The Blackmail » 2009 » December

Ubiquitous Underground

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 23:53:40 +0000

Text: Kat Hartmann Images: Tao Lin

Imagine this… Learning about the work of a young author by word of mouth. Yes, that increasingly redundant method of conveying information. Literary blogs, online publications, forwarded emails and press releases need not apply: said information came from one’s lips to another’s ears. Admittedly, the mouth belongs to none other than the aforementioned author’s publisher, Melville Houses’ Dennis Loy Johnson and the ears were mine, wide open at this year’s Melbourne Writer’s Festival. Also, the words were regarding the writer’s savvy online audience engagement so we’re not really talking casual conversation fodder here, but split hairs are not known for their longevity, nor their propensity for joy bringing, so for the sake of continuity, let’s move on.

The internet savvy, Brooklyn-based author in question, Tao Lin is a worthy conversation piece. During his 26 years of existence he has managed to rack up an impressive list of achievements and accolades. He’s penned two books – the second of which, the 55,000-word Richard Yates, is slated for release in 2010 – e-books and various works of poetry. His words have adorned the pages of Vice and Noon magazines. Lin also founded and is editor of Muumuu House – yes, like the dress – the publishers of all things words.

Not happy to sit on his I-just-wrote-a-novel-what-have-you-done-lately laurels, Lin instigated ingenious promotional campaigns in the lead up to publication of both his novels. The first, the ‘Britney Spears’ campaign is covered in more detail below. The second involved him selling six shares in Richard Yates, at $2000 a pop. The shares reportedly accredited holders with 10% of the book’s future royalties. Needless to say the UK and US media picked up this obscure headline-making activity.

Lin is a journalists dream and a nightmare all in the one writer’s body. He’s ubiquitous underground. There is plenty of related word fodder; great publicity campaigns, high-profile fans, indie status, but it can be hard to remove the fact from the digital fallacies. Some people struggle to determine where his work begins and ends; he was once credited then discredited with being the creator of Hipster Runoff, the touted-then-titled “culturally relevant”, “blog worth blogging about”. Others can’t get enough of him and his literary and word-based works; Miranda July is partial to espousing words of praise when questioned about Lin’s writing – and sometimes, when not. As are journalists at The LA Times.

Lin is the JT Leroy of the latter part of this decade. That is, if Leroy hadn’t turned out to be the product of an elaborate, actor-involved, B.O.Box-requiring, Laura-Albert instigated literary ruse. His works are unique, they are edgy and increasingly relevant. As one of the biggest selling authors currently on Melville Houses’ books his loyal fan-base is expanding at a seemingly exponential rate, as is his notoriety. Culturally centric blog, Gothamist recently reported that fellow NYC powerhouse blog, Gawker was increasingly unimpressed by the author’s below out-lined ‘Britney Spears’ campaign. As you will discover below, Lin assures me this is not the case.

Kat Hartmann: Let’s start by talking about your soon-to-be-released sophomore novel, Richard Yates. Am I right in my assumption that it is connected to the infamous journalist and author of the same name?

Tao Lin: Yes, it is connected. He is mentioned in the novel three times, I think. But it isn’t about him.

KH: I see. A small connection… Why the title choice then? What is the novel about?

TL: It’s titled Richard Yates because:
1. I felt I wanted to title it in the same manner I might title an email that I didn’t know what to title, then just titled sort of non-sequiturly.
2. I felt I wanted to title it Richard Yates because it sort of makes the reader always be aware of Richard Yate’s life, as it is conveyed through the three times he is referenced in the novel, while reading about the two main characters (of Richard Yates, the novel) lives.
3. I think it will be interesting how people react to the title.
4. I like Richard Yates’ writing a lot and think that other people who like his writing will see his name as the title of my novel and feel interested in my novel.
5. [Some other reasons].

The novel is about a girl and a boy in a relationship. It is linear, takes place in New York City and rural Pennsylvania and one year of time. It is a tightly-plotted page-turner.

KH: I’m interested in the link between an email title and the book title. You seem actively engaged in the connection between the internet and literature and the role of the former in shaping the later. How does this interest impact on your writing?

TL: I think when I said “email” one could substitute “letter” or “note” or “telegram” and have it be the same to me. I don’t think I’m interested in how the internet has an affect on literature. Almost all of the books that I read and reread, and try to recreate the effects of, in my books, were written before the internet was created. I think the internet’s existence has as much effect on my books, in my view, as the existence of eagles or buildings. The internet is in many of my books but one could substitute “Gmail chat” with “telephone” or “web page” with “billboard” or something and to me it would be the same.

KH: I guess I should clarify… I was speaking more from a dissemination and promotion of literature perspective, not so much its impact on the writing process.

TL: I see. I don’t think it has impacted literature that much, based on what I know. Authors who get really large advances are still the ones who mostly get reviewed multiple times in the New York Times and other venues of that nature. Authors who get little or no advances, who promote themselves on the internet, probably sell much less of their books than those that get reviewed by mainstream magazines and newspapers and get on TV or NPR. In terms of gaining a readership on a blog, or something, I think it is now easier, but still not much easier, because any person who starts a blog isn’t going to just immediately have 10 or 100 readers. In the same manner, any person who makes a chapbook, or a zine, like 10 years ago, wouldn’t immediately have 10 or 100 readers. Either way would require an amount of work that is similar, I feel, when compared to each other (internet vs. print).

KH: That makes sense. You seem to be very involved in your own destiny in that you are willing to pull up your sleeves and get right into the job of getting your work out there. In the case of a new novel, how important is self-promotion?

TL: I think for me self promotion is very important, maybe, but for authors with ‘high powered’ agents and editors at large publishing houses it seems not important at all. Even damaging, because it makes one seem like ‘less sacred’ and ‘more humanlike’ if one promotes oneself, which can reduce sales, I think.

KH: During a recent panel discussion at the Melbourne Writers Festival your publisher, Dennis Loy Johnson spoke about your rather successful ‘Britney Spears’ campaign – I believe it was for your first book, Shoplifting from American Apparel? What inspired this campaign?

TL: I wanted to put ‘Britney Spears’ on a sticker next to one of my books’ covers, so people would approach the sticker with curiosity re: ‘Britney Spears’ and then see my book cover next to it, and feel confused. That got revised to just ‘Britney Spears’.

KH: Why the revision?

TL: Having my book cover on it seemed ‘expected’ and didn’t feel satisfying artistically to me. It seemed both more artistically satisfying/exciting and effective to have it only say ‘Britney Spears’, and have people find out what it’s promoting later on, on the internet or something.

KH: Enlighten me on the logistics of the BS campaign. How did you manage to get so many stickers plastered around NY?

TL: I carried stickers with me all the time and put them places while doing what I normally do, like going to the library or to dinner. I also gave them to friends who put them up, over like two to eight weeks maybe.

KH: Gawker’s initial response to the stickering was rather interesting… where you expecting such an overtly irritated reaction?

