One thing that I think draws people to my confusing literary zine about a town in California’s Central Valley is the artwork. I am by no means an established visual artist of any kind. The thing that I love to do is write. I have friends who are incredible artists. They could probably do better with illustrations or collages than I have. But it has been important to me that every part of the zine comes from my own imagination, even if the result is a bit rough around the edges. The Frazno! zine came about from my desire to write something others would see. It followed that if I wanted to distribute my own written art that it would need a visual element to draw people in. As a writer, I needed to create art for my zines which was indicative of Fresno, CA.

The cover of my first issue, Summer 2022 is a favorite of anyone who takes a look at my zines. It was almost an accident too. I had dropped into the 1418 bookstore on Fulton street to discuss with Vicente the formatting and printing of the zine. I had most of the art for the zine done—both photographs and crude ink drawings. But I was still undecided on the cover image. At the Fulton street corner, I noticed the old bank building, which is a part of the Fresno skyline. Palm trees waved in front of it in an almost nonexistent summer breeze. The heat was too much to stand and the brick of the old bank building surrounded by the lush trees seemed the perfect encapsulation of Fresno: a façade which becomes real through interaction. The printing of the zine was delayed a day or two because of this but it was worth it.

I have since done around six issues of Frazno! with a couple mini-zines and a little notebook in the mix. One thing I try to do is to make the art style different with each publication. Issue one for example is all digital photos, issue three is collages, issue six is mosaic art made with construction paper. The art may not be from someone with a perfect process, but it is something that I am proud of. The designs I decide on are eye-catching and they make people stop and ask, “what’s this about?” which I think is a great thing in anyone’s art. I was reminded during a tabling session at Fresno Zine Fest one season outside of Sour Milk that there is a childhood connection here for me. As a kid I would explore the dusty shelves of nature magazines in my grandparents’ garage. There were wonders to be seen, and part of the wonder was finding something hidden away for what felt to be a long amount of time. With the covers of my zine I try to emulate the feeling of finding a dusty old magazine at one’s grandparents’ house as a child full of wonder that is immensely intriguing.