Check out profiles of other countries in our Global Zine Report.
We asked Catalina Salazar aka Rapiña to write us a zine report about Bogotá, Colombia.
This is a zine report about what happens in these lands of the mango. For three years I’ve worked in La Maleta Fanzinera (which translates to “Fanzine Suitcase”), which has zines from all over Latin America. Thanks to this project, I’ve gotten to know more about the zine movement, and we are always getting new volumes in our collection.
Bogotá is a great place for zines — we frequently have workshops, zine fairs, and small independent presses. Indie projects that use zines as a means of distribution, and a platform to find new ways of expressing their ideas, are coming to light.
At La valija del fuego
There are plenty of great spaces to find fanzine treasures. One example is A la postre 101, a zine library that’s open to the public and holds lots of ’80s and ’90s gems, along with a little café. The Distribuidora Libertaria Rojinegro is a distro you can find in one of Bogotá’s old-school neighbourhoods, and it promotes the development and spread of free thinking. The Valija de Fuego bookstore is a punk home base. It has been open for a bit more than eight years, carries a super rich range of zines and has its own small press.
Amongst the workshops there is Colmillo, a risograph and silk screen studio, where they illustrate cassettes and always release accompanying zines. Another place to find the movement would be the women who run the Histéricas collective, a group of empowered women who use zines as a medium to share knowledge about diversity and the social problems faced by women in Colombia.
Catalina and zinester Mariela Pabón at a discussion of zines during Entreviñetas festival
This city is in continual movement — some projects end, and others gain strength in the indie scene. This is just the tip of the iceberg of cool zine projects in the country of mangos.