Christie's Portfolio

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M A H S A W CHRISTIE

ILLUSTRATOR-WRITER-DESIGNER


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RESUME....................................................2 WRITING...................................................5 GALLERY...................................................12 Illustration................13 Design.......................19 Photography...............23


CHRISTIE WASHAM

876 Margaret St., St. Paul, MN 55106 • 612-850-9545 Christina.washam@gmail.com • www.thequickandthedeadart.tumblr.com

EXPERIENCE>> FACT-CHECKER

2012-2013

Delta Sky Magazine • •

Check and update listings for domestic and international stores, restaurants, attractions and night clubs. Required extensive internet research as well as phone interviews Write copy for new listings

Milkweed Editions • • •

With a 2-week turnaround deadline, checked a 600-page manuscript for Empty Hands, Open Arms, a travelogue and study of bonobo conservation in the Democratic Republic of Congo Internet research: Academic databases, news websites, non-profit organizations, scientific studies Library research: effectively locate and document passages and references to ensure faithful and accurate usage (topics ranging from biology to politics and history)

MNopedia • • •

Check and cross-reference articles relating to historical events, organizations, people and places in Minnesota Internet research: Academic databases, organization websites Library research: Microfilm newspapers, archives, scholarly journals, artifacts

EDITORIAL SUPPORT

2013

Minnesota Historical Society •

• • •

Work with the education department on the second edition of Northern Lights, an academic textbook used by sixth graders Convert Quark documents to Word documents Organize editorial copy within Word for easy interactive scripting Conduct photo archive research, statistical research, and in-house collections research

REPORTING

2012

Medill News Service • • •

As a business reporter, covered manufacturing in the Chicago area Wrote, checked and published articles to the web. Utilized multimedia storytelling: interactive tools, photography, video and audio.

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ILLUSTRATION

2011-2013

The Varafan People series by Nancy Crowley • •

Provide full-color illustrations to coordinate with story pages Cindy and Mary; The Road Trip; Saffron; and The Varafan People

Steelers Football Club (Durham, UK) •

Create cartoon mascot for club website (www.steelers-fc.co.uk)

DESIGN

2009-2013

Minnesota Historical Society Press • • •

Design and production internship Created promotional material including coloring pages, web advertisements and postcard mailings Touched up cover designs for upcoming book releases

Twin Cities Robert Emmets Hurling Club •

Create t-shirt designs to represent the athletic club at tournaments

Umbrella Bed (Minneapolis-based ska band) • •

Design beer tap logos out of previous record releases for an upcoming CD cover Update band’s logo design

Duluth Hurling Club •

Create promotional posters for club events

EDUCATION>> Medill School of Journalism @ Northwestern University

graduated: 2012

MS-Journalism •

• •

Coursework in magazine writing and editing and producing multimedia content for the web (video, interactive, graphic, audio, etc.) Fluency in Adobe Creative Suite and basic programming (HTML, CSS, WordPress). Subjects focused on travel, sports and business Northwestern Editorial Scholarship recipient Edward E. Lindsay Scholarship recipient

University of Wisconsin-River Falls

graduated: 2010

BS-English • • • • •

Coursework focused on creative writing with a minor in international studies. Graduated summa cum laude Sigma Tau Delta International Honors Society Writing Center tutor Published fiction in Prologue, UW-RF’s literary magazine, 2007, 2010

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• • •

UW-RF Journalism Department Photo Contest winner 2008 2008 Study tour Japan participant 2007 Study tour Ireland participant

University of Limerick • •

Coursework focused on literature, history and culture. Helped found the UL Writers’ Society

study abroad: 2009


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Caravan Skateboards: Not just a half-pipe dream By Christie Washam, Medill Reports: Chicago Feb. 07, 2012 In a dark hoodie sweatshirt, with his long, curly dark hair held back in a ponytail, Adam Facciolla looks every bit like the skateboarder he is. But the 21-year-old Loyola University Chicago senior is also an entrepreneur. A year and a half ago, he started his own brand: Caravan Skateboards. While most skateboarders are a little like bears in the winter, hibernating while waiting for the weather to warm up, Facciolla is hard at work. “There really is no typical day,” he said. “Skateboarding’s nice because it’s a seasonal sport so I can use the winter to plan for all the events in the spring and summer—am I going to have enough boards? How many graphics I want to come out; what events I’m going to do and when.” Working out of his North Side apartment, Facciolla juggles wholesale orders, designing, planning events and pitching his wares to shops with his class schedule and homework. He is a business student, so it’s an opportunity to put into practice what he learns in the classroom. “It’s tricky at times,” he admitted. “But while being in school, all of my classes relate to running the business.” He spent around $5,000 in savings getting Caravan started. With boards retailing for $45, he’s now just about breaking even and hopes the new season will bring the first real profits. Last year, Caravan brought in an estimated $5,000 in revenue, all of which was invested back into the company. Caravan boards are currently for sale at skate shops across Chicago as well as in New Jersey, New York and Maryland. Facciolla sells some boards to shops on a wholesale basis and others are on consignment, meaning he doesn’t receive money until the board is sold. This spring, he

