Eric Bartholomew's Blog (9)

It was a good first time for me at the Midwest Zine Fest in Champaign Urbana.  (Or, as craigslist calls it, "Chambana.")  The fest was on the Urbana side.  I drove down with friends Nicki and Meghan from SPOC -Self Publishers of Chicago, and they had a table.  I had my Junk Drawer table, which was actually two old card tables I brought.  Other Chicago writers making the trip included…

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It was another great time at the Chicago Zine Fest, but I almost didn't make it.  The fest filled up on the first day of registration, and I had to get on a waiting list.  Fortunately a spot opened up at the last week.  Then I had to buckle down and finish my new zine that I'd begun slacking on.

I met some…

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At zine fests I've had something called Guess the Odds & Ends, which is kind of a game where you try to guess what things are.  But this time, for the Milwaukee Zine Fest, I forgot all my odds & ends at home.  I had to scrounge around, and fortunately I had enough other random things with me that I was able to keep the game going. …

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Thanks to everyone who stopped by the Junk Drawer table at the Chicago Zine Fest.  It was fun with Guess the Odds & Ends.  Some people…

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A couple of my Junk Drawer zines are currently in an art exhibit about mass consumption and the environment. It's taking place at AE Studios LIC, in Queens, New York. If you can't make it to the show, you can still see most of the artwork on the site for Art for Global Justice, which is the group that organized it:
http://www.artforglobaljustice.org/exhibits/excess/excess.html

There is a Junk Drawer display at the “The Opportunity Shop” in Hyde

Park in Chicago.

The shop is a temporary experimental project space. It is located in a former Hollywood Video store that has been totally redone as a community art center.

The Junk Drawer set-up was created almost entirely out of stuff found at

the space: sets of drawer, and display racks that were previously used

for DVD’s. Zines are for sale, and there’s a drawer full of odds and

ends you can… Continue

Some Junk Drawer zines can now be found in New York City.

All are for sale at Bluestockings bookstore. They have a fine selection of books and zines, and a few Chicago zines. Junk Drawer issue #1 is in the zine library collection at ABC No Rio.

Both these places are on the Lower East Side, and are worth checking out. They are great supporters of independent writing and zines.…

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It was super cool to be at the Chicago Zine Fest. Thanks to everyone who stopped by the Junk Drawer table. I'm glad people enjoyed playing "Guess the Odds & Ends." I only wish I'd had more time to spend at all the other tables. There were so many great zines and zinesters there. Feel free to write your comments about the zine fest, junk drawers, or anything from the zine fest weekend. Looking forward to next year.

Three zines from my "Junk Drawer" series will be part of an exhibition of artist made books at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. There will be 13 other artists and writers featured, and from what I've seen, most seem to be pretty accomplished. And then there's me, with little photocopied, stapled zines. Nothing fancy, but somehow they're in an art exhibit. Well, I'm just glad that zines are being recognized along with other "art books," as they call them.

The show takes place… Continue