singer," a documentary about Kathleen Hanna, and thinking about creative ways to approach Hurricane Sandy Relief. She writes about feminist cultural production, primarily in punk scenes. In December, Kate published "Freakin' Out: Remaking Masculinity through Punk Rock in Detroit," an article in "Punk Anteriors," a special double issue of Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory. Ever a zine enthusiast, she curates BRAIN WAVES: a zine and print collection, and co-edited International Girl Gang Underground, a compilation zine about reverberations of the riot grrrl movement in the wake of its legacy. Kate is a founding member of For the Birds Collective as well as a classic virgo, coffee enthusiast, bass player, and rabble rouser.

Melanie Maddison (Leeds, UK) collates the zine, ‘Shape & Situate: Posters Of Inspirational European Women’ (4 issues, 2010-.2012).
Melanie has also produced/created the zines ‘Colouring Outside the Lines’ - a zine featuring interviews with contemporary female artists, 'Taking Cultural Production Into Our Own Hands', 'Reassess Your Weapons', 'With Arms Outstretched', 'UK Ladyfest Artwork Zine', and 'I'm Not Waiting: Doing It Yrself Now', as well as writing for
www.pikaland.com and Aorta magazine (USA). She has curated and been involved with many zine-related art exhibitions including ones at The Women’s Library, London; Gallery II, Bradford; Space Station 65, London; Ladyfest Leeds; Victoria Baths, Manchester; and The New Museum, New York. She is also a regular contributor to various UK-based zine fairs and events. Melanie is currently working on a zine project, ‘Remembering Who We Are’, alongside Lindsay Starbuck. The project is looking at individual’s personal histories to see how we come to be the people that we are, with the politics that we have. It looks at social and political history on a personal level; things that individuals have experienced in their lifetime that have influenced and activated them, or formative events that have made people think about the world in a different way – collating stepping stones for inspiration and encouragement. The project aims to challenge the myth of the ‘perfect’ activist who comes to their work fully actualised; and aims to remember some of where we've come from in order to show how our unique experiences have led us to work to create change in the ways that we do.

Julia Downes is a Research Associate in the School of Applied Social Sciences at Durham University where she is currently working on a project on domestic violence. Julia's writing and research has also focused on riot grrrl, queer feminist communities, cultural activism and all-girl bands. She has lectured on popular music and society, feminist cultural activism and queer girl cultures at the University of Leeds, University of Derby, University of Birmingham and Durham University. Julia has been active in DIY queer feminist cultural activism for over 10 years within Manifesta, Ladyfest Leeds, Ladies Rock UK, Star and Shadow Cinema and even clean hands cause damage and as a drummer in the bands The Holy Terror, Fake Tan, Vile Vile Creatures and the Physicists.

remembering who we are zine

Remembering Who We Are zine -- Deadline extended
 
 
We’re looking for contributors to 'Remembering Who We Are' zine.

 We'd love for as many people as possible, from all over the world to contribute. We already have a number of submissions, but are seeking more.

The zine has links to the memory and history work that Melanie’s 'Shape & Situate' zine has been doing, as well as the art work that Lindsay has been part of with 'Caged Bird Club', and beyond. This time, however, we want to look at our own individual, personal histories to see how we come to be the ...people that we are, with the politics that we have.

It's about who we are and how it links with what we do.

We want participants to share a unique story of a formative event or influential person in their life. We want to hear, see and share examples of moments that have shaped or are shaping people's political values and have made them into who they are today.
We’re looking for examples of social and political history on a personal level; things that you have experienced in your lifetime that have influenced and activated you, or formative events that have made you think about the world in a different way.
This may be as simple as a conversation that you had with someone that made you think critically about things. Or, it may be an example of actions/activisms that have buoyed your own interest in, and your knowledge/awareness of, politics and political action, and/or led you to engage in your own everyday activism, action or activity.

Please see the flier for more information, as we'd love to collect as many contributions as possible, to show how much of a broad church 'activism' is, and how broad and unique all of our inlets to it are.

We want to show how individual’s experiences create interesting and interested activists, and challenge the daunting myth that all activists must and do come-to-be by knowing it all from the get-go, and knowing all the same things. We’re all human, and we’ve all seen and done a lot to get to the points that we’re at. The zine aims to remember some of this, and to show how our unique experiences have led us to work to create change in the ways that we do.

Please feel free to share this with friends who may also be interested.

Submissions or questions should be sent to: rememberingzine@gmail.com by the end of March 2013.

////

To view the fliers up close, see: http://andsomeplyers.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/workshop-and-zine-call-out.html

The fliers say:

Nobody is born a fully formed anarchist, eco warrior, militant worker or radical feminist. We want to pull together stories that reflect the inspiration, the disappointments, and the naiveté that everyone goes through when trying to figure out how to live in a world they want to change.

