For its 51st publication, Public Collectors continues with the daily creative practice of QUARANZINE but shifts its focus from the COVID-19 pandemic to the Chicago Police Department. The result is an intense barrage of notes about what could be heard over the police scanner, accompanied by an essay about the project and the experience of listening and taking notes. From the back cover:

PUBLIC COLLECTORS POLICE SCANNER

For 75 days in 2020 I listened to the police scanner and the interplay between dispatchers and Chicago police officers working throughout the city. I listened using Broadcastify.com and Crimeisdown.com. While listening, I took notes and indicated the day, date, and time on a sheet of paper, along with the day number for the project. I would listen in one continous session for around 45 minutes a day. This book compiles every day of my police scanner notes. I began on September 10, 2020 and ended the project on November 23, 2020.

– Marc Fischer / Public Collectors

About PUBLIC COLLECTORS:

Marc Fischer is the administrator of Public Collectors, an initiative he formed in 2007. Public Collectors aims to encourage greater access and scholarship for marginal cultural materials, particularly those that museums ignore. Public Collectors’ work includes the Library Excavations publication series, Malachi Ritscher—a project about the late Chicago music documentarian and anti-war activist, The Courtroom Artist Residency Program, and Quaranzine—a series of 100 single-page publications created with over 75 collaborators at the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

This book is dedicated to Bill Talsma.