The Charlotte Museum

Te Whare Takataapui-wahine o Aotearoa

The Charlotte Museum collects preserves and exhibits object, items and ephemera about lesbian history, the lesbian cultural experience and our diverse lesbian communities in Aotearoa.

For Zinefest we will produce two special edition zines. One a selection of personal writing from vintage lesbian feminist sapphic publications produced in Aotearoa before 2000. And a second zine of new personal writing and artwork.

Zines are independent, simple and cheap alternatives to the mainstream publishing corporations that censors ignore and negatively represent marginalised communities such as ours.

Zine creation is essentially the story our vintage publications – The Circle – Dyke News - Lesbian Quarterly – Bitches Witches & Dykes - L.I.P. Lesbians In Print - Lesbian Newsletter Wellington - Sapphic Star – TMLN Tamaki Makaurau Lesbian Newsletter - Spiral Women’s Art Magazine (to mention a few!) – were published by collectives or small groups of women in response to the dearth of representation in mainstream media and as a way to connect our communities. They wrote on topics and issues important to our communities from the perspective of lesbian sapphic women. We are looking forward to sharing our vintage collections and to carrying on the tradition of alternative publication by producing our zines for this event.