The PHX Zine Fest returns this weekend for a two-day virtual festival all about zines, or small-circulation, self-published pieces of art that tell any story an artist wishes to share.
Charissa Lucille, the owner of the Wasted Ink Zine Distro and creator of the PHX Zine Fest, refers to a zine as an “unedited place that exists outside of traditional publishing and media where folks can have their true story heard by others.”
A zine is a piece of paper with quite literally anything an artist or artists wants to put on it, from words to pictures or both either hand-written, drawn-on, photocopied or designed. Some zines contain heavy comic content, poetry or DIY content, while others provide instruction, narratives or even social and political messages.
“More and more people realize the power of printed media as a form of social change and cultural shifts,” Lucille said. “Zines are still being widely used in social movements to have that freedom of speech and freedom to have conversations that are unedited.”
The PHX Zine Fest invites “zinesters” from all over the state, and this year, from all over the world, to learn and celebrate the infinite perspectives within this community of diverse artists and artwork.
“I always view zines as a catalyst for human connection,” Lucille said. “They really are such tangible ways for people to learn about themselves and one another.”
This year, the festival is completely virtual and open for anyone to attend. It is also free admission to any of the speaking panels, workshops and show-and-shares.
There are a total of six panels, two workshops and three show-and-shares taking place within the two-day festival.
There will also be over 80 zine vendors in attendance, and everyone will have access to all their zines via a digital vendor haul posted on phxzinefest.org.
Lucille began the festival in 2016, a year after opening the Wasted Ink Zine Distro in December 2015 as a “hole-in-the-wall” in Tempe.
“It started out of necessity — I realized that Arizona didn’t have a zine fest that was large-scale, well-rounded, well-organized and diverse.” Lucille said. “We [needed to] have a fest that showed off all the creativity in Arizona and beyond, and puts artists at the forefront and values their art form.”
The Wasted Ink Distro is a store-front, online store and zine library on Roosevelt Row in downtown Phoenix. The distro currently represents 350 zine creators who are based in Arizona, and other states and countries around the world, all with identities of Black, Indigenous, people of color, LGBTQIA+, neurodiverse and chronically ill and disabled.
“Anyone who has been historically silenced or invisibilized, we invite them to have their narratives uplifted within Wasted Ink,” Lucille said.
In the same building complex as Wasted Ink Zine Distro stands Palabras Bilingual Bookstore, Por Vida Bakery, Pachanga Press and Abalone Mountain Press. This area is called “Nurture House” and serves as a literary hub and community art space for a diverse range of artists.
“It’s really meaningful to see all the hard work that Charissa and the people of the zine-scene have put in to create Wasted Ink and the PHX Zine Fest,” Theo Quest, another organizer of the festival and who has worked with Lucille from the beginning, said. “Now not only can you find people to talk to about zines more easily, you can find places to go to meet people who you didn’t even know were making zines.”
Both Lucille and Quest spoke to the decision of holding the fest virtually this year as a safety precaution of the COVID-19 pandemic, but one that ultimately opened an opportunity for first-time global participation that wouldn’t otherwise be possible.
“We have so many more opportunities for all of our guests to learn from zinesters from all walks of life who will be speaking this year,” Quest said.
Vendors applied from all over the world, including Indonesia, Belgium, Germany, Austria and the United Kingdom. One of the panels, “Around the World in 80 Zines,” features some of these international zine creators and their work.
Local zine creator Yolie Contreras, who has been making zines for over 20 years and is another organizer of the fest, will be hosting a panel called “From Me to You: A Perzine Panel” on Saturday at 3:30 p.m.
“Perzine is short for personal zine, and they usually come from one person,” Contreras said. “There are so many genres of zines — I hope to clarify what perzines are about and highlight what people are working on and their processes, and have deeper conversations and strengthen connections.”
Contreras’ panel will be joined by four other zine creators.
Another local zine creator, Julie Fiveash, will be hosting the panel “Borrowed Staplers & Beaded Earrings: Indigenous Zinesters” on Sunday at 12:30 p.m.
“When I first started making zines, I didn’t know any Native person that was making a zine,” Fiveash said. “It felt very lonely as someone who was Indigenous to think about where your place was in zine making.”
The panel will be joined by four other Indigenous zine creators.
“I’m really excited to talk about how Indigenous people have been able to have this medium to have their voices heard within the zine community,” Fiveash said. “If I give [a zine] to somebody and they say, ‘Oh, that same thing happened to me,’ it’s a very cool feeling and another way to connect with people on a more personal level.”
In addition to the panels, two workshops at the end of each day will be held. Soft Jaws, a local printing company, is raffling off the opportunity to print with them in their workshop “Riso Printing W/ Soft Jaws.”
Spanish translation will be available for the first time this year.
Contreras will be hosting the kick-off event on Friday at 7 p.m., which is an open-mic zine reading.
How to attend PHX Zine Fest
All the information for the PHX Zine Fest, including the digital vendor haul, panel and workshop titles, and the schedule for Saturday and Sunday, can be found here.
There will be one Zoom link for the event, and it can be found here, or on the front website page of phxzinefest.org.
The PHX Zine Fest Instagram page can be found here.
