LETTERS FROM THE EDITORS

ON DETOXING

PHOTOGRAPHED BY KETAKI "SONALI" UPASANI

As I sat down to write this letter, the first thing I did was press play on “Butterfly” by Mariah Carey. The 12-track LP is the diva’s self-proclaimed magnum opus, but is also, from my perspective, as a mega-fan, her reset. Though her sixth album, it is essentially Carey’s reintroduction to the public as the truest form of herself. Made when she was just beginning to taste the depths of having complete creative and artistic freedom, “Butterfly” is the perfect synthesis of Carey as the artist she’d always been and the artist she’d always wanted to be. She isn’t sacrificing any of what trapped the adoration of the public and made her a household name. She’s enhancing that allure by packaging it in a way that many didn’t see coming (or like) but that she knew felt more honest to who she was than she’d ever been publicly at that point.

Obviously, I’ll never be Mariah Carey, and she won’t be in-between the covers of Coulture anytime soon (cross your fingers!), but there is a connective tissue between her commitment to authenticity that layers each note of “Butterfly” that I aimed to weave throughout each image, sentence and pose selected for this issue. Whether it’s Justin Pfeifer’s essay on his journey with the ego, Valeria Cloes’ exploration of immigration as rebirth or Celia Funderburk’s interrogation of Tik Tok’s impact on true style: this entire magazine is concerned with the question of trying to see the end in the beginning and the beginning in the end.

That’s why we chose to include “00” in the title. While I’m better friends with words than numbers, I am confident in saying that 0 is the only number that truly moves in both directions. Negative and positive. It is deeply symbolic of desperately wanting to taste what is in front of you while being keenly aware of what is behind you, as well as the summation of the obfuscated in-between. That sort of awareness, that level of cognizance, is something that can only be achieved by making an active choice to reset. By examining yourself, or a magazine in this case, holistically and identifying strengths and weaknesses in an effort to understand instead of efface.

Note that resetting isn’t starting over or an erasure of what came before, regardless of how bruised and discolored it may be. At its purest, a reset is collecting our contusions, our mistakes to help edit and repair—both metaphorically and literally.

You may be a stranger to the calamity that befell Coulture last semester, and that propelled me, a junior who was just an associate editor-in-chief four months ago, to the top of the magazine’s masthead. I won’t go over the dreadful details here because it replays ad nauseam in my mind, and we don’t have the space (but if you see me and stop to ask, I’ll spare no facts.) What I will say, however, is that the dysfunction and frustration of the last semester were a large part of the dialogue that shaped the pages of this issue that I’m so proud to share with you. There is no excuse for lacking models of color. There is no excuse for somehow deleting the names of Black models from a photoshoot conceptualized by the magazine’s only Black editor. And still, yet, there is no excuse for the magazine’s first Black editor-in-chief having to rectify the burden of those oblique obstacles.

So I didn’t. And I won’t. But I will give the magazine the reintroduction it so deserves. Quite simply: “I’m not new to this. I’m true to this.” Sometimes you have to remind people of that. Without the foundation of those who have held this position for me, I wouldn’t have even known how to log into the magazine’s Instagram account, yes. But similarly, without my predecessors, I also wouldn’t know what mistakes not to make, or have the room to make mistakes of my own. Thus, I aimed to create a reset while not chaining myself to the past, but instead framing the past as a concomitantly painful and blissful reference.

That is my hope for you. That is my hope for what you take away from this magazine. You can move on without forgetting. You can remember without looking back. You can reset without starting over.

Much love, always.

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“Come spread your wings, and you’ll see that it’s alright to fly…” - Mariah Carey.

PHOTOGRAPHED BY ANWAR BOUTAYBA AND MARIANA BYKER

Zero was the hardest number to name. At first, I was surprised by that since zero symbolizes nothingness. How difficult is it to define nothing?

Incredibly difficult. In order for something to be “nothing,” it has to be worth something. Even the number zero has value.

Coulture was not worth something when it was an entity that excluded Black models and staff members, thus fostering a culture where Black people and other minority groups felt intimidated to apply and/or participate. Because of that, we decided to make it nothing.

Starting from 00, or should I say, resetting, was the key to recentering Coulture to its original mission statement: to give a voice to all of UNC-Chapel Hill’s vibrant community, not just the voices we hear everyday. This is why you will see that our articles and photoshoots seem a little different this year. Maybe they contain fresher perspectives, like Justin Pfeifer’s piece on the ego or Morgan Taylor’s piece analyzing whether women are consciously altering their styles to match their partners. Or, you’ll just notice the new layout, the life behind all the photos and the attention to detail spent on truly resetting this magazine.

