Art students circulate new ‘Local Strangers’ zine on campus

Two senior fine arts students are finding new ways to showcase their art, and the art of their peers, through producing and selling a new zine called “Local Strangers.”

Zines are smaller-circulation artistic publications produced with a “do-it-yourself” ethos, usually aimed at specific subcultures of people with the intent to highlight underground culture, music and in this case, local artists. They are typically the shape and size of a magazine or booklet and are meant for aesthetic experience.

Emma Johnson, senior fine arts major with a printmaking emphasis, and Dillon Bryant, senior fine arts major with a photography emphasis, are working on producing and printing the second edition of their new “Local Strangers” zine to highlight student artwork.

Bryant said zines are a good way for artists to get their name and work out to people without the hassle of hosting an art gallery, which they said are few and far between in this region.

“One of the things that we’re both interested in as art students, as artists, is making opportunities for ourselves to get our work out there because we’re basically in the middle of nowhere in kind of a remote area,” Bryant said. “It’s very difficult to go see galleries and museum exhibitions and art shows like that, so we were thinking about what if we had our own way of getting our work out there?”

Johnson said the idea for the zine had been “brewing” between them since the fall semester. They chose the name through a poll in the Student Art Alliance (SAA), which they are both executive members of. 

“Zines are definitely getting really popular with artists right now,” she said. “You don’t have to be an art student to be (featured in the zine), it’s really just anyone creative who wants to have their stuff shown.”

“Local Strangers” is printed on newsprint, which Bryant said is more “in the spirit” of zine production. Each zine is two dollars, and they are hoping to sell copies at upcoming student art sales through SAA.

“The really fun thing with zines is that they’re so grungy and low fidelity. A lot of people have in the past used cutting and pasting and Xeroxing them, so it’s really just like a DIY approach, doing whatever works,” he said.

Sam Ostman, a junior fine arts major with an emphasis in painting, has two of her paintings featured in the first edition of the zine. She said she heard about the zine through the close-knit fine arts community.

“The painting department is pretty tiny because not a lot of people think you can make a living selling paintings, so any opportunity for people to see my work and also wanted to help the community,” she said. “I wanted to contribute more. I think it’s cool to make a space for students to have their work displayed locally.”

Ostman said her work is about contemporary combat sports and how women are viewed and treated within that culture.

“There’s been a lot of people that don’t think that they’re legitimate athletes because they’re women and so I want to paint these portraits of them,” she said. “They’re all really bloody and that’s not meant to be like shock value or anything, it’s more meant to be a testament to how strong they are. It’s really about uplifting them… it’s become like this feminist overture for me.”

Submissions for upcoming editions of the zine are open. Johnson said anyone can submit artwork, writing or even promotions; it’s completely open.

“It’s free to submit work to this. It’s so open,” she said. “If you have a speech you’re giving soon, and you want to advertise for it, send in something. Whatever you want to submit, submit it and if your work gets published, you get a free copy of the zine.”

Contact the makers of “Local Strangers” at [email protected] to submit work.