TL: I think Gawker completely ignored it. Gothamist, or something, got a photo of it from a Gawker intern, I think, and they posted it. I think Gawker just completely ignored it – that we put like 100 stickers on their front door one night.

KH: Oh, really? I guess you can’t trust everything you read online. Dennis mentioned he was a little dubious about the concept initially but that you presented as confident it would be a runaway success. Was that an act or where you really that cocksure?

TL: I felt confident it would be funny and exciting to me, so I was sure about that – that I myself would like it. And if I like something I’ll promote it harder, so in that sense I felt it would be better to make the sticker in a way that I felt most excited about.

KH: What better motivation can you have? Moving on: Tell me a little bit about Muumuu House and your role as founder and editor.

TL: I founded Muumuu House in October, 2008. So far Muumuu House has published two books of poetry, debut books, by Ellen Kennedy and Brandon Scott Gorrell. Ellen Kennedy’s book is almost sold out in its first printing. Muumuu House also publishes things regularly online. I’m happy I started Muumuu House. It is a money-losing company but I feel excited about it.

KH: Regarding Muumuu house; you seem keen to explore the development of internet presence for individuals – via encouraged commenting and user engagement. What is it about this medium that you find appealing?

TL: I think I just like there to be discussion and “mad hits,” in part to decrease loneliness, in part to “have something to do,” and in part to increase appeal for mainstream journalists who require “an angle” before their editors let them write about anything.

KH: I know plenty of writers who are struggling to come to terms with the immediacy and in-your-faceness of online commentary – one of Australia’s most technologically experimental journalists, Annabel Crabb recently spoke to me about the journey down from the ivory tower that a lot of writers have had to take – how does this at-times brutal feedback affect you?

TL: I don’t feel much affected by any feedback, except in a non-personal manner, where I feel interested in what someone is saying or I feel that what someone is saying, in a certain context, is funny or surprising. I think I’m immune to shit-talking in part because I know that people “think” negative things about other people daily. If they aren’t typing it they are still thinking it, so I’m not surprised or affected much when I read it on a computer screen. I know it is going to happen in their heads even if they don’t type it.

KH: True. So the benefit of engaging others outweighs the affect (or, in your case, non-affect) of thoughts displayed on screen?

TL: I don’t think so. I think all of it is beneficial financially. A thousand people shit-talking you means that people who like you will defend you, and some of the shit talkers will buy your book, or something, and overall it just creates more publicity. I don’t think I view any negative things about being on the internet.

KH: You have been touted the best-selling author currently on Melville Houses’ books. What’s that journey been like?

TL: I think I was the best-selling fiction author. I think now I’m the best-selling “living” fiction author on Melville House, due to Hans Fallada. So far it has been satisfying and fun.

Tao Lin

Next Article: Andrew Jackson – Is It Really Real

The Wolf

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 21:37:03 +0000

Text: Gabriel Knowles Images: Patrick Wolf

Patrick Wolf doesn’t normally do things by halves. Follow press reports, catch him in concert or his check out his latest film clip, ‘Vulture’. Emotionally, audibly, visibly – he’s no shrinking violet. But on stage spats and a firm stance on music piracy aside, he also doesn’t make make music by half. Until now.

Following a long schedule of touring to support his third studio album The Magic Position, Patrick returned home drained and promptly threw his passport away so he didn’t have to tour again. “It was total therapy. I was able to sit down and say ‘no more airports’ because I’d been to so many airports but hadn’t actually seen much of any cities or culture. I did it so I could stay in one place and then all the music came back to me.”

“I probably shouldn’t have been on stage, I really didn’t feel like I wanted to be on stage,” he admits now. It’s hearsay as to whether that, or his penchant for “living a champagne lifestyle on lemonade money” resulted in Universal dropping him in 2008. Regardless Patrick pushed on and set about funding his next album through Bandstocks.com, and with a confidence-inducing shot of funds from his fans he produced enough songs for not one but two albums. So he released half of those songs earlier this year as The Bachelor, an array of folksy, electronic and even industrial numbers.

“The whole experience has been a way of re-communicating with my audience again. Of feeling that intimacy that I had when I first started my musical journey. It’s tricky with the digital age to have any intimacy and closeness with your audience.” Patrick explains. “You don’t really have any idea who your audience is or who they might be unless you go out and do signings and things like that. It gave me a lot of confidence to know that people really cared about my music so much that they would pay for it before it was made.”

For a man who has proclaimed his desire to be the male Madonna ever since he rose to prominence in 2003 it’s somewhat surprising to find he ever lacks confidence, but as he confides he wasn’t himself then. “I was very lonely then, those emotions that were going on at the time were actually the influence for The Bachelor. I was working through those feelings of alienation of being alone on the other side of the planet from your home without really knowing what you’re doing with your life, or where your heart is, I had no idea where my heart or my head or body was.” The 26-year-old continues.

“And also going from England to Japan to Australia in the space of a week with no sleep and different journalists asking you their version of the same thing is just beyond belief. It’s just such a head fuck, a real head fuck. Especially when you’re single and you’ve got no one to call. You’re on this really weird self mutilating trip, it’s like you’re masturbating furiously just talking about yourself in a different country. It’s really, really strange.”

By the time I talk to him things are obviously back in place and his plans have evolved somewhat, “I either want to be the English Elvis or the male Madonna. Or a cross between the two. That’s my goal,” he announces before trailing off, “I love her so much. She’s the ultimate pantomime game. I love her.”

Love, it seems, has also played its part in maturing the young musician. Not that Patrick will discuss it in any detail, referring only briefly to William, the man he credits with making him “a better and more complete person now.” With The Bachelor now at peace the second half of Wolf’s songs are just waiting to come out, will The Conqueror be released with the aid of fan funding too?

“I can’t say anything right now and it has been quite empowering but because of that wonderful support there’s been a lot of people who want to sign me up but I can’t announce anything right now. I’m biting my tongue right now! I loved the experience and I’d go back to it if need be. I still think the music industry is a great place full of great people that passionately believe in music and the collaboration between an artist and a record label if you find the right people.” Part of that statement may have been tongue-in-cheek but the jokes stop there.

“At the end of the day I want to be the male Madonna and I’m not going to be able to do that running my own label with just me and my two managers.”

Patrick Wolf is touring Australia from December 9 through December 14

Next Article: Ubiquitous Underground – Tao Lin

Mad Digits

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 18:31:14 +0000

Text: Steele Bonus Images: Lovefingers

Chances are you already know about the Lovefingers website, quite possibly the best site at the moment for downloading rare unearthed music from the past 30-40 years. What you probably don’t know is that the man behind the site, Andrew Hogge, is one of the most friendly and laid back guys going around. A native Californian who currently resides in Brooklyn, he’ll probably tell you himself that he’s lazy. However he still manages to hold down a full time job and at the same time run two record labels, update his website with daily ‘fingertracks’ and mixes, work on his own music as one half of production duo The Stallions, party with the energy of an 18 year old, and tour the world djing. Recently he even became a father. Steele Bonus caught up with Lovefingers a month outside of his second trip down under.

