Zine Prompts to explore your creativity

^{Cover image zine by Prasanna Venkatesh}

Are you looking for some inspiration for your next zine project? You might want to try some of these prompts. Here are a few unique zine prompts can help you generate ideas, explore different topics, and challenge yourself creatively.

1. Make a zine about your favorite hobby. What do you love about it? How did you get into it? What are some tips or tricks you can share? You can include photos, illustrations, stories, reviews, or anything else related to your hobby. Check out Ayushi Singhal’s mini-comic on taking a break and enjoying a bowl of noodles here.

2. Make a zine about a place you have visited or want to visit. What makes this place special? What are some of the sights, sounds, smells, and tastes you experienced or imagine? You can include maps, sketches, postcards, souvenirs, or anything else that captures the essence of the place. Check out Aditi Elassery’s Snapshots photo-zine of Jaipur, Rajasthan, India here, or Rohini Kejriwal’s It Was Just A Dream.

3. Make a zine about a social issue you care about. Why is this issue important to you? What are some of the facts, opinions, or perspectives you have learned or want to learn more about? You can include quotes, statistics, interviews, comics, or anything else that informs or educates your readers. Get some inspiration from Nazaria Arts Collective’s zine bunch – Aazadi Par Sabha Haq Hai, find it here.

4. Make a zine about a random topic. Pick a word, phrase, or question from a book, magazine, website, or any other source and use it as the basis for your zine. You can research, brainstorm, or freewrite about the topic and see where it takes you. You might be surprised by what you discover or create. Get inspired by Saloni Mahajan’s dystopian world in Maskenfreiheit.

5. Make a zine about a personal story or experience. What happened? How did you feel? What did you learn? You can use words, images, symbols, or any other form of expression to tell your story. You can also choose to make your zine autobiographical, fictional, or somewhere in between. Check out Hansika Jethnani’s award-winning perzines here. Or weave your personal story around your favourite music and artists, the way Bad Press did with their Just Another Bunch of Love Songs collection.

You can also pick a theme and collaborate with zinemakers, storytellers, and artists from around the world to put together a zine, like I did for my very first zine – Going Grey – a collection of personal anecdotes, poems, and fiction story on spotting the first strand of grey hair on your head. The most important thing is to have fun and enjoy the process of making your own zine.

These are just some of the many possible prompts you can use to make a zine. Remember that there are no rules or limits when it comes to zines, so you can always tweak, modify, or combine prompts to suit your needs and preferences.