Sennadyne Press

Submission Guidelines

Please ensure you have also read the submission opportunity page before submitting, friends.

The Telltale Rot

— A Zine the state would want to burn.

STATUS: Open until December 15th, 2025 for Issue 1; January 10th for Issues 2 & 3.

Read Submission Call

My dear neighbours,

I am glad you are interested in submitting to The Telltale Rot Zine. Capitalism and its branches of colonialism, imperialism, and fascism have done profound harm to the body of humanity and its future, and I am grateful you might be keen on using your art to take up a fight against this creature. Anyone can fight the monsters.

Below is a set of information, details, and guidelines any contributing artist should know about this project. I kindly ask that you review them carefully before attempting to submit to the Zine.

And please, consider sharing this around with other artists you know!

Thank you, my fellow peers,

—Elizabeth Dean, Editor-in-Chief

House Rules

Please note that anywhere we use the word ‘artist‘, we are including literary artists (authors, writers) in this term. Anywhere we use the words ‘art‘ or ‘artwork‘, we are including literary work (poetry, prose, etc.) in this term.

General Information

Eligibility

  • All contributing artists must be based in what is colonially referred to as Southern Ontario.
  • EXCEPTION: For all those who identify as Indigenous people, we will extend this boundary to the entirety of what is colonially referred to as Canada. We are limiting to this border in order to continue to qualify for grants to help the press persist. We understand that the borders of Canada are not the borders of the proper nations of Turtle Island.

Submission Periods

There are four (4) submission periods for The Telltale Rot Zine:

  • Fall: October 15th – November 30th (extended to December 15th for Issue 1, January 10th for Issues 2 & 3)
  • Winter: January 15th – February 28th
  • Spring: April 15th – May 31st
  • Summer: July 15th – August 31st

Sennadyne Press has four (4) publication seasons:

  • Slumber — January, February, & March
  • Regrowth — April, May, & June
  • Flourish — July, August, & September
  • Decay — October, November, & December

Here is how our considerations will work:

  • Fall submissions will be considered for the Slumber issues.
  • Winter submissions will be considered for the Regrowth issues.
  • Spring submissions will be considered for the Flourish issues.
  • Summer submissions will be considered for the Decay issues.

Artist Compensation

You will be paid.

It will certainly not be what your art is truly worth, but this project is being done on a ‘dirt-cheap’ budget, and there are two reasons for this. The first is that a lower sales price will help put this publication into as many hands as possible. The second is that this press is currently run by one person, thriving on instant noodles, bread, and tea.

So, once again, we are doing this ‘dollar-style’.

How you will be paid: There are three ways you can receive your payment. Please indicate in your submission form which method you prefer. The first two options are Interac e-Transfer (bank transfer) and PayPal. In this case, we will reach out to you at the provided contact email and confirm the correct information to send your payment to. The third option is to find you in the wild and hand you the cash. We will only be able to do this if you can be found haunting the Greater Toronto Area. If it is absolutely necessary, you may request a completely different option for receiving payment (again using the submission form) but there is no guarantee it can be done. We will try.

When you will be paid: Payment will happen after the end of each season. For example, if we published your work in Issue 1, January, which is during the Slumber season, you will be paid at the start of the Regrowth season. This would be sometime around April 10th. Please note that if a month has passed since the end of the season and you have not received payment, you should absolutely send in an email. Our office gnome may be hoarding the gold again.

What you will be paid: Money. Specifically, all contributing artists will be paid a flat fee amount per each submission of theirs we accept, and it is likely to be somewhere between $16 and $20 per submission. The fee is calculated by evenly dividing the profits from an issue’s sales by the number of pieces in that issue. This is why the amount will vary from issue to issue. You may also opt to put forward a portion of your fee towards receiving a copy of the issue your work appears in. All contributing artists will also be listed at the bottom of the About section of the website, alongside a photograph and/or artist bio if preferred.