Steele Bonus: Tell us about your origins in music. How did you come about collecting records and DJing?

Andrew Lovefingers: I grew up in a musical home, mum was a music teacher and we played and sang together from as far back as I can remember. I started playing drums when I was seven or eight. It was pretty cool, after I first set up the kit my mum jumped on and dropped some beats, I couldn’t believe it! As for records, the first was a huge box of my dad’s 45s, mostly Beatles and Beach Boys. My first purchased records were probably Run DMC and Zeppelin. I got into metal, punk and hardcore later and started compulsively collecting 7″s which led to everything else.

SB: Did you ever play in bands? Do you miss jamming with a band?

AL: Yeah a handful of punk bands in high school, and later some stoner rock bands, no need to name any of them… but I guess the last band I played in was Ariel Pink’s Haunted Graffiti. Yeah I haven’t had a drum kit for a while, I need one badly!

SB: So you’ve been working on a bunch of tracks lately with Lee Douglas. You guys also travel and DJ together a fair bit. How did this partnership come about?

AL: We actually grew up in the same area and hung around the same punk kids, and have always had a lot of mutual friends. Funny now we also live a block from each other. I dunno, we just started hanging out a lot and listening to records all the time. So it was just inevitable that we started laying down tracks. I was asked by Findlay Brown to remix a song for his new album, so it was our first real project after a lot of talk. Then Findlay was really happy with the remix and his label asked us to produce some original material for him in the studio, and it ended up being a super great collaboration. Now we’re remixing a handful more artists and working on an album together. And since it seemed like we had to make up a name we are calling ourselves The Stallions.

SB: You made the move from LA to NYC a couple of years back. Did the music scene in NYC influence this decision? Do you think the music/club scene in NYC is all it’s cracked up to be? Are there any DJs, bands or producers in NYC that you think the rest of the world needs to know about?

AL: I’ve always loved NYC but moving there had nothing to do with music. It was more work related really. But I’m a million times happier with the music scene in NYC than LA. I grew up in LA and it was just time for a change. Not to talk bad on LA, it’s a great place, and full of great people (despite the reputation). The music scene in NYC has always been amazing, but it’s by no means some disco-laden wonderland. There is a small pool of DJs and record freaks and we all go to each other’s parties. It’s actually a super tough place to play in right now, money is low and people are jaded, but we still have fun. Underground parties are always where it’s at. I can’t really think of anything new in New York that people need to know about, TBD is the jam and also my buddy Speculator has a new label called Willy T… his release for Hunee is dope.

SB: DJing has taken you to play gigs at plenty of different locations around the globe. Any of them stand out as being the most memorable? Any crazy stories you feel like sharing?

AL: I love Turkey. I went to this little beach town in southern Turkey this summer and it was just amazing. Girls dancing in the knee high water under a full moon til the sun rose. Yeah of course when you are out all night weird things and people are involved but no real standouts. It’s all a blur. Just really awesome to meet such cool people and real music freaks all over the place! Stallions just played a fantastic gig last night in Stockholm and we’re on to Berlin tomorrow. Later in the week we’re over to Serbia to play in Belgrade, that’s really got me excited!

SB: Lets talk about your site. I have heard that you are going to stop once you reach 1000 tracks. It’s currently up there in the nine hundreds right? There mustn’t be long to go. What will happen when you hit 1000?

AL: Yeah maybe 30 something more to go. Not sure what will happen at 1000 but I’ve been trying to figure out a way to make it a radio station. Not sure. It’s really a long mix, and a lot of tracks are totally specific to the time they were posted, but if you listen to the catalogue in its entirety it’s the best, so I might just make it stream. I wish there was a way to package the 1000 song mix but it would end up being a ridiculously large box set.

SB: I think lots of people are going to miss the updates. Especially after recently similar ‘track of the day’ type sites Bumrocks and Dream Chimney have shut down. Do you think it is a bit of an end of an era?

AL: Let’s just say that these specific sites you mentioned are the cream. I feel like Bumrocks, Dream Chimney and my site have accomplished something pretty cool, but honestly they’re kinda the only ones I pay attention to. The point is to promote great music and artists and get their music out there, but not to replace the actual records. That’s why the files are not high bit rate, its just to sample and then you need to go out to the record store, or at least the online record store. There is too much at your fingertips these days and it’s really overwhelming. So easy to get lost in the computer and its much better to get in, get out and get on with your day.

SB: Any plans to follow on with a different project? Or are you just looking forward to a break?

AL: Yes my new project is my new son Jaspar! I can’t think of anything more rewarding than listening and playing music with him. He’s got his favourites already, and he’s only a month old!

SB: There’s been a lot of hype, mostly taking place on the internet, about a resurgence in ‘cosmic disco’ music. Have you noticed much of a change in the popularity for this kind of music over the last few years in regards to the interest in your DJing and your site?

AL: Meh, buzz words I guess. I mean the sub-genre thing is quite boring to me. It’s like when people put mixed styles of music together it’s all of a sudden “cosmic”. That’s not at all what I think of as cosmic. It’s a vibe not a genre. Unless I guess you’re referring to Baldelli’s classic jams from that era, which I really love, but mixing it all up is the way I like it and I’d never consider anything I do cosmic.

SB: So you are coming down under for the New Year and some of January right? It’s been a long time coming and almost didn’t happen. Are you excited? Where are you playing?

AL: Yeah man, I’m super stoked! Playing at The Toff on New Years Eve and at the Picnic party in Sydney the next week… a handful of other parties as well, I’ll post ‘em all on my site soon. Will be super cool to hang out with all you guys again, and especially to get a second shot at summer!

SB: What sort of stuff can audiences here expect to hear you play?

AL: Disco, house, sleazy rock jams, maybe some chanting monks and snake charming music? I got a bunch of new things too.

SB: So tell us about this new label you are starting up, the ESP Institute. What sort of stuff are you going to be putting out? Did you start it with a certain kind of music or certain acts in mind to release? How will it be different from your other label Blackdisco?

AL: Blackdisco is just about servicing DJs and the dancefloor, it’s all edits and reworks of songs for that specific use. ESP Institute is new music. Totally open minded beautiful sounds. Lots of great things from friends in Japan as well. My wife and I have also started a childrens clothing label under the ESP Institute called ESPno.1… Other things will follow and hopefully a boutique one day.

SB: Run us through some of the releases you’ve got coming up on the two labels.

AL: For Blackdisco, I will do another edit 12″ at some point but things that are for sure are a 12″ from Thriftcotheque (Eddie Ruscha of Laughing Light Of Plenty) and a 12″ from Justin Vandervolgen (TBD, Try and Find Me). The debut release from ESP Institute is Journey To The Centre Of The Sun by Sombrero Galaxy (which is two good buddies Tako and Jonny Nash) with a remix on the b-side by The Stallions. It’s out end of January. After that is a release by Chee Shimizu of Discosession. A super deep promo mix CD will be out first and probably free with the first shipped 12″s. The rest will be sold and the profits will all go to benefit music programs for children. The artwork for ESP is also going to be great, Mario Hugo is doing the whole package and he’s an amazing NYC artist.

