zine Archives — bd-studios.com

💋💋💋 New zine Kissing Hedwig out now 💋💋💋

Kissing Hedwig zine

If you’re on the bd email list, you already know we sent out an announcement a couple of weeks ago about my new zine Kissing Hedwig (if you’re not on the list, do sign up!). I debuted this new work at the 8th Annual Rainbow Book Fair in New York City. This is the second year bd-studios.com tabled along with our sister publisher New Lit Salon Press. We had a full table of artist publications and literary fiction available for purchase.

Kissing Hedwig is really special to me. The essay is a unique blend of memoir and Hedwig and the Angry Inch fanzine. The Hedwig show played an important part in my life as a young, queer artist coming of age in New York City in the late ’90’s. This zine is the first time I’ve publicly told part of my coming out story. There’s more to tell—and one day I will. But, for now, I hope you’ll enjoy Kissing Hedwig. The zine is lovingly made, hand bound, and custom stamped. It’s made with lots of love and I can’t imagine a more perfect expression of the story it tells inside. Contact us if you’d like to buy a copy!

New Zine: marie was an artist by luke kurtis

My latest zine is marie was an artist. It’s a fully illustrated but handheld size zine featuring a single poem. The zine format is well suited to this type of intensely focused yet concise content. The idea behind this particular zine was to tell the story of my Aunt Marie, who died of cancer in 1987, through her own paintings.

Marie is a special figure in my life. Though she died before I was even ten years old, she somehow went on to influence me a great deal as I began to build my own creative path. She was the only member of my family that was an artist. Her paintings hung on the walls of my parents and other family members growing up. She watched over me in this way, making me keenly aware of how an artist’s presence radiates from her work and becomes part of something much larger. Looking at Marie’s paintings as a kid always made me wonder… could I be an artist one day?

Even now Marie still inspires me. With this zine I hope maybe I’ve inspired her—wherever she may be—a little bit too.

See the zine in the bd Library.

Linocut portrait of luke kurtis by Rick Villodas

Rick Villodas’s linoleum cut based on my self-portrait from the cover of INTERSECTION no. 7. His print won an award at the Richter Association for the Arts member art show. Rick is such a talented print-maker and I love the way he transformed my work into a new medium. Above is a photo I took of his print, titled The Collaborator, as exhibited in the Cyber Blade show (which also contained our Collaboration piece). Below is the cover of my zine his print is based on.

Cyber Blade group show curated by Rick Villodas

This past weekend I showed some work from my muse series for the first time since last year. Rick Villodas, who first saw my muse prints in the Just Panic… show, curated the Cyber Blade show. He selected some of the works that were in Just Panic (muse no.’s 7, 11, and 12) along with muse no. 18, which had never been shown before. It was just a weekend pop-up show but I was able to make it up to Danbury that Sunday. It was refreshing to get out of the city for an afternoon (even though it was a bit cold–the venue’s furnace was out that weekend)! Above is a photo of me with my work (photo by Matthew Cales).