Liminal Excavations (2024) is a zine I co-produced with Aksel Biørn-Hansen for the 2024 ICT4S (ICT for Sustainability) conference. I stumbled into this one when I spotted that Aksel was going to be a Zine chair for the conference. Zine making was a way to bring the conversations, ideas and moments that happen in liminal spaces between the main program at conferences into a container that could be shared with conference goers and beyond.
You can find an archive of the call for contributions here on the ICT4S site.
We oversaw the curation and creation of Liminal Excavations, including:
- Call and curation - I played trouble maker and vibe checker, helping ensure that the zine was open to all, and not stuck completely in the academic culture that prevents the ideas and knowledge that people produce getting out into the world.
- Collaboration and Connections sessions - We hosted remote sessions where contributors, a mix of authors, designs and illustrators, could gather to share their ideas and make connections to other folk that could collaborate. These sessions were also the primary way that we found consent around the design decisions we made.
- Presentation and Zine Cafe - At the conference we ran a facilitated workshop style session. We handed out physical copies of the zine, and then ran a cafe style session where tables in the session all made their own DIY contributions about themes and topics that they discussed. After the session we kept resources and the zines (art?) that attendees had created in a common space so that anyone could Zine Cafe at any point throughout the conference, which you can see here:
My Role
- Co-editor and co-factilitator - I was both a co-editor of the Zine and facilitator of the Zine cafe and session at the conference.
Tech and tools
- Adobe InDesign
- Adobe Photoshop
Reflection
Zines and zine making offers alternative ways to participate and have a voice in a conference. Having been a multidisciplinary early career researcher I’d always struggled to find the ways to bring complex and multidisciplinary ideas into existing communities. In academia you can do a talk, write a paper, present a poster or host/attend a workshop. These ways of contributing can feel wrong sized hen you want to dip your toe into a new community or communicate complex ideas to different audiences. In my practice I’ve found zine making a wonder way to quickly turn an idea into something that is complete enough to share with others. Zines in academic settings lower the entry to participation for those who are new, curious or just passing by a topic or community.