SB: On your Blackdisco label you recently put out an edit by a guy from Brisbane – Julien Love. Julien is a very talented guy, but is still relatively unknown around these parts. How did it come about that you ended up putting out his music?

AL: A friend of mine played me his edit of The Jacksons and I just had to contact him to let it come out on Blackdisco. He’s sent me heaps of super fantastic edits and hopefully we’ll do another 12″ soon. He’s a great dude and everyone should fly him over for parties. Also check his music videos on Youtube, total dopeness.

SB: Thanks man, one more question, now that you have the responsibility of being a dad do you think you’ll slow down on going out partying till the wee hours of the morning?

AL: Everything is OK in moderation.

Lovefingers plays at Melbourne’s the Toff In Town on December 31 amongst other shows.

Next Article: The Words We Found – Voiceworks

Is It Really Real

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:29:00 +0000

Text: Oliver Georgiou Images: Etcetc

A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away Princess Leia was beamed out of R2D2’s head in holographic form and we all went “Wow, that is the future”.

Since then, augmented reality has been slowly creeping into our lives; we’ve experienced it during live sports telecasts where advertising logos and scores are superimposed onto playing fields and lines indicate ball and play directions. It’s also been on the rise in the gaming world, as well as having many uses in mobile content. Augmented reality was also utilised during the recent USA Presidential election with CNN’s Virtual View camera system, superimposing newsreaders and Will.I.Am were into the newsroom with up-to-date election information.

Subsequently, Sydney band Lost Valentinos, have announced the world’s first truly interactive augmented reality music video project. Conceived by Etcetc and developed by Crucial By Design and production crew Pedestrian, now we all have a chance to try our hand at a bit of music video production using AR in the comfort of our own homes. Oliver Georgiou had a chat with director Andrew Jackson to find out what it was all about.

Oliver Georgiou: Can you give us a basic idea of how augmented reality works?

Andrew Jackson: Augmented reality (AR) works by overlaying digital imagery in a realtime view of a user’s world. In this case, you can have the band members from Lost Valentinos playing their song ‘Nightmoves’ in the palms of your hands. You print out these little markers – each one representing a band member – then go to lostvalentinos.com. When you place one of the markers in view of your webcam, it augments video footage of the corresponding band member playing their instrument on top of that marker. Move it or rotate it in any direction and the ‘hologram’ of the player will move exactly the same way in realtime. So you can stage your own sets or use interesting locations, then record your own unique music video and share it online.

OG: How did you find out about this technology yourself and was it something you immediately wanted to be involved in?

AJ: I saw a couple of interesting uses of it over the past few months and it’s one of those rare technologies that just has wow factor, so I really wanted to do something with it. I ran the idea past the boys and they loved it, so we got planning on how to make it work immediately.

OG: How was the decision made to use this technology in conjunction with the release of this particular track?

AJ: Of all the tracks on the Lost Valentinos new album, ‘Nightmoves’ is probably my personal favourite, and is a song that kind of layers up from few elements into this epic, brooding monster. So all the parts were there to do something interesting with the technology, where you could hold Simon and Pat building the tension in drums and bass to start, layer up Jono and Andrew’s guitars and then have singer Nik roaring his falsetto – all being movable live players in your real world.

OG: Do you have a personal favourite video that has been produced with this application?

AJ: There have been so many videos submitted from around the world already – some of them really clever and interesting, like one who has the players ejecting out of a Polaroid camera or another where the players were floating on water in a sink. But my favourite would probably be one called ‘Seven’ where some guy went to the trouble of setting up this really cool miniature set that looks like they’re playing on the set of Playschool. It’s not the most innovative but a clever idea done well, and makes the most of being able to cheat or enhance reality by superimposing the band members in an interesting context.

OG: Have there been any clips made that you have not been able to share with the public?

AJ: Not yet, but I’m waiting! There are a few odd and creepy ones – strange men mostly. Some scantily clad, but still technically within Youtube’s criteria for broadcast. Besides, you have to take the weird with the good I guess. That’s the whole spirit of this project!

OG: From a Director’s standpoint how do you feel about putting the final stages of a production into the public’s hands?

AJ: Excited! Without sounding wanky, the idea was in a way about making the world’s first true music video 2.0, where it wasn’t about the video we made but what other fans have made themselves. We’re collecting all the different clips that have been made by friends, fans and randoms and will be piecing it together into one final clip – the amalgam of many ideas which I think will make a pretty unique video.

OG: I found that for the user this application is very straightforward. While creating this production was it difficult to keep the front end from becoming more complex?

AJ: Yeah in a way. There were severe obstacles at each point that we had to overcome to make this as simple as possible. AR can be a real drain on your processor and bandwidth, especially the recording aspect of it. It took many severe crashes and a whole lot of bug-fixing to get to this point, but I think it works really smoothly now and I’m excited that a technology that was only a few months ago limited to dedicated software is now accessible to anyone with an internet connection and a webcam.

OG: The concept of mixing reality with the cyber world is quite an abstract concept that is fast becoming day-to-day. Do you think that this kind of application will have uses outside of the entertainment world in the future?

AJ: Yeah totally. I think AR has huge potential within the world of gaming in the near future, but outside of entertainment has probably found more useful applications of late in the mobile world with apps that overlay information in your real-world view. Virtual reality was a bit of a miss in that it was attempting to replace reality, but I think in the way that AR enhances it, there’s real scope for some interesting and useful developments on the horizon.

OG: Do you have any future productions lined up utilising this kind of medium?

AJ: None planned. We were happy to be the first to do what we did and will now move on to find the next cool idea!

If you have a printer and a computer with a webcam and would like to have a crack-a-lack at making your very own music video go to www.lostvalentinos.com.

Crucial By Design

Next Article: Therese Rawsthorne – The Temptress

Things That Should Matter

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:24:24 +0000

Text: Gabriel Knowles Images: Rene Vaile

We all start somewhere. For photographer Rene Vaile it was as a skate photographer. These days you’re more likely to find Rene’s images hanging on a gallery wall or adorning the glossy pages of fashion magazines and the matte pages of sought after zines. “I used to shoot for Slam in Australia and Manual Magazine in New Zealand. I haven’t shot skating in years, I got really bored with the attitude of skateboarders. The role of a photographer at times is a tough one. A lot of the time the skater will dictate what the shoot will be – what the trick will be, what spot it is and how to hold the camera. I got burnt out. Skateboarding itself excites me much more than capturing it now. It’s self rewarding, especially in your old age you get back your old tricks and you fall down, it’s a constant challenge. Whereas with the skate photography it stays the same – the same angle, the same light, the same boring rehashed photo over and over. All these shots are all reminiscent of things that matter. Things that should matter.”

