Earlier this year whilst living in Spain’s capital city during my Erasmus Year, I created the body of work ‘12 Streets of Madrid’, which can be viewed here in full detail on my website: https://hollyhoultonphotog.wixsite.com/mysite-2/12-streets-of-madrid The project focused on photographing street art from various different locations around the city, with the aim to give them a more permanent platform to be appreciated; rather than the wash-away, semi-permanent nature they have being displayed on a wall only to be taken down or painted over later on. In order to achieve this, I decided to create a zine to distribute around the city to passers-by, alongside sharing the work online through my social media platforms to also give a permanent space for the work. The zine was designed to share my concept and idea and to celebrate the stunning work created by these street artists, who often go un-acknowledged. I ensured to include the concept in both English and Spanish, to enable both main audiences to be able to read about my work. I also included the names of the streets where the images had been captured, so that readers of the zine would be able to go back and visit the artwork if they wished – or be able to appreciate it through the zine if they found it has been taken down! I decided to include a combination of close-up and further away shots. The close-up shots represent the important and intricate details of the illustrations to give the artist’s methods more credit. The further away shots show the artwork as a whole piece and give more contextual information of its location. I distributed the zines in the places the photographs were taken, so that the passersby who were given one would have seen the artwork in person too and receive this physical element to keep as a record. I deliberately chose to produce the zines using the classical and traditional zine conventions, using average quality printing paper and stapling as the binding technique. This was due to fitting with the grunge/street aesthetic that the artwork itself presents.
Here are some photos of the final zines and their contents:
I found it rather challenging to approach people and attempt to offer them a zine; this was difficult as I find it is always nerve-racking to present my work to other people but also, I was trying to speak Spanish too! However, I found that I had a really positive reception and that more often than not people were very happy and willing to take a copy of my zine! In hindsight, I’m really happy I created the zine and shared it with others in this way, I think it’s been a successful platform and method to give the artists the appreciation of their work I think they deserve and created an interesting photography project in the process.
Here are some photos of me handing out the zines!
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