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Writing & research for graphic designers
(Text)
120
This book is a densely illustrated and sharply argued history of the
humble fanzine. Written by Teal Triggs, a graphic design academic,
it is a switchback ride through the outlaw terrain of samizdat zine
publishing. Triggs shows how fanzines offer a maverick history of
pop culture; how they have acted as pathfinders for stylistic and
editorial developments in mainstream media; and how they presaged
the DIY publishing revolution made possible by the internet.
Triggs is a surefooted guide: she maintains a cool analytical
detachment and avoids tipping over into fannish obsession,
or for that matter, academic turgidity. Her book begins by
delving into the antecedents of zines. The term “fanzine” was
coined by the American Sci-Fi enthusiast and zine producer
Louis Russell Chauvenet in 1940 “when he declared his pref-
erence for the term ‘fanzine’ rather than ‘fanmag.’” By 1949
the word had entered the cultural lexicon and appeared as an
entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.
The author somewhat fancifully connects contemporary
fanzines with publishing activity at the time of the French
Revolution, Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense (1776),
and the engravings of William Blake (1778). She is, however,
on more measurable ground when she links zines to the pam-
phleteering of Dada, Fluxus and the Situationists. From the
publications of these avant-garde groups we can follow a lineage
that travels through Sci-Fi “fan” mags of 1940s America, on
through the Underground press of the 1960s, and finally arrives
in the Xeroxed and stapled fanzines of the ’70s and ’80s.
If the punk eruption of the mid-’70s ushered in an era of
DIY music and labels, then a generation of writers, designers
and editors also seized the moment to bypass the publishing
establishment and speak directly to like-minded audiences.
Triggs stresses the importance of Jamie Reid’s Suburban Press
(1970–75) —“a Situationist-inspired publication that, along
with Sub magazine and King Mob, provided a bridge between
the hippie press and punk fanzines,” and the appearance in
1976 of Mark Perry’s Sniffin’ Glue. She points out, however,
that Perry rejected the “first fanzine” tag and cited Greg
Shaw’s Who Put the Bomp (1970–79) and Brian Hogg’s
Bam Balam (1974–c.1980s) as precursors.
It wasn’t only music that fanned the fanzine revolution:
oppositional political movements of all colours—anarcho-punks,
skinheads and sexual revolutionaries—adopted the fanzine for-
mat to advance contrarian cultural agendas. Triggs devotes
a chapter to the riot grrrl movement and its smart use of the
fanzine format. She notes the radical subversion of feminine ico-
nography—lipstick lettering, romance fiction, ’50s housewives
CASE STUDY:
fanzines by Teal Triggs
aDrian shaughnessy
Designer, writer, broadcaster, and publisher of Unit Editions
(Originally published in The Wire #324, February 2011)
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section 4
learning from experiences writers discuss their writing
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121
’70s and ’80s Fanzines
are the epitome of D.I.Y.,
some are photocopied
sheets, like Starlet, others
like Letigre and Twinkle
Eye are printed offset on
newsprint.
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Writing & research for graphic designers
(Text)
120
This book is a densely illustrated and sharply argued history of the
humble fanzine. Written by Teal Triggs, a graphic design academic,
it is a switchback ride through the outlaw terrain of samizdat zine
publishing. Triggs shows how fanzines offer a maverick history of
pop culture; how they have acted as pathfinders for stylistic and
editorial developments in mainstream media; and how they presaged
the DIY publishing revolution made possible by the internet.
Triggs is a surefooted guide: she maintains a cool analytical
detachment and avoids tipping over into fannish obsession,
or for that matter, academic turgidity. Her book begins by
delving into the antecedents of zines. The term “fanzine” was
coined by the American Sci-Fi enthusiast and zine producer
Louis Russell Chauvenet in 1940 “when he declared his pref-
erence for the term ‘fanzine’ rather than ‘fanmag.’” By 1949
the word had entered the cultural lexicon and appeared as an
entry in the Oxford English Dictionary.
The author somewhat fancifully connects contemporary
fanzines with publishing activity at the time of the French
Revolution, Thomas Paine’s pamphlet Common Sense (1776),
and the engravings of William Blake (1778). She is, however,
on more measurable ground when she links zines to the pam-
phleteering of Dada, Fluxus and the Situationists. From the
publications of these avant-garde groups we can follow a lineage
that travels through Sci-Fi “fan” mags of 1940s America, on
through the Underground press of the 1960s, and finally arrives
in the Xeroxed and stapled fanzines of the ’70s and ’80s.
If the punk eruption of the mid-’70s ushered in an era of
DIY music and labels, then a generation of writers, designers
and editors also seized the moment to bypass the publishing
establishment and speak directly to like-minded audiences.
Triggs stresses the importance of Jamie Reid’s Suburban Press
(1970–75) —“a Situationist-inspired publication that, along
with Sub magazine and King Mob, provided a bridge between
the hippie press and punk fanzines,” and the appearance in
1976 of Mark Perry’s Sniffin’ Glue. She points out, however,
that Perry rejected the “first fanzine” tag and cited Greg
Shaw’s Who Put the Bomp (1970–79) and Brian Hogg’s
Bam Balam (1974–c.1980s) as precursors.