Below is a collection of Rene’s older work that for one reason or another largely went unpublished.

Justin Watene, unpublished, Auckland

“This was in an ad for a skateboard shop in Auckland. Glenn lives in Sydney now and he’s one of my favourite skaters and best dudes that I know.”

Glenn Wignall, ollie, Ngaruawahia

“Secombe’s a good friend who lives on the Gold Coast now. It’s a hip-hop style photo which is fitting because he’s always been into hip-hop. We were at some music festival where they had a skateboarding demo.”

Brett Chan, Auckland

“That’s in Auckland on the highest ledge at that spot and it’s way above waist height, Brett was the first to skate it and one of the only ever too. I was trying to figure out when it was by what shoes he was wearing but I think it’s late 2003.

Dan Kircher, Wellington

Dan Kircher, Hamilton

“That was at a Red Bull sponsored tour that we were on, it’s more of a portrait than a skate shot and that’s why I like it. It’s another one of those ones where you’re distancing yourself from a theoretical skate type photo and you’re pushing something different. I shoot a lot of my photos like that these days with simple lighting techniques.”

“That’s my friend Dave Chami shooting there, he was just cutting his teeth and getting the hang of it then but now he works for Transworld Skateboarding as a senior photographer. I think it relates much more closely to my work now being that I shoot a lot of snapshots of life and portraits. It’s definitely one of those moments that you can point your finger at.”

Rene Vaile

Next Article: Patrick Wolf – The Wolf

Cookes In The Kitchen

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:20:34 +0000

Text: Caroline Clements Images: Sophie Cookes

Wooed into business by a lady with a plate full of cupcakes, Sophie Cookes started her culinary career scooping ice-cream for her best friend’s dad. She has since worked in kitchens with the likes of Wendy Fogarty, Maggie Beer and Greg Malouf. Now, one half of Cookes Food, Cookes is a chef in her own right, running a small food shop/cafe/catering company out of well endowed open-plan kitchen in the Toorak Village in Melbourne. Caroline Clements talks to her about how many turkeys she’ll be stuffing for other people in the lead-up to Christmas, among other mouth-watering matters.

Caroline Clements: How did you get into food and cooking?

Sophie Cookes: I always loved food and for a long time I thought maybe I just liked eating…it turned out it was more than that.

CC: Where did it all begin? Give us some back-story.

SC: I have always loved cooking. Always. I worked for my best friend’s dad scooping ice cream for years and spent the whole time trying to work back of house instead of front of house. It took ages, but I finally got in there. I worked under a pretty funny chef, he had a soft nature and really warmed me to the idea. Finally, I broke the news to my parents that I wanted to pursue cooking as a profession, they thought I was crazy.

CC: Did you cook much before you could see over the bench?

SC: I did cook a bit as a kid but I was terrible, nothing worked. Cooking has certainly been a skill I have had to learn and study. Perhaps I wasn’t born with a natural ability, but with I was born with the love for it.

CC: Where did you learn how to cook?

SC: I went to France and studied cooking for a year in Paris, I got pretty plump! Then I went to London and got the best experience of my like working at Petersham Nurseries under Skye Gyngell. I didn’t have an apprenticeship and she told me not to do it as I would probably get too many bad habits. She took me under her wing and I stayed there for two years. We became close and she is definitely my biggest influence. She taught me about produce and ingredients and why it’s so important to work seasonally. Whilst with her I got to work with the LEGEND Wendy Fogarty (head of UK slow food), Maggie Beer, Alice Waters and Greg Malouf.

CC: That’s a pretty good resume to begin with. Where did you take it from there?

SC: When I got home I could not for the life of me get a job. I applied everywhere and no one wanted a bar of me. It was very disheartening. So I worked in a café, which I did feel was a step backwards, but that’s how I met Nicole who came in to sell me cupcakes. We got to talking, realised a shared love for food and a desire to do something different, and started Cookes Food.

CC: But there are plenty of catering companies out there, what is Cookes Food ‘bringing to the table’ that is so different?

SC: Everything in catering seems too big, too many people, too many of the same menus and too many of the same foods, touched and tiny! Ever noticed how bad food is at a catered event, and the bigger the party the worse the food is? We wanted to create something smaller and more boutique. Catering for people who REALLY like food, restaurant quality food at a catered event.
We change our catering menus each season and try to work with seasonality and locality in our minds. We run small cooking classes to meet new potential clients and give them a window into what we do. Opening our doors as a café is simply a further extension of us. Its casual, simple and constructed with the best produce we can get our hands on.

CC: So are your suppliers all local?

SC: Yes, we use some great local suppliers, but we are happy to take food from anywhere really. This winter we had a lady who was bringing us massive pine mushrooms from her garden at home. She would bring in box loads, and they were so huge. We’d serve one mushroom as a dish and it would take up the whole plate. People were struggling to get through them.

CC: What cuisine most influences your cooking style?

SC: I love people more than places; Alice Waters, Maggie Beer, Skye (Gyngell), Damien Pignolet, Judy Rodgers, Ruth Rodgers and Rose Grey…to name but a few. They have a rustic, unpretentious, natural style of cooking which is similar to my own.

CC: What is you favourite restaurant?

SC: My favourite restaurant in Melbourne is Da Noi – it feels natural and warm, and Sean’s Panaroma in Sydney.

CC: What do you look for when hiring kitchen staff?

SC: I look for someone who cares about what they are making, who likes food – you would be surprised how many people don’t. But actually, even when we are flat out, it seems to run pretty smoothly just with Nic on the floor and me in the kitchen anyway.

CC: How many turkeys will you be stuffing this year?

SC: We are just about to start taking orders. Just about every second person that comes in says they will order one, so we may have a whole kitchen full of the birds. There is no room for error here, as you can imagine. If I miss one order, that would be someone’s Christmas Day ruined. The other thing is, turkey doesn’t have a long shelf life, so I can’t get started early. I am going to start the puddings next week though.

CC: What’s your favourite cooking utensil?

SC: Pestle and mortar.

CC: What would be your last meal?

SC: Spanner crab with a glass of pinot grigio.

CC: If you could have dinner with anyone, alive or dead, who would it be?

SC: Frida Kahlo – in Mexico.

Cookes Food was begun by Sophie Cookes and Nicole Debono Two years ago. They have just released their winter menu for 2010.

Cookes Food

Next Article: Lovefingers – Mad Digits

Rubbish Culture

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:19:14 +0000

Text: Michael Kucyk Images: Dylan Martorell

A few months ago I was asked to contribute a mix that would be the soundtrack for a mysterious installation-based project that Melbourne artist/musician Dylan Martorell was undertaking in Vietnam and Indonesia. It was briefly explained that Dylan was planning to construct and tour a multi-purpose nomadic structure made from bamboo, tarps and market bags, which he would perform music and dj in. With the themes of his musical and visual output in mind, I pieced together a that was organic and earthy; meditative and psychedelic. Upon Dylan’s return to Australia, I quizzed him on the outcomes of this hair-brained scheme.