Contribution Guidelines

What is The Telltale Rot?

The Telltale Rot is a 50-page monthly Zine that is handmade, hand-bound, and available in print only. We are working with Cambridge Dictionary’s definition of a Zine: a small magazine that is produced cheaply by one person or a small group of people, and is about a subject they are interested in. The Zine will be printed on plain letter-sized paper cut to a third of its height, so dimensions of 21.6 cm in width and 9.3cm in height. The Zine will also be printed in black-and-white with the exception of a colourful 2-page midsection and vivid, engaging cover art.

The tagline for this project is “a Zine the state would want to burn“. Throughout history, empires have persistently destroyed literature and art with fire when it directly criticizes or antagonizes their power, dominance, behaviour, or motivations. This is not a pointless endeavour. Art influences culture and community perceptions of the world at large, while imposed ignorance, misinformation, and under-education are effective tools for controlling and exploiting a community.

The point and voice of this Zine is education and revelation of truth to our shared communities. Tell them why capitalism should die. The artwork you submit to this project should attack this structure, highlight the core of what is happening, reveal a truth or a reality therein, or otherwise open our neighbours’ eyes, show them their worth, and teach them their power. Help peel back the layers and reveal that this system of greed, over-production, exploitation, and apathy is not human nature, that it is not normal or necessary for anyone to be barely scraping by. And please, the editor is personally begging you, please do not hold back.

What to Submit

There are three submission categories: the black-and-white section, the midsection, and the cover art.

We will accept submissions in the following categories:

For the black-and-white section:

  • Poetry
  • Short prose
  • Mini essay
  • Photography
  • Visual artistry
  • Rants
  • ‘Retching’ (creative word-vomit of sorts, but hey, you interpret this)
  • Instructions
  • Creative lists
  • Comics
  • Dreams
  • Summons
  • Spells
  • And more…?

This is a non-exhaustive list and we encourage you to be creative with your style!

For the midsection:

  • Photography
  • Visual artistry
  • Comics
  • Something else…?

Important: This is a two-page section. Only one or two artists will be selected per issue for this category.

This is a section for visuals with colour. Please don’t hesitate to be a bit experimental. We’re curious to see what you offer!

For the cover art:

  • Photography
  • Visual artistry
  • And more…?

It might be hard to get away with more than the first two options. Please still be creative, and don’t self-reject! If we can make it work, we will consider it.

Please keep in mind the following limitations, however:

  • Size: Your canvas is small. In the interest of balance, artists will be permitted a maximum of three pages in total within an issue.
    • For written work, this is approximately 5500 characters in total, or around 1800 characters per page. This is also a 50-page Zine. No 4000-word essays (we hope this goes without saying!).
    • If you are submitting visual artistry, photography, or comics, your canvas is 20.6 cm in width and 9.3 cm in height, titles and captions included. Please leave 2 mm of space or bleed around the borders of your image so that nothing critical is lost when we cut the page.
    • If you are submitting cover art, your canvas is 21.6 cm in width and 9.3 cm in height. Please leave 2 mm of space or bleed around the borders of your image so that nothing critical is lost when we cut the page.
  • Ink Colour:
    • The black-and-white section is… well… in black and white. This means that your vivid colour photography or visual artistry will be printed in greyscale, so the colours probably shouldn’t be the highlight of the piece. Printing the your visual piece in greyscale should also not seriously impair the piece.
    • The midsection and cover art will be in colour, printed off of an inkjet printer. While it is not a necessity, as we can edit and adapt, we do strongly encourage you to send us images that are in CMYK colour space. If you have no clue what we mean by that, don’t worry about it, never fear! Just send us what you have and we will find a way.
  • Layout Decisions:
    • Cover art requires that you submit two images, both a front cover image and a back cover image. Your front cover image must be able to stand out against the Zine title, as we will need to print this, along with the issue number and price, on top of your image. We can attempt to tailor the layout to your image if it works.
    • Written work will be printed in 10pt font, and will likely be single-spaced. If there is a creative use of spaces in your work, or stanzas, then we will take care to adjust the page layout to accommodate so long as the space allows.
    • The midsection will be on pages 25 and 26 of the Zine, with one photo/visual art/comic (colour) on each page. It is important to note that these pages are not side by side, and are instead the front and back of a sheet of paper. This means one image will not span two pages at once and the reader will have to turn the page. You are allowed to submit a two-page collection of images, or a two-page comic for the midsection.
Permissions and Agreements

