oomkzine:

By Heiba Lamara

On Sunday 7^th April the Rich Mix in Shoreditch played host to the first day-long DIY Cultures Festival. The venue was packed out with zine stalls, artists’ books, comics, crafts, talks, workshops, films, video-art and music. Organised by OOMK and Other Asias, it incorporated the best of DIY zine culture with cross-disciplinary arts, providing a platform for creatives who are low on budget but high on skill.

DIY Cultures was my first zine fair, and it gave me the opportunity to talk to and learn from different artists, buy and swap work directly with them and forge some fantastic collaborative links. Most importantly it showed me how to get on and start doing the things I loved while side-stepping the year-long unpaid internships and the suspiciously expensive master-classes with the ‘expert in your chosen field’. I only caught the last few minutes of the talk but I distinctly recall a man walking out of the Unemployment and Creativity Panel Discussion muttering “intense” and looking like the weight of the world had been lifted from his shoulders. DIY Cultures can do that to people it seems.

The zine fair, which was spread over two floors, brought together a wide range of independent publications and artwork which ranged in subject from riot grrrl to extradition, unemployment to urban gardening. The result was a forum for discussion and debate, a trading place and inadvertently, a classroom for struggling artists. Operating on the fringe of our mass-market society, DIY Cultures and its celebration of independent culture makers drew in a large crowd, and the cafeteria of activities, talks and wares subverted any attempts to browse selectively.

The writer Wilson Harris wrote, “political radicalism is merely a fashionable attitude unless it is accompanied by profound insights into the experimental nature of the arts and the sciences”. The festival’s claim to alterity and autonomy was certainly supported by its operation at the intersection of art and politics.

One of my favourite purchases was Developmentia - “like dementia but with foreign donors” - a witty handmade zine by IMASE/Other Asias which offered a guide to identifying the symptoms of and providing the cure for exploitative development projects.  

The latest issue of SCARF, a cross-cultural journal edited by Kinsi Abdulleh, which was as brilliant visually as it was in terms of its literary exploration of race, art and identity, was another favourite.

Although I couldn’t attend all the talks, I was glad I had the chance to listen to the panel on Prisoner Zines, Writing and Creativity, hosted by Marek of Not Shut Up Magazine, Nicki Jameson of Prisoner Fightback, and Trenton Oldfield and Hamja Ahsan of the Free Talha Ahsan Campaign. Situating their conversation within the context of the Strangeways prison riot, the ‘War on Terror’ and the Government’s current austerity measures, the panellists provided valuable insights into the relationship between prison reform and prison literature, the politics of distribution, and the possibility of a new generation of confrontational prisoner writing.

DIY Cultures firmly established itself as an important cultural event not to be missed. In Rethinking the Public Sphere: a Contribution to the Critique of Actually Existing Democracy, Nancy Fraser describes subaltern public spheres as ‘parallel discursive arenas’ created by subordinated social groups in order to circulate counter-discourses which assist in creating new interpretations of their ‘identities, interests and needs’. In this way, subaltern public spheres act not only as ‘spaces of withdrawal and regroupment’ but as ‘bases and training grounds for agitational activities directed toward wider publics’.

Add a few quirky illustrations, some homemade cupcakes and you have the DIY Cultures Festival!

oomkzine:

By Indrani Balaratnam

What would you expect the daughter of a man held in Guantanamo Bay for 11 years to look like? I don’t know what I expected. Maybe part of me thought she would have red eyes from 11 years of crying, or would wear a Save Shaker t-shirt all day, every day. I didn’t…

7th April 12pm - 7pm

Rich Mix, London

All Welcome

diycultures:

The session will talk about the value of prisoners creative writing and expression, the limits and of writing. As part of the DIY Cultures day Festival at Rich Mix
http://diycultures.tumblr.com/
twitter hashtag: #DIYPrison


MAREK KAZMIERSKI - Managing Editor of NOT SHUP UP Magazine of Prison Writing & Art
http://www.notshutup.org/who-we-are.html

Marek is a writer, translator, tutor and former Head of Diversity at HMYOI Feltham. Founder of OFF_PRESS, a non-profit press with a world literature focus, he is also on the steering committee of the English PEN Readers & Writers programme. 

NICKI JAMESON - journalist, author, activist

Prisoners Rights Activist. Joint author of Strangeways 1990 - a serious disturbance, the only book to chronicle prisoners’ accounts of the biggest uprising ever to hit the British prison system. Editor of Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism!’s ‘Prisoners Fightback’ page and Prisoners Fightback Facebook page. 

Will speak about the ways in which prisoners who write against the prison system manage to use official and unofficial publications and structures to get their message across. 


http://www.facebook.com/pages/Prisoners-Fightback/75937136732

HAMJA AHSAN - Free Talha Ahsan Campaign, artist and curator
www.freetalha.org

Will introduce Nausea - a zine co-written with his brother with 2 early short stories by Talha on teenager and Dulwich College Experience. Will talk about Bonnie Kerness anthology of Prisoners writings on solitary confinement, US prisoners art anthologies and how it help him cope with trauma.

diycultures:

Really looking forward to this talk from Blackfeminists at DIY Cultures!

We All Can Do It: Join Black Feminists at DIY Cultures for our talk on how black women have played a vital role in DIY culture with Stephanie Phillips, Aurella Yussuf and Rianna Parker.

Facebook Event:https://www.facebook.com/events/557797294242900

diycultures:

“What is DIY?” opens this film …

What are the ethics, ideas, joy and pitfalls, meaning of being an DIY artist -

Why stay independent?

The film is billed as a celebration of the artistic underdog and features interviews and performances from: Lydia Lunch, Ian MacKaye (Fugazi), J Mascis (Dinosaur jr.), Jim Rose (Jim Rose Sideshow), J.G. Thirlwell (Foetus), Mike Watt (Minutemen), Richard Kern (Filmmaker),Ron Asheton (Stooges), Madigan Shive (Bonfire Madigan), Dave Brockie (Gwar), Craig Newmark (founder Craig’s List) and more.

Sunday, April 7, 2013 2:00pm until 3:00pm

screening: http://www.facebook.com/events/175591002594428/

main event: http://www.facebook.com/events/590291354321604/

extraboneshq:

COMING UP! a spinning drawing experiment devised and led by Extra Bones’ Robert Bidder and Andrew Kerr. This is gonna happen in the midst of zine fair (and more) event DIY Cultures! Extra Bones will also be hosting a table full of great zines and esp things “Made For Extra Bones”.

extraboneshq:

next Lunch Music is the first off site! new projects from members of Dead Rat Orchestra, Szilárd and Goodbye Leopold. plus another new project from an un-named source…This is at the same place, on the same day as The Spinny Who-a-trope project too!

usurpzines:

USURP Zine fair Saturday 28th April 2012.  

- We are currently putting together details of how many tables will be available on the day and will keep you updated.

- Tables are free (but limited) and we are looking for applicants to take up these seats!  To apply, please be in touch with your details and web link so we can allocate tables.

- We also have a number of slots for workshop demos.  We are particularly interested in talks on- tips for self publishing and working with printers and screen-print demos.  But if you have any ideas for workshops or talks, please be in touch with a summary.

- We currently have tables assigned to our friends Walrus Zines and Other Asias.  We will be updating the list of contributors with tables over the next month before out progamme is out!

This is our flyer! Please respond email, print and share! Thank you, we are very excited and hope you are too!