Have you had an amazing conversation with someone that made you think critically about things and see the world differently?

Have you had a direct experience of activism where the outcome made you think about or engage in activism in a new way?

What was it about this moment in your life that made you want to keep going?

We want to hear, see, and share examples of personal moments that have shaped your political values and made you who you are today.

By ‘remembering who we are’ we can create something to inspire and encourage people who are new to activism or maybe just feeling burnt out.

The finished zine, featuring highlights of what is produced for this project, will be available as a free/copyleft downloadable PDF later in 2013.

Contributions can be words, drawings, handmade, computer generated, or any combination of these. But they must be A4, portrait, black & white jpegs or pdfs.

Send your submission to: rememberingzine@gmail.com by the end of March 2013 (deadline has been extended)


////

To paraphrase a recent conversation artist Melanie Cervantes had on her FB wall:

“I didn't know what social justice was back then but these experiences left deep impressions on my heart and memory. #TheThingsThatShapeWhoWeAre
This is why every thing I do I do with that in mind.
Political discourse in the present day stimulates the memories and the gut feeling that I recall throughout my adolescence of situations I thought were not fair. I didn't have the vocabulary then to talk about oppression, labor, and exploitation. May we continue to bring memory forward, to full view, it is one of the strongest tools we have to shape our visions of what may be.”

(Hope you don’t mind me sharing this, Melanie, but it’s helping me further to put all of this into relatable terms, and I think your words are really important and useful)
 

 

the dugout inclusive arts festival


On the 2nd of March I'm going to be part of The Dugout Festival in London, running the zine making area.

www.thedugoutfestival.com

The Dugout is an Inclusive Women’s Arts Festival that has been researched and organised collaboratively by women with and without learning disabilities. 

 The (free) festival aims to support women with learning disabilities to better access art, as well as provide a space for women to creatively collaborate and share skills.

 There's going to be inclusive workshops, an exhibition, a film programme, stalls, collaborative projects, and more.

If anybody knows women who might like to attend, or if you work with groups who love art making then please do pass the information on, as I think it's going to be a really great day.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Dugout-Festival/376906159029636?ref=ts&fref=ts

the para-academic hanbook

From my inbox, from Debi Withers of hammeronpress.net
 
Call for contributions: The Para-Academic Handbook: A toolkit for making-learning-creating-acting
 
There is a name for those under- and precariously employed, but actively working, academics in today’s society: the para-academic.

Para-academics mimic academic practices to liberate them from the confines of the university. Our work, and our lives, reflect how the idea of a university as a place for knowledge production, discussion and learning, has become distorted by neo-liberal market forces. We create alternative, genuinely open access, learning-thinking-making-acting spaces on the internet, in public...ations, in exhibitions, discussion groups or other mediums that seem appropriate to the situation. We don’t sit back and worry about our career developments paths. We write for the love of it, we think because we have to, we do it because we care.

We take the prefix para- to illustrate how we work alongside, beside, next to, and rub up against, the all too proper location of the Academy, making the work of higher education a little more irregular, a little more perverse, a little more improper. Our work takes up the potential of the multiple and contradictory resonances of para- as decisive location for change, within the university as much as beyond it.

Specialists in all manner of things, from the humanities to the social and biological sciences, the para-academic works alongside the traditional university, sometimes by necessity, sometimes by choice, usually a mixture of both. Frustrated by the lack of opportunities to research, create learning experiences or make a basic living within the university on our own terms, para-academics don’t seek out alternative careers in the face of an evaporated future, we just continue to do what we’ve always done: write, research, learn, think, and facilitate that process for others.

We do this without prior legitimisation from any one institution. Para-academics do not need to churn out endless ‘outputs’ because of the pressures of a heavily assessed research environment. We work towards making ideas because learning, sharing, thinking and creating matter beyond easily quantifiable ‘products’. And we know that this is possible, that we are possible, without the constraints of an increasingly hierarchical academy.

As the para-academic community grows there is a real need to build supportive networks, share knowledge, ideas and strategies that can allow these types of interventions to become sustainable and flourish. There is a very real need to create spaces of solace and creativity.

The Para-Academic Handbook: A Toolkit for making-learning-creating-acting, edited by Alex Wardrop and Deborah Withers, calls for articles (between 1,000-6,000 words), cartoons, photographs, illustrations, inspirations and other forms of text/graphic communication exploring para-academic practice, and its place within active intellectual cultures of the early 21st century.

It will be published by HammerOn Press in 2014.

Enquiries to mail@hammeronpress.net
Deadline for submissions 1 July 2013.