“You can’t do this forever” by Kate Wadkins  

KATE WADKINS  

My Grandmother drove me to a job interview in her little blue Honda, stalling outside of the real estate company where I would work for the summer of 2003. “You can’t do this forever, you know,” she said, facing me. “You can’t just keep working in offices your whole life, you have to graduate college and pursue your art.” That was the summer I published my first zine, on borrowed time, typewriters and office Xerox machines. Ten years later, my Grandmother passed away, overcome by illness and surrounded by her children. This one is for her.  

Kate Wadkins is a Brooklyn-based writer and artist. Her recent works focus on materiality, memory, and communication; both her subject matter and artistic praxis are indicative of her upbringing in the New York punk scene. Kate writes about feminist cultural production, primarily in music scenes; her writing has appeared in Women & Performance: a journal of feminist theory, Hyperallergic, Idiom, Maximum Rocknroll and the New York Daily News, among others. Ever a zine enthusiast, she curates BRAIN WAVES: a zine and print collection, and co-edited International Girl Gang Underground, a compilation zine about reverberations of the riot grrrl movement in the wake of its legacy. Kate is a founding member of For the Birds Collective as well as a classic virgo, coffee enthusiast, bass player, and rabble rouser.  

Website: katewadkins.com

Email: mskatherinewadkins@gmail.com

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We lost my Grandma Anita 5 years ago today, thinking of her. ❤️

From Patti Smith to Bikini Kill, The Story of Feminist Punk in 33 Songs

Honored to have contributed pieces on G.L.O.S.S. & Spitboy for "The Story of Feminist Punk in 33 Songs" (@pitchfork)

There was a week in high school when my mom begrudgingly let me stay out in New York City for almost three nights in a row. It was the early 2000s, and I hopped between shows at the Knitting Factory, CBGBs, and Brownies (these clubs don’t exist anymore, and the Knitting Factory moved from Leonard Street to Brooklyn). The punk I enjoyed then would have been unrecognizable to the genre’s originators, and the New York I knew then would be, too. The punk in 2016? Forget about it.

In New York City, Punk Is in the Air

ICYMI: last week I wrote this thing about punk + art in NYC for @hyperallergic.

waking up on october 1st like

Baaaaaaasically.

KW is reading How to Build a Girl, in the urgent care clinic, on her birthday.

KW is reading Clothes. Clothes. Clothes. Music. Music. Music. Boys. Boys. Boys.

KW is reading Girl in a Band

I started a new tumblr where you can follow along with what I'm reading ✨ isreading