Tell us a little about yourselves.
We are partners in almost everything we do, though Kseniya is better at most of it. As the organizers of the Brooklyn Zine Fest (second annual is Sunday, April 21st 2013 at Public Assembly in Williamsburg!) and in our own zines like I Love Bad Movies, we’ve gotten to work with so many amazing writers and artists that it’s almost embarrassing. And every time we get a new bookcase, it is immediately filled.
Who or what are your influences?
Matt: I’m interested in the places and stories you don’t usually see and hear. Davy Rothbart tells the untold tales in his own writing and as the editor of FOUND Magazine, and his work has long been a spirit-guide in my own.
Kseniya: Julia Child, for her zest and spice of life more than her cooking. She took a few decades to figure out what she wanted and loved to do, which is comforting since those things aren’t immediately clear for everybody. As she wrote in My Life in France, “The pleasures of the table, and of life, are infinite – toujours bon appétit!”
What subjects do you touch upon in your work?
In an abstract way: dedication and (healthy) obsession about art and other people.
In a straightforward way: good movies, bad movies, game shows, geography, body parts (mostly human), Internet dating, and cultural history.
What is your most recent work?
Matt is putting the final touches on Come on Down, a zine of essays by game show contestants, writers, producers, and viewers, about a whole slew of shows that you’ve watched many times. It’s a collection of glimpses into a very polished world that doesn’t normally open itself up to the curious. Every piece is revealing and fascinating in different ways.
Kseniya just finished Fig. 1, the first in a zine series that celebrates weird, bold, and occasionally uncomfortable diagrams collected from a huge range of books and pamphlets. This one is themed “Human Bodies,” so there’s plenty of awkward situations.
What are you looking forward to most at the fest?
Mostly, we want to incite a terrible rivalry between Scranton and Wilkes-Barre that turns brother against sister and frenemies into actual enemies. But once that’s done, we (lacka)wanna meet new folks from the northeast reaches of Penn’s Woods and read the stories they’re telling.
Photo credit by Anna White.