It wasn’t only music that fanned the fanzine revolution:
oppositional political movements of all colours—anarcho-punks,
skinheads and sexual revolutionaries—adopted the fanzine for-
mat to advance contrarian cultural agendas. Triggs devotes
a chapter to the riot grrrl movement and its smart use of the
fanzine format. She notes the radical subversion of feminine ico-
nography—lipstick lettering, romance fiction, ’50s housewives
CASE STUDY:
fanzines by Teal Triggs
aDrian shaughnessy
Designer, writer, broadcaster, and publisher of Unit Editions
(Originally published in The Wire #324, February 2011)
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section 4
learning from experiences writers discuss their writing
(Text)
121
’70s and ’80s Fanzines
are the epitome of D.I.Y.,
some are photocopied
sheets, like Starlet, others
like Letigre and Twinkle
Eye are printed offset on
newsprint.
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Writing & research for graphic designers
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Cover of Fanzines by
Teal Triggs represents
the photocopy ethos
of the zones.
Vague, Kitten Carousel, Bombshell and Ablaze care little for the niceties of design, but the emotional quality is clear.
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What is the virtue of the funny/surprising anecdote?
Most graphic design is not autobiographical, in the way that painting
and other forms of visual art often are. Therefore, to understand graphic
designers we usually have to look at their actions and words rather than
their work—ye shall know them by their anecdotes! An anecdote, if sharply
observed and sharply told, can take us to the core of someone faster than
historical analysis.
What do you feel are the advantages of using a strongly personal
writing voice (as opposed to the more distant third-person one)?
My own preference is for something in between. It is a very rare writer
who can impose him or herself into a piece of writing and not obscure
their subject. Equally, I find overtly academic texts where the writer’s
personality has been eliminated, to be off-putting. When I started writing
about design I scrupulously avoided the first person. Then I realized that
I was usually writing about subjects that I had direct personal experience
with, and it was this that gave my writing conviction. So I gradually
allowed the personal pronoun to creep in. I still have to boot it out
occasionally.
What role do you feel personal taste should play in design criticism?
I’d go as far as to say that I don’t think there is any criticism without
personal taste. Absolute objectivity is impossible. The art of critical writing,
however, is to prove that your personal taste is correct—or at least valid.
We like those critics who share our prejudices and give voice to them.
with aprons—to sanction the ethos that “riot grrrls were both
empowered to be feminists and had the choice to be feminine.”
Triggs makes the point that not all fanzines were opposition-
al, and that the scene has always been big enough to accommo-
date football zines, comic zines and “a housewife from Virginia
or from Hertfordshire producing a zine about collecting Pez
dispensers.” She also notes the existence of a burgeoning meta
zine culture involving fanzines about fanzines, academic sym-
posia and zine festivals.
Fanzine producers were early adopters of the internet. E-
zines flourished around bulletin boards and the hacking and
phreaking movements of the early ’80s. But as vast swathes
of the fanzine audience moved online—first to MySpace, then
Facebook, and latterly Twitter—fanzine producers retained
their stubborn fondness for paper and printed formats. Triggs
quotes one zine theorist who noted that the internet has made
“communication too easy and that the deviant socialization
process of the underground might be lost as a consequence.” In
the final chapter she identifies “craft” and “making by hand” as
prime drivers in fanzine culture.
As a graphic designer in the 80s and 90s I was so bound up
in learning the formal aspects of my craft—grids, the laws of ty-
pography and sophisticated production techniques—that I rarely
felt much empathy with the seemingly chaotic and anti-formal-
ist fanzine scene. Yet today, I look at the covers and spreads from
early zines and I see a lost Eden: a graphic arcadia that has been
submerged in a tidal wave of uniformity, visual conservatism,
and the homogenizing effect of rampant commercialism.
What do designers stand to gain through the honing of their writing skills?
Clarity. Mastery of their subject matter. A deeper understanding of the
world. Heightened communication skills. I meet so many designers (mostly
students) who have no interest in joining the conventional world of professional
graphic design. They are part of what I have started to call “post-graphic
design.” This is a phrase I’ve been using to describe my teaching: It means
that since it is no longer an attractive option to work in a traditional design
studio or in the design department of a corporation, students are looking
for alternative ways of making a living. And one of the ways they can do
this is through taking ownership of their own projects. I see students inter-
ested in using design skills not to make beautiful design objects and statutes
(which I wanted to do), but to use their skills to achieve social and cultural
goals. Almost certainly, this will involve “reporting skills”— and that means
writing skills.
Being a designer informs your writing; does being a writer inform
your design?
Yes, mainly in the increased understanding of a subject I have after writing
about it, but also in quite mundane ways. For instance, I am never shy about
suggesting copy changes to clients when I see that the copy they have given
me is bad — or doesn’t fit into my layouts. For a long time I suffered silently
while trying to get bad copy to fit. Then I developed the confidence to sug-
gest better copy, and as a result, my design has often been “improved” simply
by rewriting the copy to make it fit. You can’t always do this — I wouldn’t
try rewriting a legal document, for example — but it can benefit design and
communication if designers are able to suggest copy improvements.
Adrian Shaughnessy Talks about Being Personal
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