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TRAVEL AND CULTURE FOR THE GRADUATED VEGAN · ISSUE NO. 3
On the ground in East Africa, partnering with communities to protect nature for the benefit of all.
June 2016: A four year old boy named Sainingo is living in the Chyulu Hills in southern Kenya. Elephants and giraffes, zebra and gazelle, eland and oryx, lions and jackals and leopards also live here. Every day, Sainingo’s father, one of the longest-serving Big Life Foundation rangers, goes to work to protect these very animals. At least in one small corner of the continent, this is the Africa of today. If we are willing to make the effort, it can also be the Africa of not just Sainingo’s tomorrow, but of all our tomorrows. Big Life Foundation employs hundreds of local Maasai rangers—with more than 40 permanent outposts and tentbased field units, 13 vehicles, tracker dogs, and aerial surveillance—protecting 2 million acres of wilderness in the Amboseli-Tsavo-Kilimanjaro ecosystem of East Africa. Due to this - and with the support of the local communities - poaching of all animals in the region has been massively reduced since Big Life’s inception in 2010.
Learn more and donate: biglife.org
TaBLE OF COnTEnTS TRavEL 12 Iceland
in every issue 5
Editor-in-Chief Holly Feral heads into the woods
Exploring an island of contrasts
35 Be Nice or Leave
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Embracing a long layover
48 Sunset at the Stanford Inn A resort with its own vegan restaurant
56 Tuk-Tuks, Temples & an Elephant Sanctuary Chiang Mai, Thailand & volunteering at Elephant Nature Park
68 Vegan in the Balkans Sunning and swimming in Bosnia and Croatia
76 A Practical Guide for Meandering Tips for long-term road-tripping
Dig on This Managing Editor Michele Truty leaves the comforts of home and dips her toes in boat life
Being a vegan New Orleanean
41 Panama Pit Stop
Editor’s Note
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Travel Q&A with Jojo Huxster Our travel pro answers your queries
44 Vegan Faces A selection of portraits by Jeremie Frémaux
52 According to… Travel advice from our readers
54 Book Club A look at The Most Good You Can Do and A Vegan Ethic
73 North American Nomad Part Three: Faith in the unknown
81 What’s Next? Here’s what we’re working on for next issue
culture 17 Profile: Aaron Adams Creating a vegan heritage in Cascadia
23 Witnessing Wonder The adventure photography of Jonathan Rosenberry
28 Artist to Artist: Sue Coe & Zoë Kolln Two artists discuss technique, trends, and activism
64 Akemi A stylist and activist uses her salon as a hub for outreach
Travel and culture for the graduated vegan Issue Three Visit us online at DriftwoodMag.com Follow us on social media
DriftwoodMagazine
DriftwoodMag Driftwood_Mag
Driftwood Media
editor-in-chief
Holly Feral
managing editor
Michele Truty
design lead
Kim Rountree
designers contributing writers
contributing artists advertising manager
Sarah Cadwell, Shannon Hickman, Robin Ridley, Jade Sturms Nicole Abramowski, Melissa Bastian Breedlove, Stephanie Christianson, Sue Coe, Lacy Davis, Helen Feliciano-Bailey, Michael Friedman, Jojo Huxster, Jim Kettner, ZoĂŤ Kolln, Leigh Matthews, Matt Ruscigno Jeremie FrĂŠmaux, Jonathan Rosenberry Jon Richardson
& digital producer special projects designer
Kat Marshello
& coordinator style editor legal consultant
Eve White Sarah El Ebiary
Driftwood magazine is published quarterly in print and digital editions by Driftwood Media. P.O. Box 28581, Portland, OR 97228 POSTMASTER: Please send address changes to above address. Submissions, letters, and queries to info@driftwoodmag.com Newsstand inquiries to sales@driftwoodmag.com Advertising inquiries to ads@driftwoodmag.com Printed at Vegan Printer, Los Angeles, California
Jonathan shot this and the cover photo along the coast of Manchester, California, near the Point Arena Lighthouse while on a seven-week bike trip from Seattle to San Diego, raising money for Team Humane League. Photos by Jonathan Rosenberry
Copyright 2016 by Driftwood Media. Reproduction in whole or in part without written permission is strictly prohibited. Opinions expressed in articles are those of the author. ISSN 2380-3789 (print) 2380-3797 (digital)
I braved the rain just long enough to heat water for coffee, then snuck back to my warm sleeping bag and observed the morning from my shelter. My cohorts scampered over and we had an editorial meeting right there in the diffused, blue-green light of a damp tent. Contributing photographer and avid camper Mark Rainha tapped on the mesh window to show us a fat, red salamander. The ground was covered with hundreds of his squiggling cousins brought out by the downpour. We were scouting locations for the first installment of our new "Driftwood in Motion" video series. Apart from the rain, this seemed like the perfect spot to host a group camping trip: plenty of clear space here for tents and designated fire rings. Most importantly, it was completely unpopulated, which isn’t surprising. May in Oregon tends to be wet and cold, and a lot of mountain passes are still closed from winter. Cut to two months later, it's a very warm July, and Michele and I show up to the campsite a few days in advance of our group to set up. We watch as the campsite fills in with young adult types toting coolers and boomboxes. We’re slowly encircled by what can best be described as an American beer commercial. Wild trails become littered with toilet paper wads, shards of brown glass from broken beer bottles threaten tent bottoms and bare feet, and dogs run wild. One unruly pup runs into our camp and hikes his leg to my pack. Even though we’re camped in the exact spot from before, maybe 100 feet from the raging Clackamas River, we don’t see a single salamander or any other wildlife, for that matter.