To be honest, I did not expect to be in this position. Given that I was going to be abroad, I was expecting to take a semester off as Associate Editor-in-Chief. “I mean, I’m just an Associate, what’s the worst that could happen,” I thought to myself. The worst did not necessarily happen; I was very grateful to be “promoted,” but the promotion never had any merit. I simply was on an elevator and someone pressed the button for me. There is no need to sit here and type away at how hard I worked and how deserved this opportunity was.

It was/is deserved. I just wish I could have worked for it more, especially since I was the man behind the Parisian green curtain the entire semester. Yes, I edited articles, came up with concepts and sat in meetings; but, was I there, stressing out about every single garment and pose? No. I was not, and I feel bad for that.

However, being away from something I wanted to be a part of so badly really forced me to go through my own reset. My absence from this issue forced me to rethink my issues with control, with the fact that everything needs to be perfect. This time, nothing could be to my standards since my standards would be 4,045 miles away.

My absence from Coulture helped me realize that I needed to step back to fully understand how it worked, to make sense of all the changes going on around me and, most importantly, it helped me understand how I can be there for Coulture and its members next year.

Yet, in my absence, I never felt nervous about this issue. Not only did Clay and Joey have all the capacities, brain power and fashion references to deliver an incredible issue, I knew it would come together because everyone agreed that Coulture needed a fresh start. Though the start was rocky and we are still in progress of making Coulture a well-oiled machine, this issue taught me some fundamental things:

1. Who you surround yourself with is paramount. 2. Inspiration comes from everywhere. 3. Things can just work out with the presence of people who care. 4. Take a breath.

When reading this letter, I hope you consider trying to be an observer instead of a participant. I want you to analyze your life and see where you could use a reset. But that will be easy once you finish reading all of the thought provoking articles and looking at the gorgeous photos in this issue.

I know hearing renewal, perspective and other inspirational buzzwords is probably earth shatteringly annoying so the last thing I will say is this: I hope you enjoy this issue.

To everyone that spent countless hours editing, photographing, makeup-ing, copywriting, developing, styling, researching, slugging (you should read that article as well), and all the other assorted tasks concerned with making 00: The Reset Issue, thank you.

With infinite love wherever I am,

“The camera doesn’t have to be pointed at you all the time. Sometimes, it’s better to see someone else getting their picture taken.” - Fatima Boubsis

PHOTOGRAPHED BY DIANNAH ABDEL HALIM AND OLA ZUBROWICZ

Imust preface this letter by heeding those on which the success of this magazine and myself hinged. There is not a high enough word count to allow for my ineffable thanks, but I would be remiss in not giving at least some recognition to a few of the many who inspire me on a daily basis.

Thank you, Clay. Simply put, thank you for being there. You know the details.

Thank you, Diannah, my muse, for showing me the beauty in the minutiae and in the chaos of being a sophomore in college. Thank you, Luke, for being the first person in any situation and for reminding me of the levity of the world. Thank you, Emi, for your evergreen wisdom and shrewdness. From Ehaus to the Arbo, it’s always really been us.

Before succumbing to political ennui, there was a specific Hillary Clinton line I often circled back to in the early months of 2017. In the zeitgeist of ‘60s protests and social movements and as Wellesley’s first student commencement speaker, she responded to the rhetorical, “Why, if you’re dissatisfied, do you stay in a place?” by replying, “Well, if you didn’t care a lot about it you wouldn’t stay.”

Fashion was my first love, and this adage has come to define my feelings behind Coulture and the fantasy in which we author. I refuse to let the blight of last semester define the integrity of our magazine and masthead. That being said, it is equally irresponsible to minimize its consequences, as that pain is indelible to the Black and brown students who faced the brunt of such shortcomings. 00 was more than apt; it was necessary. Delineating ourselves from issue zero (this is technically issue fourteen), we recognize the need to look inward, a concept the last two years have taught us more than anything, and evolve. Evolution does not mean erasure, and a reset is an evolution.

The election of Teddy Vann, who we profile in this issue, was certainly a reset, one of welcomed historical significance to the tapestry of this university. Her profile can be found among articles chronicling everything from poetry to Parisian profundity. We hope you enjoy reading them as much as we enjoyed writing and editing them.

My final revisions are made in the early morning. As I shower myself under the mist of REPLICA Jazz Club, birds chirp and croon as the rising sun casts the patinated dome of the Old Well to its original gold, and I’m reminded of nascent summer. The gold lapses down the rest of Cameron Avenue and bronzes my face, and I can see that the UV Index will reach 7 today. I glance at Chris Eigeman from the “Metropolitan” poster on my wall as my bloodstream caffeinates.

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“How do you direct a movie you didn’t know there wasn’t a script for? You write the script yourself.” -Clay Morris