An early-90s feminist movement, riot grrrl inspired many fanzines, posters and flyers. Now some of the best examples have been brought together in a book, The Riot Grrrl Collection, published by The Feminist Press at £24.99. Below, former riot grrrl Olivia Laing talks through her favourites.
Read Olivia Laing's recollections of her time as a teenage member of the movement here
Sun 30 Jun 2013 00.05 BST First published on Sun 30 Jun 2013 00.05 BST
Riot Grrrl no. 1, Molly Neuman and Allison Wolfe, July 1991. All you need to start a counter-culture revolution is a few sheets of A4 paper, a typewriter, a photocopier, a Sharpie and some old magazines. Zines were fast to produce and easy to distribute.
Flyer by Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill. You can’t have a political movement without a few good manifestos. This one, by Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna, focuses on the individual’s responsibility not to perpetuate the system of oppression. As feminists have always known, the personal is political. The combination of “Trust” and “Burn down the walls that say you can’t” sums up the defiantly open spirit of riot grrrl.
Riot Grrrl no. 1, Molly Neuman and Allison Wolfe, July 1991. Given out at gigs and mailed to an ever-increasing network of girls, the aesthetic of the earliest zines was sexy and subversive, clashing together punk and Just 17.
Thorn No 2 zine by Kelly Marie Martin, 1992. What tends to be forgotten about riot grrrl is that it highlighted underground cultural figures. Martin wrote an ardent homage to artist and Aids activist David Wojnarowicz, who had died that year. Other zines paid tribute to feminist poet Audre Lorde, and activist Amy Carter, daughter of the former US president.
Bikini Kill no. 2, circa 1991. This much-reproduced image of a leaping cheerleader with pompoms and a Bikini Kill sweater captures the riot grrrl aesthetic. The desire to reclaim girlishness, the willingness to show (uncool, dorky) emotion, the ragged hand-lettering: it’s all there. And while the movement was often irritatingly reduced to its fashions by the mainstream media, I must confess to coveting that jumper.
Go-Go flyer, Kathleen Hanna, 1991. In a pre-internet world, riot grrrl spread mostly by paper: flyers, zines, stickers and letters. Creating all-girl spaces was a key act, as was the creation of all-girl mosh pits at the front of gigs. The rallying cry of "Girls to the Front" is also the title of Sara Marcus’s 2010 history of the movement.
My Life with Evan Dando, Popstar, Kathleen Hanna. In 1993, Bikini Kill’s Kathleen Hanna created a visually raw mock-psychotic fanzine about Lemonheads frontman Evan Dando in order to explore violence, objectification, misogyny and the politics of creative success. More artistically risky than many riot grrrl productions, it remains an extraordinary document, inspired in part by rage and horror at the anti-feminist mass murderer Marc Lépine.
Riot grrrl Orange County flyer. From conventions and gigs to tiny support groups, Riot Grrrl was about building connections and solidarity between teenage girls. Sometimes loose-knit and sometimes tightly bonded, Riot Grrrl collectives acted as spaces for discussion and organising, as well as goofing around making up songs and communally produced zines.
Cupsize no. 3, Sasha Cagen. Although by 1995 the movement was waning, zine production had become considerably more ambitious. Cupsize, edited by writer Sasha Cagen (author in 2004 of Quirkyalone), is a case in point. The cover promises articles such as ‘I lost my soul to postmodernism’ and ‘The truth about night people’, while inside there’s a long thoughtful discussion about the role of the media in the demise of riot grrrl.
Slant no. 5, Mimi Thi Ngyuen, 1996. Riot grrrl was criticised for failing to be truly inclusive, or transcending its status as a predominantly white, middle-class movement. But there were riot grrrls of colour, who in classic punk style seized back the conversation on race. Zines such as Slant, Bamboo Girl, Evolution of a Race Riot and Chop Suey Spex refused the identity, as Ngyuen puts it, of “voiceless victims or objects-to-be-rescued of white punk anti-racist discourses”.
Artaud-Mania: The Diary of a Fan, Johanna Fateman, January 1997. Produced in the wake of riot grrrl, Artaud-Mania used the fanzine model to create an intellectually sophisticated and visually striking piece of work: a deranged, Dear Diary-style homage to French Theatre of Cruelty playwright Antonin Artaud. Using confessional teen-girl speak (I mean, you know, like), Fateman at once sends up and reappropriates serious cultural critique. The following year, Fateman would form Le Tigre with Sadie Benning and Bikini Kill's Kathleen Hanna.
