Baker Artist Portfolios

China Martens is a zinestress extraordinaire born in Baltimore. Her first book, "The Future Generation", is a compilation of 16 years of her first zine that was reissued in March 2017. She is also the co-editor of "Don't Leave Your Friends Behind: Concrete Ways To Support Families In Social Justice Movements & Communities" (PM Press, 2012) and "Revolutionary Mothering: Love On The Front Lines" (PM Press, 2016), an anthology which centers mothers of color and marginalized mothers voices, which Pulitzer Prize-winning author Alice Walker called “Juicy, gutsy, vulnerable, and brave.”

China’s short story, “On the Road (with baby)” was published in Breeder: Real-Life Stories from the New Generation of Mothers (Seal Press, 2001) and has had various other essays printed in publications such as Baltimore Indypendent Reader, HipMama, WIN Magazine, and Revolutionary Motherhood. She also is a zinestress extraordinaire producing titles such as BWI Spy, Supermarket Supermodel, and Catbird; was the submissions editor for the collaborative mama/papa zine project Mamaphiles #4 “Raising Hell”; a columnist for DIY newsprint publication Slug and Lettuce (from 1994 to 2004) and won Baltimore City Paper “Best Zine” Award for I was . . . a Student Nurse! The Future Generation - won #3 - The Beat's Top 10 Baltimore Books of 2017/Baltimore Beat

Since 2003, China has facilitated workshops to create support for parents and children in activist and radical communities. Along with Sine Hwang Jensen and Harriet Moon, she cofounded Kidz City, which was a radical, anarcha-feminist child care collective that began at the “City From Below” conference and supported parents and children participation at social justice gatherings and events in Baltimore from 2009-2012.

Her first novel "The Avenue" based on the years she worked in an antique store in Hampden is coming out in Spring 2023 as a Literary Kitchen imprint.

For more information on her writing: https://www.pmpress.org/blog/authors-artists-comrades/china-martens/