I get the sinking feeling of having my bubble bursted. But then, our group arrives and our youngest camper reminds me of a lesson that I am constantly relearning. He befriends some kids in the neighboring site and, as deftly as any activist I’ve ever seen, turns it into an outreach opportunity. He invites them to have vegan treats with us. What kid can say no to S’mores? He introduces the other kids to a snake he finds, inviting them to meet this new friend and asking them to not harm or eat him. And in the process of chatting around the bonfire, I also learn some new things about leaving no trace and best camping practices. Coming out of our houses to camp amongst strangers in the wild, we are already making ourselves vulnerable, yet open to possibilities. We’re at the mercy of nature, and there is an inherent desire to appreciate it that makes for a rare opening to talk about preservation in a way that isn’t a distant hypothetical concept for pundits and scientists to worry over. Witnessing my young friend act so graciously to this opening, I am reminded that it’s within the context of friendship that we can have the greatest positive impact on each other by simply sharing our joy. In Driftwood, we invite you to visit our hometowns and to come along on our journeys, to marvel with us as we peel back the layers of the seemingly commonplace to expose the incredible. Artists open up about their vision, and vegans from around the globe invite us into their lives, even if for just a moment. Take a break, kick up your feet, and come along on this tour through our backyards. We’re taking veganism out of the kitchen to share the heart of it: a sense of wonder for our planet. Enjoy!
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This issue of Driftwood was made for you by all these lovelies
Nicole Abramowski
Melissa Bastian Breedlove
Stephanie Christianson
BERLIN, GERMANY VEGAN 10 YEARS, PAGE 68
NEW ORLEANS, LOUISIANA, USA VEGAN 10 YEARS, PAGE 35
PORTLAND, OREGON, USA VEGAN 8 YEARS, PAGE 12
Lacy Davis
Helen Feliciano-Bailey
PORTLAND, OREGON, USA VEGAN 16 YEARS, PAGE 48
DISCOVERY BAY, CALIFORNIA, USA VEGAN 3 YEARS, PAGE 56
Jeremie Frémaux
Michael Friedman
Jojo Huxster
OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA, USA VEGAN 4 YEARS, PAGE 44
PORTLAND, OREGON, USA VEGAN 9 YEARS, PAGE 73
ROAMING! VEGAN 10 YEARS, PAGE 8
Sue Coe UPSTATE NEW YORK, USA VEGAN BEFORE IT WAS COOL, PAGE 28
Jim Kettner
Zoë Kolln
Leigh Matthews
PORTLAND, OREGON, USA VEGAN 18 YEARS, PAGE 48
OLYMPIA, WASHINGTON, USA VEGAN 3 YEARS, PAGE 28
VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA VEGAN 11 YEARS, PAGE 54
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Jonathan Rosenberry
Matt Ruscigno, MPH, RD
SEATTLE, WASHINGTON, USA VEGAN 2 YEARS, PAGE 23
LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA, USA VEGAN 20 YEARS, PAGE 41
Dig on this. What's been turning Michele's gears
The sky is filled with stars, the masts of neighboring boats, and a steady stream of airplanes headed to and from LAX, my field of vision constantly shifting as the boat engages in the laziest tugof-war with the dock. It’s surprisingly quiet, save for the teensiest splishy splash from said tug-of-war and this clicking sound I can’t quite figure out, sort of like the reeling in of a fishing line, but there are no fishermen—no, everyone has either gone home like the landlubbers they are or secreted away inside their boats. Holly’s down in our own berth, I think it’s called (cabin?), eating chips and watching a movie on her tablet. Because it’s the twenty-first century and that’s how you do. I’ve snuck out to sit on the deck (again, I think that's what it’s called) to slip on my headphones, listen to Ride, and fill a few pages of my notebook with a fun little cocktail of memory and fiction. And reflect on how lucky I am to have this moment. We drove down to Los Angeles to attend Expo West (Natural Products Expo), press-check Issue Two, and table at Vegan Street Fair. Since our indie publisher startup hotel budget sits comfortably at zero dollars, I reached out to some old friends for couches on which to rest our road-weary butts. Thus we rounded out our tour with nights spent in Downtowny L.A., Brentwood, San Fernando Valley, Los Feliz...and three nights on a friend-of-a-friend’s boat docked in Marina Del Rey. Directly south of Venice, Marina Del Rey is not as pretentious as I’d expected. Sure, it’s the depot for some gazillionaires’ toys, but it’s also where some people make their home, as docking
fees are much cheaper than rent in a city like L.A. The hotels in the area are super luxe, but the staff and boat owners at the marina itself are friendly, and I have yet to spy a single ascot. Just a couple of blocks away is a regular old Ralph’s grocery store and even a pizza joint that has vegan cheese. (While not the greatest, I got to eat cold pizza for breakfast on a boat, so I’m calling it a win.) I’ve maybe spent a collective 24 hours on boats in my lifetime, so living on one for a few days is a new experience. It's much like an RV, with tight, convertible spaces and lots of tucking/hiding away of things. And lots of bruises—somehow I've managed to bang and bark my legs at least once a day. We haven't spent a ton of time inside the boat, as we have so much running around (read: sitting in traffic) to do throughout the city, but the time we have has been a treat. The view, the cool mornings, the gentle rocking to sleep...well, I can see why so many rent-dodgers, drifters, and piratey types call these little floating cradles home. You can rent boats like this—or even fancier—on Airbnb-type sites, although I didn’t see anything in my adopted marina. But maybe you have a friend-of-a-friend boat owner you never knew about. Or you’re ready for an experiment in not paying ridiculous rent. Or you’re a gazillionaire looking for a new toy, in which case I quote Ferris Bueller: “If you have the means, I highly recommend picking one up.” Also, let me know when I can sleep over. Ascots negotiable.
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8 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
VEGAN TRAVEL Q&A WITH
JOJO HUXSTER Hi! I’m Jojo, your travel agony aunt! In January 2015 I left the UK to travel full time and I’ve been living life on the road ever since. Last year I explored Thailand, Laos, Vietnam, Cambodia, North America, and Eastern Europe, and so far 2016 has seen me taking in the sights and sounds of Taiwan, Hong Kong, Japan, and South Korea. I spent two months managing a cat shelter in Inawashiro, Japan, on a voluntary basis. This lodging in exchange for work deal really helps lengthen my travels, as well as gives me fulfilling new experiences (and plenty of kitty cuddles) along the way. I’m passionate about opening up the whole world to vegan travelers, so I’m excited to answer any questions you can think of to send my way—just e-mail info@driftwoodmag.com with the subject line Hey Jojo!
