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Zine Fest Houston 2018 and Remembering ZFH Founder, shane patrick boyle

Miscellaneous Manuscript Collections
Elizabeth Cruces at the recent 15th annual Zine Fest Houston.

Elizabeth Cruces at the 15th annual Zine Fest Houston.

Last month Lawndale Art Center hosted the 15th annual Zine Fest Houston festival. Held annually in Houston, Texas, Zine Fest Houston (ZFH) was founded in 2004 by local creative shane patrick boyle as an event dedicated to promoting zines, mini-comics, and other forms of small press, alternative, underground, DIY media and art. Following the donation of the ZFH records and zine collections to UH’s Special Collections and the in the wake of boyle’s unexpected passing in 2017, current ZFH organizers (Maria-Elisa Heg and Stacy Kirages) collaboratively worked with UH’s Hispanic Collections Archivist, Elizabeth Lisa Cruces to increase awareness of boyle’s contributions to Houston’s DIY community and local history. boyle was an avid collector and creator of zines and is responsible for the bulk of zines and ephemera found in the collection. Thanks to spb’s collecting and contributions to growing the DIY scene in Houston, ZFH and other creatives have been able to flourish.

In addition to showcasing some of the earliest hand-made artwork and ephemera from the ZFH Records, Cruces provided information to attendees on how to make their own zines and how to donate zines to the archives. Regarding the future of this living archive, Cruces said, “For the ZFH archives to succeed in their mission—to more inclusively preserve Houston’s diverse voices, in particular LGBTQ and minority groups, we not only need to ensure that the collection is accessible to all, but that it continues to grow and in turn show the increasingly national and transnational contributions of Houstonians.”

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