Michael Kucyk: Why the trip to Indonesia and Vietnam?

Dylan Martorell: Indonesia has had such a strong influence on my various practices – the use of time within performance, the materials, the music, the costumes etc. Improvisation, ritual, spontaneity and music are a daily fact of life there. I’ve always gone to other places knowing that I’d go to Indonesia one day and now that I have I’m in love with the place.

I really didn’t want to come back to Australia. I didn’t plan to go to Vietnam, but a Vietnamese friend of ours does textile tours focusing on the hill-tribes near the Chinese border and after going to one of her talks I was convinced it would be a great experience, which it was. Amazing place!

MK: Were your installations organised with galleries or any artist institutions, or were they entirely guerrilla operations?

DM: The installation in Jogja was part guerilla, part organised. Before I got there I didn’t know what was going to happen, I had no idea what to expect. Luckily I hooked up with the South Project and ICAN (Indonesian Contemporary Art Network) and within a small amount of time I had the perfect outdoor space and all the materials I needed to get to work. I’m used to working in rubber time so I loved it.

MK: If the installation was a travelling show, how did the construction differ each time? Were you always using the same materials that you carried around?

DM: I travelled with my family which includes Inez (six) and Xavi (18 months). It became pretty clear early on for various reasons that my fantastic plans to travel with the structure weren’t going to work so the Bali and Vietnam part of the project became more about collecting materials and documentation. During this time I recorded about 30 hours of field recordings of rituals, wildlife and traffic, and documented various things that I was really interested in.

Mainly various types of bamboo construction, the ways in which people use public space and the different ways in which places dealt with their rubbish. Hanoi was particularly amazing. They have no bins. You just throw your stuff straight onto the street. But the city is very clean and they have a small army of women who each have a material they collect – foam, cardboard etc. They then push their carts of material to the edge of town where it’s sorted into trucks. Chaos meets communism. I love rubbish culture!

MK: Tell me a little about your daily performances and their audience reactions.

DM: The daily performances were quite diverse. They averaged three to four hours and were mainly solo performances which involved me playing on the various instruments and constructions I had made or collected. These included ant covered sugar crystals, gongs tied to a hand cranked bejak (large cyclo), various motor driven instruments, guitars and bottles, experiments with microphones, fans, stones, insects, tiles, cheap aquarium equipment and field recordings of buffalos and frogs from Vietnam and Bali.

It was really liberating as I don’t usually play as a solo performer. This gave me the chance to really experiment in front of an often bemused but often highly appreciative audience. Sometimes the guys that lived around the gallery would spontaneously jump onto the instruments and we’d have a crazy gong driven psych-out. It was really everything I’d hoped it would be.

The performance on the last night was a kraton tea ceremony at sundown. This was my favourite performance.

The crickets where all in chorus to the sound of the call to prayer in full swing while I went into a dazed trance. The concept was to play furniture music but I got a bit carried away.

Download Michael’s mix here… Right click and save!

Dylan Martorell

Next Article: Cookes In The Kitchen – Sophie Cookes

Drawn Out

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:17:08 +0000

Text: Tristan Ceddia Images: Hana Shimada & Tristan Ceddia>

Earlier this year I attended the opening of Hana Shimada’s first solo jaunt, The Hana Shimada Show at Black & Blue gallery in Redfern. Only mildly aware of her work at the time, my mind was this night exposed to the weird and wonderful world of Hana’s pun filled imagination. Rich in satire with a heavy emphasis on comedy value, Hana’s pictures did then, and do now, excite me each time a new one comes around. I caught up with Hana over an iced coffee at her home studio, Sydney, to talk about her art and guys who work behind the counter in kebab shops.

Tristan Ceddia: How old were you when you started drawing?

Hana Shimada: First drawings from age two my mum reckons. She told me she still has one she dated two years and 11 months I did of figures in 1978.

TC: Did you wake up one day and decide to draw, or have things just worked out that way?

HS: If you mean in terms of what has come to be the closest thing I have to an ongoing profession, I think that things have just turned out that way, yes. I majored in painting at university. For whatever reason I really choked up there. I was an earnest, cartilaginous tall-baby trying feebly to get the attention of a bunch of side-stepping, John Karandonis shoe-sporting, beard-wearing lecturers. I had a lot more fun in high school with making, I was a lot more fancy free, and so consequently I reckon I made better stuff at that time than I ever did at university.

I probably did skill up a bit more at uni I guess, even if the outcomes were pretty stilted and unimaginitive. But majoring in painting and all that expensive expansive blank canvas really got me back onto the relative simplicity and immediacy of pens and pencils and paper. I got a scholarship to research traditional Japanese painting at a uni of fine art and music in Tokyo post my degree here, which I found out requires an even more convoluted set up. It involves using these rich pigments and bunny guts extract concoctions, like a black diamond version of tempera painting. I do like the ceremony of preparing for executing something though… like when you’re doing cooking preparations, or shining your boots before you head out. But if in that ceremony the original impetus for an idea becomes too scrutinised, I feel like I lose my way or thread, and that’s no good.

But yeah, I wound up living in Japan for around six years and I guess that was where I started doing fun commercial illustration. Yet another great thing about that place is the lack of interest in the significance of doing fine art versus doing commercial art or design. So long as it’s interesting, it’s rated. I like to make things in general, and drawing is always a key part of that process even if the end product isn’t one, so yeah, it’s a big thing for me.

TC: A few of your drawings reference the guy behind the counter at infamous Sydney kebab spot Fatimas. One of your drawings comes to mind where he has his arm around a mean looking tiger. What’s your obsession with drawing this guy?

HS: Two drawings of Nada to date. I really like public postings of defining moment snaps and other nib-jibs of personal consequence. It’s a really nice invitation into the lives of the posters, and a warm territory marker. The tourist image of him with the tiger that I drew is quite remarkable because they are both wearing chains and bearing their teeth, needless to say for very different reasons. One bald, one haired. One wild, one acting wild. I just like his appearance.

TC: You live and work quite close to Fatimas. Does this guy know he is a subject in your illustrations?

HS: Yes. He knows. He’s been very accommodating of my arty requests. He even let me take some shots of his mug right out the front of Fatimas one day. I got right up in his face with the camera, and he was absolutely fine with it. I have given him prints of each of the drawings I have made starring him. He told me he was going to laminate them.

TC: Earlier this year you had your first solo show, The Hana Shimada Show at Black & Blue Gallery in Sydney. Had you exhibited much work prior to this?

