Their story, in their words…
For my challenge, I decided to host a two-session series of zine making workshops for other year 12s at school. I believe that at our age, it’s rare to find time to be creative – and when we are, it’s often for academic purposes. I hoped that with these workshops, I could show my peers a way of making art that was accessible and massively customisable – and by the end they would have made something they were proud of!
I ran two workshops, each an hour long over the span of two weeks. On the first session, I gave a short presentation about what zines are and the history behind them, then gave some guidance on how to go about making a zine using all the craft materials I had supplied. The aim of the first session was for everyone to make their first draft of their final zine and it worked super well, I was glad to see how everyone engaged so readily.
At the end of the session, everyone gave me a list of photos they wanted printed for their final zines. The second session was calmer as everyone knew what to do now – I handed out the printouts and everyone got to work making their final zines while I put their music requests on in the background.
To help fundraising, I made prints of the zines and sold them at a local library event. They ended up being very popular, with 8 zines selling for 75p each!
Overall it worked out even better than I had hoped – so many people turned up and made an effort to get involved and all created something, I appreciated their energy so much! The environment and feedback was super positive.
Thank you to the Mark Evison foundation for funding this! It helped me develop countless crucial skills, such a leadership, organisation and presentation, and I feel much more confident about my abilities in these areas now. I plan to do more of this in the future!