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plans on having an official board release complemented by an art show featuring board designs. In the future, he hopes his business will thrive nationally but he remains cautious. “In order to support myself and others it would need to be on a much larger scale or it’s just going to become a part-time hobby job,” he said. Currently, Facciolla isn’t taking a salary from the business and is paying his living expenses with student loans. Originally from New Jersey, Facciolla began skating about 10 years ago but his business prowess began even earlier. “I’ve started a couple businesses as a young child; converting records into CDs and things like that,” Facciolla said. “It got to the natural progression that I wanted to get more involved in skateboarding and figured I could do so by starting a board company.” He came up with the idea while in his second year at Loyola and then took it home to New Jersey that summer for testing. He registered the business there and pitched his boards to local shops. Since then the focus has been on Chicago. Facciolla works with local skaters and artists here to come up with the designs for the boards. Facciolla also has an eye for saving the environment. While most boards are made of maple, Caravan boards are either entirely bamboo or a bamboo/maple composite. They are sourced from A.S.F. Distribution Inc., a skateboard manufacturer in Chula Vista, Calif. Surprisingly, skateboards are the leading cause of maple deforestation in the U.S., and while a single maple tree can take about 50 years to mature, bamboo takes just a year. “Bamboo shows superior qualities over maple—I personally feel that way—because it’s lighter, which is premium,” said Facciolla. Daniel Bezinovich, 21, a Caravan board rider, said that in addition to being lighter, the bamboo boards are “a bit crisper than traditional skateboards.” The boards also are “actually stronger per square inch because of bamboo’s thin fibers,” explained Facciolla. “And they cross lay over each other. It allows the board to have a little more flex so it won’t break or snap as easy.” When a maple board chips or has a chunk taken out of it by a trick gone awry, most people get a new board because the feel of the ride is unbalanced. When a bamboo board suffers the same thrashing, the fibers peel but don’t necessarily break.

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“For the bamboo boards, shops were skeptical,” Facciolla admitted. “Some embraced the idea and were pleased with the results while others didn’t take to it too well.” The complaints? Mostly that the shops weren’t ready to try something new, he said. The skateboarding industry on the whole has yet to embrace the idea of bamboo, though some long-board skateboard companies such as Sector 9 Inc. and Arbor Collective use it. Though skateboarding’s mass market appeal has waned since the heydays of the early 2000s, it is still a multi-billion dollar industry in the United States. Popular brands of skateboards and apparel are readily available at big box sporting goods stores and mall specialty shops alike. It can be hard then for a small-scale brand to make a mark. But the key to Facciolla’s plan for taking his company nationwide is to keep the feel local. For instance, one current board design features a map of Chicago’s South Shore. A Caravan board for sale in New Jersey might have a map of the Atlantic Coast. Or a Chicago-based artist would have his or her graphics on boards in this city, while an artist from New Jersey would see their designs on boards in that market. The goal is to integrate two subculture communities— young artists and skateboarders—to instill a sense of solidarity and pride in their hometowns. “I chose the name Caravan for the company because a caravan is a group of people moving in the same way,” Facciolla said. For a city as big as Chicago, getting skaters in different neighborhoods to move the same way is a challenge, something Caravan hopes to overcome. The scene isn’t very “tight-knit” said James Pritchard, who works at Citizen Skate Café in Uptown. “I think it is getting better. A lot more kids are hanging out together and I guess, trying to solidify a skate scene.” Citizen Skate, a board and coffee shop, is a non-profit business operated by the Jesus People USA, a Christian community based in the neighborhood. The Wilson Avenue shop carries Caravan boards. “Supporting local companies, small companies—that’s how you build a strong scene,” Pritchard said. “It’s like supporting small bands in a music scene.” Bezinovich explained: “The skateboard scene isn’t as prominent as the scenes out in Los

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Angeles and New York, and it is because there is a lack of industry out here.” He added, “Being a part of Caravan is exciting as it is an addition to the history and industry of Chicago skateboarding.” For now, Facciolla continues to plan and attend school. He is currently accepting artist submissions and networking throughout the areas where his boards are found. Recently, he held a skateboard trick contest in New York—a preview of the summer, which he hopes will be filled with events at skate parks and on city streets. “Come springtime everything gets set into motion,” he said with a smile. “It’s kind of like a board--you just cruise.”