HS: Yes. The excellent Black & Blue gallery took me in for my first solo show. I had been in two group shows prior to that. One self portrait show, and another group show at Imperial Slacks where I did a collaboration with a friend of mine Matthew Tumbers called Carnal Care. We had this cabinet that had all of these bedside manner “pieces” laid out like specimens in a museum. Vaseline balls lovingly rolled in silver cachous housed in cake patties titled ‘Catch Success’. We had sport socks with their toe tips dipped in Betadine threaded through serviette rings, talced heavily padded bra cups, and shot glasses filled with Listerine titled ‘Getting back your fuckwits’ just to name a few…

TC: One of your drawings was 238cm’s long and states ‘I KNOW WHAT YOU’RE TALKING ABOUT ‘CAUSE MY MUM’S A JPEG.’ What’s that all about?

HS: I overheard the earnest empathetic response: “I know what you’re talking about ’cause my Mum’s a jpeg” when I was working part-time for the Department of Education and Training. The shortest amount of retrospect told me it was almost certainly a Mondegreen, and I was probably just entertaining myself in a dry environment. But anyhow, it made me really happy, and seemed to make a lot of sense to put alongside these drawings I had been making of the street press social page poser-snaps I had been scouring and cutting out and collecting for some months. The countless homages by the children to the children who had parted their peace fingers and poked tongues through before them, willingingly replicating impersonal stances ad nauseum. I liked thinking of these kids in these throw away shots as parents, and aunties, and well, I guess, all grown up, and even dead, and these images being the only or last representations of them. The quote made sense to draw as a plaque to emulate an epitaph’s treasuring and wrapping up of a life.

TC: You also had some ‘Light Entertainment;’ a piece built out of lights reading ‘OH HOW I ENJOY THE LIGHT.’ What do you enjoy so much about the light?

HS: Light is crucial for keeping on top of one’s self. It is also crucial for enjoying many things in life like that involve seeing and making.

TC: You celebrated the 12″ format in your show with LP size artworks. Do you find this format favourable?

HS: Yes. I think there are few better thought out designs. You have a card square consummately scaled for human enjoyment/engagement with a perfect circle for sound inside. Typography and imagery in this format is imbued with sonic potential. Classic.

TC: You have illustrated record covers for record companies including Modular and BangGang 12s. Do you do much commission work?

HS: Bits and pieces. Most often I am given free reign over what I make for clients, which is nice, and fraught. A tee design I did for excellent young label to watch run outta Brooklyn by Dre Skull “MIXPAK” just dropped!

TC: Along with your partner Jimmy Sing and Amy Tamblyn you have played a hand in the opening of Goodgod Small Club. You painted the interior and design the majority of the flyers for the venue right? That must be a great creative project to constantly be working on…

HS: Yes, it is great. Those guys really let me throw my creative weight around. It’s always been important to me to have a creative presence in my community and locally, and GoodGod Small Club night spot is such a righteous mission to be channelling that into. It’s a privilege to be in constant collaboration with wonderful and tireless people that value and understand the potency of detail, and who reckon the nurturing of community and culture is worth making a fuss about. I think the night club is about providing a safe and fun face full haven in this town for bolstering excellent music, and providing a space for varietal projects to be aired. The high pressure turn around time on making posters is great for my exxxtreme design training too. Churning and being happy with results is pretty euphoric.

TC: I’ve seen you playing records dressed as… what’s the name of that clown dog character? What’s the story there?

HS: Flanky. Yeah, he’s a dog clown! My friend Matthew had a clown party for his 30th birthday four years ago. That was the first time I clowned, and I liked it straight away. I felt this immediate rapport with myself as clown… it’s so interesting what losing the weighting properties of your eyebrows and plonking some shapes down on your base face can do. You can really disappear, but your face is still hanging out there in the wind! Revelatory! Flanky has the same taste as me in just about everything, but he doesn’t heed social conventions or niceties (unless he is getting paid). He is a collapsing inward drunk and a chain smoker.

Hana Shimada

Next Article: Rubbish Culture – Dylan Martorell

The Temptress

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:15:09 +0000

Text: Adriana Giuffrida Images: Therese Rawsthorne & Tristan Ceddia

I wouldn’t be lying if I told you that I am quite a girly-girl. I like painting my nails, and getting flowers, and I especially like Therese Rawsthorne’s clothes. Each season I am captivated by her soft colour palettes, mixed with sharp tailoring and sneaky details that are subtle and sexy. I especially love that her clothes are about strong women, created for strong women, but not ignoring the fact that we all have a sensitive side. I was lucky enough to visit Therese’s Sydney studio, and have a talk with her about where her current inspiration is coming from, and who she designs her clothes for.

Adriana Giuffrida: So how many seasons has Therese Rawsthorne been going for now?

Therese Rawsthorne: I’ve done seven seasons now.

AG: And what were you doing before that?

TR: I studied at UTS, then worked for a year, then I went away and lived in London for three years, and while I was there I worked in retail. I was working over there for Issey Miyake, and then I came back. The reason I came back was because I always knew I wanted to do my own stuff. I thought, well I have to just start. I basically worked part-time jobs, and started doing stuff, and just fucked around in my bedroom for a year in my own dream-land, not really understanding how to put it out into the market. Then I thought, “this is not good, I really need to get buyers and get serious about it,” so I took six months off and did a small business course.

AG: How do you go about starting a new range? Do you find you think of a theme, or colours or fabrics?

TR: I guess I just have a general feeling or a mood. This time I just got back from my trip and got quite inspired by the desert and a lot of the colours while I was away; particularly in America. Now I’m just trying to take those loose ideas and put them into more of a form, then really start designing from there. At the moment I’m just gathering my references, I’ve pretty much already chosen my fabrics. It’s kind of weird at the beginning you choose your fabrics and have to make sure you use them, but it’s stage by stage. I work for myself and don’t work for someone else, so it’s quite a loose process. It’s not like I have to report to someone every week, but it’s good and bad because it does mean sometimes you can drift along a bit. I realised this week I was getting myself into a working frenzy, and was thinking, “Oh the holiday’s gone now”.

AG: Where did you go?

TR: We went out to the western rim of the Grand Canyon. It was so good. We did the big cities; but then going out to the desert and seeing the contrast. Going somewhere a bit kooky like Las Vegas and then actually finishing the trip with the desert after being in massive cities the whole time in Europe and the U.S., it just relaxed us. And the driving was great. It wasn’t about getting somewhere, it was about the drive. We had spent the day at the Grand Canyon and were looking at each other, thinking, “I can’t wait to get back in the car, can’t wait to get back in the car”.

AG: What kind of car did you have?

TR: We had a Chevy Silverado.

AG: What’s the inspiration behind the range that’s in store now, ‘The Temptress’? The show that you had at fashion week, you were saying it was all inspired by powerful women?

