Get involved:
We Are Unfinished Artists invites all craft workers, artists and makers to submit discarded works and also join them in creating new pieces from their collected fragments.

From September, they will be running weekly workshops at mac Birmingham where people can bring submissions, work on any pieces that spark their interest, and help to construct the final exhibition. If you would like to sign up to the workshops visit the mac website.

Find out more:
Website

//////

For more creative delights we’ve Spotted on the web take a look here.

It is devoted to people’ favourite photographs and stories behind them. Submissions usually include photos of loved ones, significant locations and images portraying special memories wanted to be preserved.

Latest, and 6th, Romka issue features photos from 69 different people from 33 countries across the world. For the first time, it also has special features in a form of an illustrated short story and a collection of found photographs.

Everyone, both professional and amateur photographers, is encouraged to share and submit their favourite photos.

Romka magazine is available online, in selected bookstores and in public collections.

/////

Find more zines we’ve featured here.

Popshot’s Jacob Denno tells us more:

Popshot started as a mini rebellion against how poetry was presenting itself to the outside world and the musty, elitist and exclusive reputation it had managed to acquire. Poetry can be an amazing art form which when written well can move people in ways that other forms of literature can’t. I didn’t really think other poetry magazines were doing a good job of showing that, so Popshot became the vehicle to publish what has since been dubbed ‘pop poetry’ – poetry that’s a little more accessible and isn’t afraid of the odd rhyme here and there.

Aims from early days have definitely mellowed. In the early days it felt like Popshot was on a bit of a mission to change the reputation of poetry altogether, which isn’t such an easy task. I think it’s important for every new magazine to have a strong mission statement and define why it needs to exist, however, as time has gone by and Popshot has started to develop a reputation for itself as a publisher of new and interesting writing, the desire to continue preaching against the establishment has lessened somewhat. Nowadays, the focus is much more on making Popshot as good as it can be, rather than trying to convince people that poetry isn’t just for people who wear tweed jackets.

Being named as one of the ‘fresh breed of literary magazines’ by The Independent was a bit of a highlight, as well as being placed on The Observer’s ‘Cool List’ back in 2010. I’m not sure whether that makes it cool now though… Gaining international distribution into 18 countries was a pretty big achievement and knowing that Popshot can be found on the shelves of Barnes & Noble in Hawaii, or in a newsagents in Sao Paulo, never seems to wear thin!

Issue 7 has just come out so that’s pretty exciting to have created another issue that I’m super proud of. There are also changes afoot with the magazine as of Issue 8. I’ve had ideas circulating around my head for a long while as to where I want the magazine to go and hopefully this year that’ll happen. It won’t be anything super drastic but it will mean the magazine will become a little more refined and a little wider in terms of remit. I’ll stop talking before I give too much away!

People can get involved by heading to our website, and more specifically to the ‘submit’ page, then reading every word that’s on there. Popshot has an open policy which means we collate poetry on a submissions basis – so the most famous poet in the world is given the same amount of time and attention as the kid that just wrote their first poem. It’s all done on the individual merit of the poem. The illustrators however are individually commissioned so if you want to get involved, write us a nice email and send a link to your portfolio/website.

Depending on where you are in the world, there might be a bookshop nearby that stocks Popshot. You can find out if there is by heading to our stockists page. Alternatively, you can order any of our issues through the Popshot online shop. We ship to anywhere in the world so geographical distance is no boundary whatsoever.

Visit Popshot’s website here.
Find it on Facebook here.

/////

Find more zines we’ve featured here.