Monday after school I found myself in Ms. Wax’s room among many excited and chatty WY students. They spoke about art and 80s music as cookies were passed around. This is a typical beginning for a meeting of Whitney Young’s new Zine Club. Friends Milo Hasmonek ‘18 and Bridget Musker ‘18 began the club this year to spend more time making Zines (pronounced like -Zine in the word magazine) and talking with people who have similar interests. I sat down with the two founders during a meeting to find out more about what they do and what their club is about.

“We make zines, which are like magazines but smaller. A zine is a self-published literary magazine. They can be niche; you can do anything you want on paper!” says Bridget. Essentially, a zine can be about everything and anything you want it to be, and can contain drawings, comics, and photos. There are no rules; it’s up to the creator! When asked why they started the club, Milo says that they “wanted to do something different, there wasn’t really anything like it. The WXYZ Zine is mainly about writing, which isn’t a bad thing because writing is great, but we wanted to do something more art based.” When asked why she joined, Bridget says “I love my best friend [Milo], I love to have fun, I love spending my days making art even if I’m not good at it!”

They spend most of the meeting drawing and goofing around. Every member seems happy to be there and have time to de-stress after the school day. “It’s a club for people not good at making art” Milo says. Not that their members aren’t talented, but they want to stress that there isn’t any pressure to be amazing at making things. The idea is to simply create and have a good time. Club Member August Greenberg ‘17 says that “Zine Club is one of the top clubs, big league, tremendous.” He loves drawing and is glad Zine Club gives him the time to do it while surrounded by fun people. Bridget says that “It’s really fun, it’s really chill, and we have people of all ages.” When asked what the end goal of all their work is Milo says that they hope to create a huge collection of the art that gets made during meetings. Another club member Daisy Rivera ‘18 says that in Zine Club “great times come all the time!” The room enthusiastically agrees with the statement as they continue drawing and chatting.

“How fun is it on a scale of 1 to 1 million? 1 Million” says Milo. The meeting I attended is clearly evident of that.

Zine Club meets on Mondays in Room 179 directly after school, inquire within if you’d like to join.