I’m about to go on a long trip to several countries. Considering they all have different climates, I need to be prepared for anything, but I want to travel light. Do you have a perfected packing list I could riff on? Of course! I’ve been traveling with a hand-luggagesize backpack for over 18 months now, and I’ve experienced temperatures ranging from -7 to 40° C (20–104° F), so I have my packing game down to a fine art. My top tips are: Never take more than a week’s worth of underwear, get your toiletries down to a minimum (do you really need to cleanse, tone, and moisturize?), and layer. Unless you’re skiing in the Alps or heading to China for the Harbin Ice Festival, then packing bulky sweaters and padded jackets is probably unnecessary. Instead, take a couple of thermal underlayers that will roll up and pack small. You’ll also want a tank top (good for the beach section of your trip) and a t-shirt or two for when you need to cover your shoulders. I always pack a dress and a couple of skirts (one short, one long) because that’s what I feel comfortable in, but choose your next items based on what you actually like to wear. If you’re a jeans person, then take your jeans. If you’re most comfortable in zip-off travel pants, then pack ’em! I also travel with a thin scarf and a microfiber travel towel rather than a bulky beach towel. The scarf works for covering up, lying on, and drying off
at the beach. Anything multifunctional is gonna be your friend on a long trip. Shoe-wise, you’re going to want comfy sneakers that won’t look out of place when you’re exploring a fashionable city. If you can fit in a second pair of shoes, I’d opt for some hybrid water/hiking shoes or a pair of smarter flats, depending on what your travel vibe is. What quick things do you do to prepare for a trip to a new destination? My first step is always to check whether I need a visa. Sometimes this can take a while, so get on it as soon as you have a destination in mind. Then I look into the climate (who wants to hit the beaches of Thailand in monsoon season?) and what vaccinations I might need because, like visas, vaccination courses can take weeks or months to complete. After scanning for cheap flights and possibly booking something, I start Googling to find out what unmissable vegan eats my destination has—from strawberry shortcake in Japan to potato-topped pizza in Italy, I want to find the best accidentally vegan foods and make sure I can fit them all in. My search usually takes me to Happy Cow, local blogs, travel blogs, and Instagram. Finally, I sit down and read up on local customs before scoping out the cities’ attractions, both well known and off the beaten path, using guide books, Wiki travel, Atlas Obscura, and travel blogs.
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I’m considering some world travel on my own but am worried about being a young, single lady traveler in some places around the world. Any advice? I understand completely, and one thing I always keep in mind is that large parts of the world are no more or less safe than home. Even when I’m not traveling alone, I try to make contact with women living in the countries I’m traveling to. They’ll have the best advice about where to take extra precautions, or even which areas to avoid, and maybe you’ll make a new friend along the way. Trust your instincts and try to stay with female hosts on Couchsurfing, meet women you know online, and buddy up with another solo female traveler when there are adventures that you aren’t up for embarking on solo. Do you ever purchase travel insurance? I’ve seen so many mixed reviews! I always, always purchase travel insurance. I see it as one of the non-negotiable costs of traveling. Yes, the company will most likely try not to pay out if you
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make a claim, but that’s how they make their money. Be ready to stand your ground and, if at all possible, check in with them before visiting a doctor or hospital. I have first-hand experience of how necessary medical coverage is, even in a non-emergency situation, from when I got really sick in Vietnam. I had been throwing up everything for five days, and if I’d not had coverage I might have just waited it out and persevered with rehydration salts for a little longer. Thankfully, because I was covered, I could go to a good hospital for blood tests, was diagnosed with some seriously bad food poisoning, and was able to afford to get the medication they prescribed straight from the hospital pharmacy. This meant that I got back on my feet faster and was able to enjoy exploring Hanoi and Halong Bay. The level of coverage you decide on is up to you, but I know I don’t want to be paying out of pocket if I need to be evacuated from the side of a mountain in an air ambulance with a couple of broken legs or a fractured skull. I also cover anything that I can’t afford
to replace. My clothes aren’t worth paying the extra premiums for, but my laptop, phone, and camera are definitely worth the extra few pounds a month. What are the best new travel items or technologies you’ve seen come out in the past few years? The lightweight DSLR and mirrorless cameras that have come out recently impress me to no end. My Sony A6000 is super light, takes fantastic pictures, fits inside my hand luggage, and sends my favorite photos to my phone at the press of a button—perfect for getting your snaps onto social media in a flash. I’m also a huge fan of the Google Translate app. You can now take a picture of any ingredient label or menu item and it’ll translate it for you there and then. Whilst it isn’t 100% in every language, it’s constantly improving, and it was invaluable in Japan. Google has also introduced a downloadable version for those times when you don’t have Wi-Fi access. Lastly, I consider a portable backup battery/charger an absolute must. The ability to charge my phone wherever I am is often crucial and, whilst these devices aren’t that new to the market, they are getting smaller and smaller every year, with some of the newer versions coming in at the size of a credit card. Do you have a favorite/most versatile type of luggage? I’m definitely a carry-on-only kinda girl these days, but if I was planning to check a bag, I would highly recommend a backpack. I hate the idea of dragging a suitcase through busy streets, and a heavy duffle bag is just impractical. I will say that if you’re the kind of person who needs to arrive at your destination with perfectly folded clothes and a range of footwear to choose from, then perhaps a backpack and a packing cube full of rolled clothes isn’t for you. But think about it like this: It’s early, you’ve just hopped off of an overnight train, and you’re starving. With a backpack you can walk the 15 minutes to the nearest vegan hotspot, eat without feeling like you’re in the way, walk the rest of the way to your destination, and have saved a ton of money on taxi fares. My backpack is 40L and has zip-away straps and lockable zips, meaning that I can check it easily if I need to. At the same time, its size means that I can take it as carry-on and don’t often get separated from it on long bus or train journeys, which offers a little extra peace of mind. A veteran globetrotter, Jojo is the voice behind Vegan in Brighton. Have a travel question? Send it to info@driftwoodmag.com, with the subject line Hey Jojo!
