Rebel Newsprint: The Underground Press Exhibit, New York City

Rebel Newsprint: The Underground Press Exhibit
Interference Archive, New York City

An exhibition, running from February 21 to March 24, 2013
Opening reception: Thursday, February 21 , 2013, 7:00-10:00 p.m.

The Vietnam War, class inequality, black liberation, and women’s struggles—against this backdrop of social upheaval, a rebellious counterculture produced a vibrant underground newspaper scene. In four short years, from 1965 to 1969, the underground press grew from five small newspapers in as many cities in the United States to over five hundred newspapers—with millions of readers—all over the world. Completely circumventing (and subverting) establishment media by utilizing its own news service and freely sharing content among the papers, the underground press at its height became the unifying institution for the alternative culture of the 1960s and 1970s. It also allowed for all sorts of intriguing and compelling art, design, and writing on its pages.

Interference Archive is pleased to host the exhibition Rebel Newsprint: The Underground Press, curated by Sean Stewart, editor of On the Ground: An Illustrated Anecdotal History of the Sixties Underground Press in the U.S. (PM Press, 2011). The show features original copies from Sean’s growing collection of underground newspapers, such as Basta Ya, Berkeley Barb, Berkeley Tribe, Chicago Seed, Helix, It Ain’t Me Babe, Los Angeles Free Press, Osawatomie, Rat Subterranean News, San Francisco Express Times, San Francisco Oracle, Screw: The Sex Review, Black Panther, East Village Other, and Realist, and related artifacts to illustrate the process, graphic sensibilities, historical context, and debates shaping these periodicals.

Sean Stewart grew up in Kingston, Jamaica and is the former owner of Babylon Falling, a bookstore and gallery in San Francisco. He now lives in Brooklyn.

Free, but donations to support the work of Interference Archive are appreciated.

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Interference Archive explores the relationship between cultural production and social movements. This work manifests in public exhibitions, a study and social center, talks, screenings, publications, workshops, and an online presence. The archive consists of many kinds of objects that are created as part of social movements by the participants themselves: posters, flyers, publications, photographs, books, T-shirts and buttons, moving images, audio recordings, and other materials. Through our programming, we use this cultural ephemera to animate histories of people mobilizing for social transformation. As an archive from below, we are a collectively run space that stresses the use of our collection over its preservation, offers open stacks and accessibility for all, works in collaboration with like-minded projects, and encourages critical as well as creative engagements with our own histories.

Interference Archive, 131 8th St., #4, Brooklyn, NY 11215
(2 blocks from F/G/R trains at 4th Ave./9th St.)
www.interferencearchive.org

Open hours: Sundays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays, noon to 5:00 p.m., or by appointment. We can be contacted at interferencearchive@gmail.com.