Toronto Zine Library

Its December! I cant wait till it snows. I thought I would let you know that I have been volunteering with the TZL for a little while now. For those of you that have never been, or even knew it existed...let me fill you in. Its located in the Tranzac, on the second floor, in a little room. The best part, its full of zines!!! It is not the most glamorous, but its pretty great place to hangout, relax, and read some zines. My fave categories are: perzines/litzines/comics, if you havent read "ghost pine" you should! There are so many reasons to come by the TZL, during staffed hours. One good reason being, to hangout with me...but really, you can borrow zines and take them home with you! all you have to do is come by and sign up for a membership its five bucks. Totally worth it! And if dont feel like forking over the five dollars, feel free to just come on down and browse through everything. Lately during the staffed hours, I bring something crafty to work on, and sometimes I will even bring a snack, and wander downstairs to purchase a lovely beverage from the Tranzac bar. Recently I have been doing staffed hours on Wednesday's 6:00pm-8:00pm regularly. So come by and say "hi" stay a lil while and hangout. And if you make zines, why dont you donate one of yours to be included in TZL. So I thought I would share with all of you the awesomeness that is the TZL, maybe I will your faces there soon...if you cant come by, at least visit the website and blog.

http://sitekreator.com/zinelibrary/main_page.html

http://torontozinelibrary.blogspot.com/

Adrienne Kammerer

I am really excited about this one. I love her drawings! and the style she draws them in. The people are so amazing, and what makes it even better is that they are real. With that hair and their clothes, also how awkward they are(i can totally relate) how can you not love them. I can also relate to Adrienne about her art school experience, and working many shitty minimum wage jobs, and drawing to waste some time. Yup, that was not too long ago....You should check out her blog to see more of her drawings, also read the little interview I did with her.


http://adriennekammerer.blogspot.com/


http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/story.cfm?content=172650

Brian Donnelly

This one took forever to get finished...it was alot of back and forth emailing. We both finally had a day where we could meet up and do this, then I woke up checked my email, and received a frantic message about Brian from his girlfriend. He had his appendix removed urgently. Once again we couldn't meet. I felt sorry for the guy....he recovered and we got it done! It was posted way too late for when his solo show was up at Show&Tell. Bummer. Lately, I have been noticing that the Artist Profiles for the NOW site arent as tight as before...it seems to me that the photos are posted really sloppy and sized weird. I think I will speak to my on-line editor about it. The order of the photos doesnt seem to make sense anymore either...I guess the whole art section is lacking really...it is really sad. Try to read the interview....


http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/story.cfm?content=172555

http://www.briandonnelly.org/home.html

The Cult of Done Manifesto

1. There are three states of being. Not knowing, action and completion.
2. Accept that everything is a draft. It helps to get it done.
3. There is no editing stage.
4. Pretending you know what you’re doing is almost the same as knowing what you are doing, so just accept that you know what you’re doing even if you don’t and do it.
5. Banish procrastination. If you wait more than a week to get an idea done, abandon it.
6. The point of being done is not to finish but to get other things done.
7. Once you’re done you can throw it away.
8. Laugh at perfection. It’s boring and keeps you from being done.
9. People without dirty hands are wrong. Doing something makes you right.
10. Failure counts as done. So do mistakes.
11. Destruction is a variant of done.
12. If you have an idea and publish it on the internet, that counts as a ghost of done.
13. Done is the engine of more.

Late last night or early morning, depending on how you look at it(I blame the mice that have been keeping awake to daylight)...I found this, "The Cult of Done Manifesto" I thought it was pretty helpful, with what I am supposed to be working on right now. Numbers 2,5,6,7 & 10 seemed to hit me in face last night. I like deadlines but I always wait till the very last second to start anything. No matter what it may be, or even how prepared I am. I felt like this was something I could identify with and thought I would share it with others in case you are stuck on something. Here is the link to the site from which it came from: http://www.ikiw.org/2009/03/04/the-cult-of-done-manifesto/

Jan Avendano

I had such a good time talking with Jan. I have seen her around and never actually talked to her before the interview. I was mostly familiar with her threadless tees...I also was super impressed with her design patterns that have been used by naked & angry. It was so nice to chat about stuff we are both into, like to-do lists or just lists in general, drawing in crappy sketchbooks and not wanting to use the nice ones that we have. Jan was nice enough to let me see all of her old sketchbooks, and I was really into her doodles and all the crazy fonts she was sketching. We both have the ability to write in different styles. Which can be usefull and a curse...also talking about yummy burgers was great too! hopefully that zine she is working on will be out soon. The interview is really fun, and i took some photos for it, but really her work space is kinda like mine. Really simple, clean and sparse. Alot of her work is computer based(not all), so it was some shots of her desk...so just photos of Jan's work was posted(incase you were wondering what happened). She is such a talented lady, I have way so many more nice things to say about her and her work, just check out her site to see the crazy variety of awesome work she makes.

http://www.janavendano.com/

http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/story.cfm?content=172237

Stephen Appleby-Barr

This is not so much a studio visit, it is just a straight forward interview. The work is so good I felt it didn't really need anything else, really. It was just posted today on the NOW site, because his opening is tonight! I just took a look at the Narwhal site and it seems all of pieces are already sold!!! Which is completely understandable, considering how well received his first solo was. I was so glad I had a chance to get Stephen to answer some of my questions just a couple days before his show...he was so prompt and polite. I know I write this about everyone I interview, but I did enjoy his answers alot. They seemed so honest and casual but also smart. I think the interview turned out nicely. The opening is tonight at Narwhal, I am not one for attending crowded art gallery openings but this one I will not miss out on, thats for sure.
Let me know what you think of this interview: http://www.nowtoronto.com/daily/story.cfm?content=172126

http://www.narwhalartprojects.com/index.php

Anneke van Bommel

This is something new I just started doing with TCA. It is similar to the Artist Profiles...but a little bit different. I am excited to be apart of TCA, and was so happy Anneke agreed to be my first victim for the interview. Her subject matter really intrigued me, and how stunning and simple her peices look. I really want one of her axe brooches (hint-hint). We also talked about her NSCAD experience... She is really busy, I could tell by how many different projects she had on the go at her studio. I was impressed by how tidy and organzied the space was...kinda like my work space. Anneke doesn't have a website, but you can see her pieces on Etsy.
Also read the interview and let me know what you think of it...it's new so any input would be welcome...

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5274564

http://torontocraftalert.ca/2009/10/22/questions-for-crafters-anneke-van-bommel/#more-6624