Other Worlds Zine Fair at Marrickville

“The Other Worlds Fair is unique for being entirely run by zine-makers and independent creators and is now Sydney’s biggest event for do-it-yourself zine-culture,” said event organiser Safdar Ahmed.  

Another zine-maker who has been involved in the organising of the fair is Ben Juers who also created the poster for this year’s event based on an old Industrial Workers of the World poster from 1917. 

“The poster represents the potential for small-scale, handmade and personally inflected art, shared among like-minded individualists, to cut through an increasingly bleak, fragmented and disorienting reality.” 

Juers said this is particularly apt in a 2017 political landscape characterised by a growing refugee crisis, nuclear uncertainty and the rise of Trump and other populist figures. 

DIY zine-making and community led art culture is more important than ever in helping to connect people and ideas in a landscape of alternative facts and massive cuts to the number of journalists employed in the media industry. 

“This year we had over 170 people apply for tables and sifting through the work and ideas of these makers from across Australia it was clear that politics is on everyone’s minds, with a huge range of peoples’ work covering topics ranging from refugee rights to issues of class and belonging,” said Jane Redgrave, another zine-maker involved in the event. 

“The fair is especially important for creating a space in which zine-makers from all backgrounds can exhibit and sell their work.

“This is especially important in Sydney where community led projects are becoming harder and harder to put on given the high cost of living and working here.”

This year’s fair will feature almost 100 stallholders who are travelling from around the country.