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Iceland Exploring an island of contrasts story and photos Stephanie Christianson
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I
celand is wild, and also trampled. When I told friends we were going to Iceland, responses ran the gamut from “I am so jealous!” to “Do people even live there?” Everyone knows the Google image search version of Iceland: Northern Lights swirling over snow-covered peaks, lush green fields filled with ponies, and ice. A lot of ice. Maybe you even know that a single road called the Ring Road circles the island. (This road has few offshoots, only in the more populated areas, helping preserve the mindset that Iceland is largely undiscovered.) But what you rarely see or hear about is the crowded capital city packed full of tourist shops, museums, art, and kitschy bars (Big Lebowski-themed bar, anyone?) staffed with people from all over the world. How do we all find ourselves in this remote land? Icelandair’s clever stopover campaign was put into place to boost the economy after the 2008 recession, an event that hit the little island nation much harder than other countries and made tourism almost inaccessible to broke travelers such as myself. The budget airline
provides dirt-cheap fares to many European destinations from U.S. cities such as Boston, NYC, Minneapolis, and Seattle, and includes a free stopover in Iceland for up to a week. The promotion offers a wonderful opportunity to explore this captivating place. Both the stopover campaign and the Gray Bus Line’s tour bus brigade have made it incredibly easy to explore Iceland and, as a result, Reykjavík has boomed. This trip was my second to Iceland, and in the three years since my first, a very large part of the city has been developed into hotels and apartments to accommodate the rapidly growing tourist and permanent populations. Let’s erase another hesitation: communication. If you speak English, then it’s easy. Everyone speaks English here, as nobody outside of Iceland speaks Icelandic. While the native language has survived, largely unchanged throughout time—likely due to the total isolation of its people from the rest of Europe—students are required to study English and at least one other Scandinavian language to prepare themselves for the world outside of the small island. A local magazine (tourist-skewed, of course) suggested that
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if a non-native speaker attempts the language, the native speaker will always answer back in English. Unique as it is, Icelandic is not a language to fumble through, unlike French, Italian, or Spanish. Embrace this early, learn “hello” and “thank you,” and you’re set.
Spend some time in the capital Reykjavík is a gorgeous little city, with lots of graffiti and vegan food and bizarre celebrations in the public square. The graffiti ranges from the tagging you can see on train cars in the U.S. to complete works of art that find themselves featured in American Express commercials. The city is incredibly walkable, and there isn’t a bad place to stay, if you don’t mind a little time on your feet. We spent four days in the city and collected so many wonderful sights, from giant trolls sitting in the street outside a storefront
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for no real purpose to Sigur Rós lyrics painted onto the side of a building, to a late-night celebration in the public square featuring Icelandic rappers and planes roaring overhead as they prepared for landing. The centerpoint of the city is Hallgrímskirkja, the tall, Lego-like church that is featured in anything related to visiting Iceland. The church is breathtaking (even for art-loving agnostics like myself) and allows for a high vantage point above the city to peek at the colorful neighborhoods running into the ocean. If you get hit with a soggy day, duck into one of the museums, which detail different aspects of Iceland’s growth from a Viking outpost to a U.S. military base (We brought them television!), to the pretty little weirdo hotspot it is today. I highly recommend the Viking Ship Museum in Keflavík, complete with a restored ship and props for photo ops.
