This is gonna be a quick one! My plan for after Spooky Poem Month was to rest up and focus on writing, but I found myself at Edinburgh Zine Fair and unexpectedly taking part in a wonderful workshop.
It was a delight to wander round, meeting fellow artists and seeing what wares they have on offer. I’ve only dipped my toes into zines as a creative format, but they strike me as creatively liberating – if you can print and/or draw and fold paper, you can make something great! I came away with a good haul, including work by Gray Crosbie, Sarah M Davies and Typewronger Books that I can’t wait to dig my teeth into.
What I didn’t realise what on though, was the workshop hosted by Lavender Menace Queer Books Archive. The topic was collage, and we were each provided with printed scans of pages from 1980s editions of Gay Scotland Magazine to peruse and create with:
The hardest part was tearing yourself away from reading the articles, adverts, horoscopes and personals long enough to do the crafting part, but somehow I managed. It was fascinating window into a different era of queer history and culture. Locations and terminology might have changed, but it was remarkable how recognisable the voices and discourses were. Section 28 homophobia then and EHRC transphobia today! The more things change, the more they stay the same. Which is to say: the fight never ends.
Picture above is my collage. I definitely focused on some of the more dramatic and sensation aspects of the magazines; I couldn’t help it. LGBTQ+ folks have always created vibrant art and that’s one of the things I love learning about. Jo (who I was there with) took a much more investigative approach, scouring the pages for the most diverse experiences they could find, trans+ and asexual ones especially. You can see theirs below:
All-in-all this was great fun and very interesting! If I’d had more time, I would have done some blackout poetry as well. A thought for next time, maybe.