KUTT was a dyke zine which ran from 2002 to 2003. There were only three issues. Founded and edited by Jessica Gysel, it was the sister publication to Jop van Bennekom and Gert Jonkers’ BUTT Magazine. ‘Kut’ means ‘cunt’ in Dutch. The C-word became the K-word, and also a reclamation and a celebration of the term.
IDEA first sold a full run of KUTT around 2012. The magazine issues are so scarce that, inevitably, they are super expensive. Most people who want them cannot afford them. Of all the rare and out-of-print books and magazines IDEA has written about, KUTT is the most popular. Hundreds of emails have been received in the last decade and their frequency only ever increases.
And so came the idea of the facsimile edition. A page-by-page replica of the original magazines, with a new cover designed by Jop van Bennekom illustrated by a Viviane Sassen photograph that should have been a cover the first time around and now gets its chance to prove its popularity (it happens to be one of the most liked photographs IDEA has ever posted to Instagram).
It was and is young. It was and is urgent. Filled with page after page of animated, buoyant, and brazen photography. Its aesthetic confidence is easy to take for granted and with work from photographers such as Martien Mulder, Ryan McGinley, and Viviane Sassen (to name a few), it is easy to understand why.
Its lilac pages are star-studded. Interviews with Chloë Sevigny, Eileen Myles, Collier Schorr and many many more. There was nothing quite like it at the time. And there hasn’t been anything which has filled its shoes since. 24 years later it is as vibrant and alive as it was in 2002
As Jessica Gysel puts it:
“I remember sometime in 2002, I was hanging with Jop van Bennekom and Gert Jonkers in a bar in Amsterdam. They had just released BUTT and we were joking about making a ‘sister’ magazine to BUTT. I would be KUTT, ‘cunt’ in Dutch. And so it happened. I went on collecting a bunch of dykes to make the magazine with. It was all very spontaneous and I sourced mainly from my personal network. And of course it was the perfect excuse to reach out to the people whose work I admired. I had no real magazine making experience. It was quite the ride!”
The book was pre-launched on 16th May at Dover Street Market during Photo London.
KUTT FACSIMILE
IDEA
Release date: 21st May, 2026
Softcover. 204 Pages
24 x 17 cm
Edition of 1000
£30 / €35 / $40
https://www.ideanow.online/
