The sketchbook wall at Brooklyn Art Library   (Photo: Sarah Peterman/Courtesy of the Brooklyn Art Library)

Instead of Tumblrs, E-Books, and Evites … Zine Publishing, BookBinding, and LetterPressing

The Sellers: The printed page lives on at Jessica Williams’s six-month-old small press NSEW (nsewpress.com), which focuses on limited-edition zines and paper-based art objects; several of Williams’s earliest efforts were picked up by artist-book mecca Printed Matter (195 Tenth Ave., nr. W. 22nd St.; 212-925-0325). Early this year, Storefront Gallery in Bushwick (16 Wilson Ave., at Noll St.; 646-361-8512 ) launched Brain Waves, a zine department that stocks more than a dozen titles. The Brooklyn Art Library (103A N. 3rd St., nr. Berry St., Williamsburg; 718-388-7941) sells journals, writing supplies, and vintage publishing ephemera and allows visitors to thumb through its exhaustive collection of 10,000-plus artists’ sketchbooks. Desert Island (540 Metropolitan Ave., nr. Union Ave., Williamsburg; 718-388-5087) stocks indie zines and comics, and Ugly Duckling Presse (The Old American Can Factory, 232 Third St., at 3rd Ave., Ste. E002, Gowanus; 347-948-5170) still cranks out poetry and art books on a hulking letterpress. Publishing festivals are also multiplying: The Camera Club of New York’s Zine and Self-Published Photo Book Fair comes July 16 and 17 (cameraclubny.org), and pop-up zine shop–gallery–reading room Show and Tell will roam the streets via truck August 13 and 14 (show-and-tell.net). Meanwhile, at one of the city’s venerable letterpress printers, Sunset Park’s Peter Kruty Editions (peterkrutyeditions.com), Kruty and partner Sayre Gaydos can press everything from art books to wedding invitations.

The Scenes: Brooklyn Brainery (515 Court St., nr. W. 9th St., Carroll Gardens; brooklynbrainery.com) offers classes in bookbinding, postcard-making, and zine creation, but the mother hub of all hands-on workshops is the Center for Book Arts (28 W. 27th St., nr. Broadway, third fl.; 212-481-0295), home to more than 2,000 artists’ books and classes in letterpress printing and relief printmaking. Would-be zine-makers can fraternize at artist Tuomas Korpijaakko’s “Zine It All” workshops on July 9 and 16 (register at 212-260-9927; cameraclubny.org), or just pick up a copy of Ayun Halliday’s newest book, The Zinester’s Guide to NYC: The Last Wholly Analog Guide to NYC. Technophobic parents can take their kids by Viva Snail Mail! (vivasnailmail.com) blogger Melissa Lohman Wild’s “Make Mail!” event on August 13 at the Greenwood Playground in Windsor Terrace. Children need simply bring the mailing address of someone they want to correspond with, and Wild will provide the stationery, stamps, and an impassioned defense of old-fashioned letter writing.

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Lomography Gallery Store   (Photo: Danny Kim/New York Magazine)

Instead of JPEGs and Camera Phones… Film Photography

The Sellers: Instant, toy, and retro cameras crowd the gift shop at the International Center of Photography (1133 Sixth Ave., at 43rd St.; 212-857-0000), while those who crave an original-issue button box can find a functional Polaroid for about $140 at vintage-clothing store Dusty Buttons (441 E. 9th St., nr. Ave. A; 212-673-4039). Polaroid revivalists seeking the slickest gear, however, should start at the Impossible Project Space (425 Broadway, nr. Canal St., fifth fl.; 212-219-3254). The group picked up where the instant-film behemoth left off when it shuttered its last plant in 2008—manufacturing, selling, and glorifying white-bordered Polaroid prints and the boxy contraptions that expel them; a refurbished Polaroid 600 Close Up camera with two packs of film goes for $149. Kicking the kitsch factor up a notch are the two Lomography Gallery Stores (41 W. 8th St., nr. Sixth Ave.; 212-529-4353; 106 E. 23rd St., nr. Park Ave.; 212-260-0240), each of which is crammed with a rainbow of Lomo repros and an in-house processing lab. For repairs, turn to the analog-savvy team at Photo Tech (110 E. 13th St., nr. Fourth Ave.; 212-673-8400).

The Scenes: Both Impossible Project and Lomography organize themed photo walks, meet-ups, and rotating gallery exhibits. The former is running an “Intro to Impossible 600 Film Photography” workshop on July 10, and the latter holds social mixers every Monday at its West Village branch. “They’re like old seventies key parties, but with film,” says Liad Cohen, Lomography’s U.S. general manager. Just drop a spent roll in the bowl, grab someone else’s, shoot on top of it, and develop it to see how the images melded. Daguerreotype devotees can congregate at the Center for Alternative Photography (36 E. 30th St., nr. Park Ave.; 917-288-0343) to learn about wet-plate collodion and other obsolete emulsion-based processes.

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Instead of Xbox, Wii, and FarmVille …Vintage Video Games

The Sellers: Admittedly, there’s no such thing as a non-digital video game. But the earliest arcade games certainly feel authentically analog­. The selection of first-generation Atari, NES, N64, SEGA, and Gameboy titles available at Video Games New York (202 E. 6th St., nr. Cooper Sq.; 212-539-1039) and 8 Bit and Up Video Games (35 St. Marks Pl., nr. Second Ave., second fl.; 212-674-0201)—both of which tender repair services—are unrivaled. Hunters might also strike gold at the Brooklyn Flea, where sellers Sam Reiss and Jarontiques’ Jaron Cupak (jarontiques.com) hawk vintage games and consoles. Brooklyn hacker Jarek Lupinski, meanwhile, just raised $15,045 on Kickstarter to fund Chip Maestro, a music project that flips old NES gaming systems into bleeping, blooping midi-chip synthesizers (soniktech.com).

The Scenes: The five-year-old Pulsewave dance series (pulsewave.org) is still the fête of choice for fans of video-game-sampling chiptune music. And 8bitpeoples (8bitpeoples.com), a collective, produces audio and visual works using fossilized gaming systems and early home computers. The vintage arcade at Astoria’s recently redesigned Museum of the Moving Image (36-01 35th Ave., nr. 37th St.; 718-777-6888) is also a magnet for the gaming-curious. Executive director Carl Goodman says his kids, who always beeline for Sonic the Hedgehog, “find it fascinating that video games were so rudimentary.” Which brings us to pinball, also enjoying a resurgence. Four beautifully restored machines are on hand at Reciprocal Skateboards (402 E. 11th St., nr. First Ave.; 212-388-9191), a favorite of Kristopher Medina, founder of the seven-month-old coed league Pinball New York City(pinballnyc.com). “My problem with techno culture today is that it has taken people away from one another,” he says. “Avatars and emoticons are poor substitutes for one’s physical presence. Whereas pinball is physical, three-dimensional, and tangible.”

Related:

• Articles by Ashlea Halpern
• Table of Contents: Jul 11, 2011 issue of New York | Subscribe!