Facciolla and P ritchard at Citi zen Skate Cafe Christie Washa in the Uptown m/Medill New neighborhood s Network of Chicago.

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Delta Sky Magazine—Copy Clips Kids Ink Children’s Bookstore 5619 N. Illinois St. 317-225-2598 www.facebook.com/pages/kids-ink-childrens-bookstore/84267983634 Hours: M-Th. 10 a.m.-8 p.m., F-Sa. 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Su. 1-5 p.m. Price: $ = Items $20 or less Type: Children’s Stuffed to the gills with books, games and toys, Kids Ink is a one-stop shop for literary-loving little ones. The friendly and extremely knowledgeable staff members are hard to stump, so even if you can’t remember the title of that one book with the penguin, odds are they’ll know exactly which one you’re talking about. Look for the popular kids’ train table or your favorite author’s signature on the wall.

Meat 1076 E. Washington St. Butchertown 501-354-3212 www.meatinlouisville.com Hours: M-Sa. 5 p.m.-4 a.m. Price: Cover charges vary by performance. Type: Bars & Nightclubs Situated in Louisville’s meatpacking district, this prohibition-style hideaway harkens to the local history—meat hangs in the entryway, curing for the Blind Pig restaurant downstairs. Thirty-plus original cocktails featuring Kentucky’s famous bourbons and whiskeys make this speakeasy the cat’s pajamas. Make sure to put on your glad rags and look extra dapper, Meat is popular with the young and hip.

El Ambia Cubano 950 Melbourne Ave. E. 321-327-8389 www.elambiacubano.com Hours: Lunch: M-Sa. 11 a.m.-3 p.m.; Dinner: M-Th. 5-8 p.m., F-Sa. 5-9 p.m. Price: $ = Entrees less than $10 Payment Options: Visa, Mastercard, American Express Type: Mexican/Latin American The Cuban fare served at this quaint restaurant will having you feeling right at home. Specials change daily, but a favorite is Thursday’s Ropa Vieja. On Fridays and Saturdays, enjoy a laidback night of dancing to live music or saddle up to the bar on one of the conga drum stools. Owner Alfredo Hernandez-Froment is a former pilot (his uniform now hangs in the restaurant) and many patrons stop by to trade aviation stories.

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CREATIVE NON-FICTION Ekuk, Alaska... It’s easy to forget there’s money to be made in this place. The wind swipes fiercely across the inlet, the tall grass permanently bent as in tribute. Rickety, rusted out, parts missing; trucks carry the precious cargo down the gravel paths to the docks. Hour after hour, day after day, rain or shine or sleet or dead of night. The Fish Know. That’s the saying we live by. Today there’s fish. Tomorrow we don’t know. Only the fish know. The fish and the biologists. It’s easy to forget how much money this place takes in. Old, natty blankets and mattress with suspicious old stains. Corrugated aluminum. Pieces of plywood hammered together to form the buildings that keep us relatively warm and relatively dry. Everyone came here for a reason. You don’t get up and leave for the edge of the world in the middle of summer without a reason. Most will tell you the money drew them here. But that’s not the real reason. Money, adventure…neither are real reasons. We all came here to get away from something. We came here to reset our switches, to forget the troubles that shadowed us in normal, south society. That’s why everyone here gets along. There was a baggage fee at the airlines so we all packed light, leaving as much as we could of ourselves behind, bringing only the stripped down human. The basic package. The fundamental person. We work and we sleep. We watch the sun skim the horizon every night, never quite disappearing completely. We listen to pop songs and sing along. Someone dances. Someone turns up the volume on the late 90s comedy movie. Someone loses another game of ping pong. That’s when there’s no fish. When the fish decide to avoid the nets, we revert to a summer camp mentality. We’re all twelve years old and away from our parents, drinking kool-aid and eating as many cookies as we can fit in our pockets. We tell each other the deepest secrets we have. Here on the edge of the world, who can judge you? Our secrets are shared with the other inmates. Is this a utopian society or a prison camp? We joke about the bears that surround the camp, keeping us from wandering too far afield. We joke that this is Hunger Games. We use rock paper scissors to solve our disagreements. We sit down wherever there’s space without worrying about whether or not we’re at the cool lunch table. We are all scholars, skilled laborers, ex-convicts, stoners, smokers, mechanics, lovers, leavers, wanderers.


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ILLUSTRATION

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DESIGN

NACB FINALS 2013 CLEVELAND, OH


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PHOTOGRAPHY

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