zine, [zeen] noun. 1. abbr. of fanzine; 2. any amateurly-published periodical. Oxford Reference

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Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Octopussy #1

from Blackguard


68 pages (not quite), $3.50 from Paco D. Taylor, 7730 East Broadway #925, Tucson AZ 85710, USA + stpaco(at)gmail.com
A quick flip through this zine and I knew it was a good one.
First up, Paco's confession that after a shitty break-up he distracted himself from the pain with booze and strip clubs. He wrote 17 stripper haikus which follow. Here's one of 'em:

HELP ME TO FORGET
TEQUILA IN THE SHOT GLASS
DANCER AT MY CHEST

Then four pages of graffiti art - really cool and wild stuff. Art collective Cum* from Ghent, Belgium covered that town's streets with their porno graffiti then got so renowned on the internet that their work become in demand at real actual art galleries. This stuff is more explicit than the street stuff. (Some of these pages are doubled up. I must have received a prototype copy!)
There's a section on Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai (1760-1849) - it has been estimated that around 35,000 paintings, drawings, prints, and illustrated books were made by Hokusai during his lifetime. And it's pretty cool that he ranged so widely with his subject matter that Paco could select four of his works featuring octopi to fit the zine title. (There's an awesome colour centrefold of Hokusai's 'Octopi and Shelldiver'.)
There's a great piece about a cool girl, Erika, that Paco met through MySpace and formed a unique, long-distance friendship with. He sent her his zine, which revealed personal stuff about him, and in turn she sent him photos of herself and her bare ass, and other saucy type snaps. But! She had a boyfriend! I'm not gonna reveal what happened when she invited Paco to stay with them, so now you'll definitely need to order the zine! Heh heh.
[This story is repeated in my copy. It ends then starts again! Hopefully my copy was just a prototype like I mentioned earlier.]
Anyway, next up is a photo series of India's 'Kama Sutra Temple' (Kandariya Mahadeva) "adorned both inside and out with a mind-blowing assortment of eroticized sandstone figures."
Cool zine. I'll be looking forward to Paco's second issue.

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