When we work with you and interact with your work, we want to be fair. We also want to be clear about how we will interact with your work and what you can expect of us.

Here is what we promise:

  • Sennadyne Press and its affiliates will treat all submitted work and all contributing artists with dignity, respect, and honour. This press is a place that is inclusive of all identities, marginalizations, traumas, and all other configurations of being. We understand that what you may submit may be sensitive work or difficult to share, and we promise to interact with you with the according empathy, to the best of our ability, and with the highest effort.
  • Sennadyne Press, and its directing company Falcon Path Media, are strictly AI-free institutions. We will never use any AI products or tools to assess or analyze your work or submissions. We will never input your work or submissions into any AI tool, product, or generator, and we will we never use these to edit your work, or in the creation of the final publication.
  • Sennadyne Press is not entitled to print, distribute, or display submissions that have not been accepted into any issue, and Sennadyne Press will not do so.
  • Regardless of whether Sennadyne Press accepts and/or publishes a submitted piece of work, or not, all artists continue to own copyright of all their submitted works. All artists are also permitted to continue distributing their art while it is under consideration with Sennadyne Press, or if it is being distributed by our press.
  • Sennadyne Press claims the non-exclusive right to print and distribute any accepted works in the context of that issue in which it is accepted, and for the duration of that issue’s run (until all copies of that issue are sold). This will also apply to the display of any accepted works on social media platforms for marketing purposes, only if the artist has provided their permission for that.
  • Sennadyne Press claims the non-exclusive right to print, distribute, and display any accepted cover art in the context of The Telltale Rot Zine, and in any marketing material related to The Telltale Rot Zine, indefinitely. This is to allow Sennadyne Press the ability to market the publication and press, and to promote submission calls, in order to help grow the press and its capabilities.
  • Sennadyne Press will credit any artists whose work is displayed on our social media in the captions of that post containing their work, and will attempt to tag their account if it was provided.

Here is what you promise:

  • The entirety of your submission was created and completed without the use of generative AI tools (ex. ChatGPT, Midjourney, Google Gemini, Adobe Generative Fill, Grammarly AI Writing Tools, etc.). Sennadyne Press, and its directing company Falcon Path Media, are strictly AI-free institutions, and will not accept any art that has in any way come into being with the use of generative AI.
  • You have the permission and rights to submit this work for publication at Sennadyne Press, including permission from any collaborators. You will also notify our press of their names and contact information through the submission form, or through email if necessary.
  • If we accept and publish your work, and then that work is later published elsewhere, we do not require that Sennadyne Press be acknowledged by that other press. Some presses do require this acknowledgement, so we would like to clarify this detail. Please feel free to submit your work for publication to other presses in the future, knowing that we do not at all need to be credited as a previous publisher. However, we do kindly request that where the option is available, that you do consider acknowledging or mentioning us as having previously published that work. It will help the press grow and stay strong. This also includes on your own social media and online platforms, so long as you think it would be appropriate for the context of that post. Otherwise, happy art-making!
Submit to the Zine

Sennadyne Press and Falcon Path Media are located on Turtle Island, on the lands of the Attiwonderonk, Huron-Wendat, Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation, Anishinaabeg, and Haudenosaunee. Our location on these lands is colonially referred to as Mississauga, Ontario, Canada.

Until they are free of the colonizer, none of us will ever live free.

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