TR: That seems so long ago now. It’s bizarre how everything moves on so quickly. So that is called ‘The Temptress’. You know, everyone loves their strong women and their idols, but I wanted to think about not only the strength of those characters through history, but also their vulnerability. I think whenever you think of controversial female figures through history, they are always seen as these impenetrable, powerful, man-eating figures. But I reckon they probably still had women’s problems, period pain, confusion about which lover was their favourite. Yet they still had to be the main carers. Women just are by default. So in the collection I had a few quite slick pieces and streamlined and modern pieces, but I always wanted to throw a softness in. So it’s not like a literal interpretation, where you’d say, “It’s inspired by Cleopatra, therefore I have gold winged lines and big shoulders”. To be honest, with the thematics for my collections I’m never usually that themed about it, it will always be a looser thing.

AG: That you visit, rather than let direct you?

TR: Well that’s just a feeling behind it. Unfortunately we live in an age where everyone wants a sound bite and so you almost have to package that inspiration and make it something that is easily understandable and easily articulated. I understand why that is the case, but for me, I am not really that literal. Essentially for me, my collection doesn’t really change that much, it doesn’t do a 360 every season. All the clothes from each season will make sense with what happened before it and what happens next.

AG: Your collections are usually quite feminine, is that something that just comes naturally?

TR: Yeah, I guess I really like the clothes to be really wearable. I love conceptual fashion and avant-garde stuff, and the designers I admire the most would be at that end of the spectrum. But when it comes down to it I don’t want my clothes to be sitting somewhere in a cupboard or on a rail and not getting worn. It’s a lot more satisfying for me if it means something in the daily life of a woman. That is something that has developed for me. When I started I thought I had to be experimental and stuff, and I sort of realised the most rewarding thing for me is when friends say to me that a dress makes them feel a certain way; like it makes them feel really confident, or if they can say “I feel so myself when I’m wearing this”. I think in a way, when I design, if I can get that affirmation when the wearer feels that confidence and affirmation of themself, that is what I find really exciting. I think not everyone can do that either.

AG: Do you ever design with a person in mind, like do you think this is the Therese girl and she would do this?

TR: Yeah definitely. Because you kind of know that you have to put a certain personality in the clothes and that is the personality you attract in a customer. Of course there will always be variance. I always think of my girl as being quite smart and cool, and not too uptight and has her shit together, and is not afraid to do her own thing in life. So that is the mindset. I guess I think about my friends and they are all quite together, but totally flawed. You know, struggling to keep it all together, but at the same time really cool girls, and really smart and funny, and not fashion victims. My friends always whenever they come to see the new range, say “You were thinking of me when you designed this one,” and different seasons will be like more Tessa, or more Alison. It’s quite funny. They really at times recognise themselves when they look at different pieces.

Therese Rawsthorne

Next Article: Hana Shimada – Drawn Out

The Words We Found

gabe — Mon, 30 Nov 2009 14:13:27 +0000

Text: Belle Place Images: Voiceworks

It’s not often that a cast of some of the best contemporary Australian writers send words of congratulations on your birthday. Unless, that is, you are The Words We Found, an anthology of the best writing from twenty-one years of Voiceworks magazine. With a forward from Christos Tsiolkas (author of The Slap) and words from John Marsden, Voiceworks sheds its adolescence and rounds up some impressive alumni to help celebrate. Belle Place asks editor Lisa Dempster to reflect on who and what has shaped Voiceworks’ life so far, and like all good twenty first celebrations, share a couple of tales of optimism and awkward adolescent behaviour.

Based in Melbourne, Express Media has been publishing Voiceworks since 1988, starting out as a small, four to six page, unbound, black and white newsletter, largely Victoria focussed, which was mailed out to Express Media members. In the early 90s, Voiceworks grew into a national literary journal, bound and dressed up with a glossy, coloured cover, and expanding its content to include poetry, short fiction, articles, opinion and illustration.

Now all grown up, Voiceworks has a unique tone and style that is raw and unapologetic, and this is what Dempster reflects upon in the anthology. “Going through all the back issues of the magazine, I discovered so much good writing that I was really blown away. I also found that Voiceworks has quite a distinct style – the writing they publish is generally very brave and experimental. It’s powerful stuff, and I tried to choose pieces in this style for The Words We Found.”

At times, the writing is somewhat unrefined, but it is often poignant and witty, and unfailingly fierce and original. There’s a whiff of teen angst, but it seems to find its place in a publication which publishes young writers. On approaching past contributors Dempster sometimes heard an outright ‘no’, and many of the contributors took some persuading to let their work be published in the here and now. “One of the hurdles was that some people were embarrassed by the stuff they had written when they were much younger, and hesitant to allow me to republish it unedited. Like, I was asking Lili Wilkinson to publish something that she’d written when she was twelve, and Justin Heazlewood to publish an essay on impotence that he’d written as a teenager, that kind of thing. I guess it was kind of confronting.”

Moving away from more traditional formats of presenting content, Dempster chose to organise the anthology around themes, reflecting the way Voiceworks produces each quarterly issue around a different idea. The themes dovetail such a broad scope of writing, reining in over two decades of content. Sifting through twenty-one years of material was an immense task, but Dempster used this framework to help choose the contributors. “I was looking for writing that fit the themes that kept arising across the history of the magazine. I think the themes are universal not just to young people but writers in general – technology and the future, identity, sex and love, experimentation, politics and nationality. I organised The Words We Found according to these themes, rather than by chronology.”

Whilst no single editor seems to have left an indelible mark, under each captaining Voiceworks seems to have crept further onward, each editor pushing the journal forward and adapting it to their particular sway. “The influence of each editor is very obvious—Adam Ford was into poetry, Kelly Chandler was into creative non-fiction, and Tom Doig was just a bit mad and unrestrained. It’s fantastic that the magazine has nurtured their careers as well as those of its writers, and makes it an unpredictable journal—and that’s a good thing. I’m convinced it has managed to stay around for twenty-one years because it keeps having fresh life blown into it by its editors.” Many of these editors’ reflections are recorded in interviews and sectioned throughout the book. It is these interviews, sitting beside the work of the contributors, which illustrate all the sweat and tears, the pureness of doing something for the love of it, the dance-offs (apparently Voiceworks “wiped the floor with [Is Not magazine], three times in a row”), and most often, blind courage, that has led the to the making of this anthology.

These days Voiceworks is now a respected literary journal which belies the youth of its contributors. It may be written by young ones, but it is no longer geared only towards a wholly youth audience. Carrying the banner ‘New fiction, poetry, journalism, artworks and opinions by young Australians’, Voiceworks is a inimitable stomping ground for young writers making their first foray into publishing. Dempster also holds her own sense of optimism for the journal. “Voiceworks fills an essential role in [Australian] publishing, because it nurtures young talent. It has helped launch the careers of many writers over the years, and will continue to do so. Voiceworks pays its contributors, and many young people consider it their first professional publication. Plus the editors and editorial committee provide a lot of feedback to contributors, which of course helps to develop their skill at writing. I think in the future it will continue to launch young talent onto literary and political and artistic landscapes.”

The Words We Found is a true coming-of-age anthology, and perfect tribute to everything that has marked Voiceworks‘ life so far.

Voiceworks

Next Article: Rene Vaile – Things That Should Matter