As a kid, Eleanorah-Pearl Antons loved comics.
She made them about her pet, Koda, and she aptly titled the cartoons “Dog.” Decades later, she still sprawls out on her Norfolk living room floor to create, but she's making zines that are sold, mailed, traded like baseball cards or passed around like contraband.
She'll share hers at Norfolk Zine Fest, Saturday at the Chrysler Museum of Art.
Surrounded by reverent and pristine works of art, artists will create and sell their self-published “little magazines,” which are often handmade, scrappy and portable.
“Perfection is not a goal. You're not seeing really finished products in a lot of ways,” said Norfolk Zine Fest organizer Rich Justis.
“Is this idea done? Let's get it out there … I feel like zines are meant to be more topical, and they're meant to kind of be replaced with the next zine.”
A typical zine involves folding and cutting a single sheet of paper such that it makes a book without needing binding. A frequent adage in the community is: There are no rules with zines.
The books can be hand-drawn or photographic, poetic or political, comedic or instructional. They are often sold for little to nothing.
Local authors have created whimsical recipe books for cooking shoes, collections of self-portraits, post-apocalyptic collages and guides to spotting Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in your community.
Similar zines have made headlines. In 2023, Georgia’s Attorney General Chris Carr brought racketeering charges against 61 activists who opposed a $90-million Atlanta police training center known as “Cop City.” Prosecutors claimed the activists’ zine-making as evidence of a criminal enterprise.
Last year, eight anti-ICE protesters in Texas were each sentenced to between 30 and 100 years in prison for crimes such as “providing material support to terrorists.” Evidence seized by the FBI included a standard office printer, a box cutter and boxes of zines covering information about protest strategies and knowing your rights.
“They're censoring you,” Justis said, “Now you’re really cool.”
Zines, as we know them, originated in the 1930s and resurged in popularity throughout the 1960s, the 1990s and now.
But Justis said discreet, concise and cheaply produced booklets have always been around.
“When I think of the 1920s and '30s Harlem Renaissance, they had those pamphlets … the Thomas Paine-era Revolutionary War … Aren't those zines?”
Antons first participated in Norfolk Zine Fest last year. When the print shop messed up her prints, she furiously scribbled her ideas on scrap paper so she could still “sling zines” and trade with the other authors.
Zine-making, being resourceful and approachable, is what Antons needed when she was busy, burnt out and exhausted.
“I would come home and just be surrounded by my art,” Antons said.
Instead of feeling inspired, she just felt guilty that she didn’t have the energy to create more.
But with zines, she discovered, “they're one piece of paper, and it's not as intimidating.”
She now makes drawings and stories that feel deeply personal and finds making and trading zines as “very loving.”
“I want my creatures to have a home.”
“You feel small sometimes as a kid, and as a grown-up. And knowing that you can make a piece of paper into something very important,” Antons said, “I think that's really cool.”
Zines have come back into fashion alongside records and cassette tapes, Justis said.
“I think people always want handheld tactile media.”
The surge in interest comes, in part, from people looking to escape the algorithms, online surveillance and AI-generated content that is unavoidable with their current media diet.
“They want imperfections,” Justis said, and something personal. You are your own editor, and you hand-select your audience.
“You can't go viral on zines,” he said, “I couldn't fold them fast enough.”
“The best secrets are always on paper.”
Norfolk Zine Fest runs 11 a.m. to 3 p.m. and is free. Visit norfolkzinefest.com for more information.