Anton Bruhin

Dem Neuen treu. Neujahrshefte 2007–2025 / True to New. New Year’s Zines Anton Bruhin

“Health, happiness and money in the New Year.” These are Anton Bruhin’s New Year wishes for 2007 in his very first zine. Ever since he was a boy, he has loved putting together little A6-size zines. His stencil-printed Plim came out in 1969, followed by more zines at April Verlag, a publishing house that Bruhin and Hannes Bossert ran jointly from 1969 to 1972.

Some thirty years later, in 1998, 40 zines were printed on a Brother fax machine under the title Vierhundertfünfundfünfzig-seelendorf Editionen. And his 2014 series Scheissegedichte (Shit Verses) featured word sequences, palindromes (ekle meteor—kroete melke), typewriter art and pixel portraits alongside drawings of electrical sockets with curlicue pig’s tails and scatological couplets, e.g. for a rather free rhyming translation: Shit stinks and poop steams,the Romans shat on wooden beamsShit’s formed by the assand normed by Brussels’ brass.

When the shit hits the wallit doesn’t bounce back like a ball. Shit’s the talk of the townand soon gets renown. Bruhin designed his New Year’s greetings as 24- to 32- page zines featuring samples of his current work.

Over the years, they covered a wide range of different linguistic and pictorial themes, subjects and genres. Their childlike curiosity and pure zest for discovery make for a certain continuity and a connection between the various issues. The Neujahrshefte hold treasures from the extravagant cornucopia of his overflowing imagination and jubilation.

—Susi Koltai