Then hit the Ring Road! Whether you’re a lone adventurer or need a little hand-holding, the island is yours to explore. There are plenty of opportunities to explore the country on your own, but there are also tour buses (the aforementioned Gray Bus Line) available for everything you can imagine: a three-day trek around the Ring Road, a full day on the Golden Circle, four hours for a brewery tour. Roads around the country are populated with a mixture of 4x4s, campervans, and tour buses. The buses are almost always packed with tourists who may not feel comfortable navigating this completely unfamiliar country alone. Any which way you choose, just make sure you do it! Some of the most beautiful waterfalls await if you head east out of Reykjavík and hop on the Golden Circle: Skógafoss, Seljalandsfoss, and Gullfoss, to name a few. Warning: Everyone stops there and stomps around in the mud and gets in your photos, so be patient. See if you can find the Bridge Between Continents, a manmade span on the Reykjanes Peninsula that crosses the spot where the Eurasian and North American plates are pulling apart. This peninsula is also where you’ll find the famed Blue Lagoon, a literal hotspot so popular they now require reservations (they didn’t in 2012!). The real visual treat, however,
is the ever-changing scenery as you continue east: fields full of Icelandic horses and sheep, imposing mountains hidden in clouds, miles of black ash and sand straight from the fires of Mordor, and eerie, mossy lava formations. The Ring Road runs about 830 miles in a circle around the island and is the most direct route to all the picturesque spots such as waterfalls, canyons, volcanoes, and glaciers. It is, for all intents and purposes, closed to vehicle traffic during the winter months due to the weather being highly unpredictable and dangerous for the casual driver. Think snow, icy roads, and powerful gusts. I have visited both in May and September and watched the conditions change every five minutes from sun to pouring rain to intense fog, but you’ll have plenty to do if you are prepared for the weather roulette, have a couple of days, and rent a car or campervan We rented a cute little Renault campervan we lovingly dubbed Reggie and hit the road almost immediately after stocking up at the grocery store. Our van was pretty basic: a bed in the back with sleeping bags; mini gas stove with a pan, plates, and cutlery; GPS; and a Wi-Fi connection (yes, really). My husband and I are not really the rugged outdoor types, so while we missed DRIFTWOODMAG.COM 15
easy access to a bathroom and fridge, Iceland is full of cheap campsites with everything we needed, like breakfast and showers. We grabbed a handy booklet listing all the campsites sorted by region and picked where we’d stay that day depending on where we thought we’d be. The grocery stores in Keflavík and Reykjavík carry Violife vegan cheese, nutritional yeast, GF snacks, and more, so stock up and get exploring. Price-wise with fuel and campsite fees, the campervan worked out to be a little bit more than if we’d stayed put in the city, but the adventure and scenery and feel of the island were so completely worth it. Once you’re east of Vik, the last “big” city east of Reykjavík, it’s desolate and empty, but with plenty of places to pull off and just take it all in. Several hours out is Laufskálavarða, a stop dedicated to building travelers’ cairns. These are piles of rocks that roughly resemble pyramids, signaling a landmark, whether it be historical or practical. Laufskálavarþa, which memorializes a farm demolished by a volcano, has grown exponentially in recent years due to increased tourism. The suggestion is to build or add to a cairn on your journey east, and the Icelandic parks department now provides—as in trucks them in—small rocks for more cairns. I tell everyone who will listen to go all the way to Jökulsárlón, the glacial lagoon that drains into the ocean. Try to go after the café/tourist shop closes and everyone has left for the day. The atmosphere is stark and silent, punctuated only by the cracking of melting ice and the splashing of seals darting around the hunks of ice. One of the most stunning visuals from the trip was the abandoned plane wreckage from the 1970s. The location of the wreckage is not published for a couple of reasons, mainly due to it being on private property that happens to be very bumpy and unstable, and I’ll be keeping that secret. But figuring out the location is part of the adventure, and with the power of Google, you can find anything (although I’ve heard the wreckage is no longer accessible). When we finally found the aircraft, after circling and turning down a few wrong roads and bumping over a very rocky track, the entire area was so socked in by fog that I had no idea we were that close to the ocean. The time we spent at the wreckage summed up Iceland for me: to be so close to humanity and yet so isolated is a testament to the hardiness of the Icelandic people. I feel lucky to have been able to explore a small part of that wild island and hope we as tourists can work to leave as little a footprint as possible.
Powered in part by vegan beer, Stephanie Christianson is working toward her goal of running half marathons in all 50 states—seven down so far! She’s also a co-director of the Portland-based nonprofit Vegan Iron Chef. Follow her adventures at @steffers_the_gnome on Instagram.
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AARON ADAMS Creating a vegan heritage in Cascadia story Michele Truty photos Holly Feral
T
he plan was for a group of us to camp up at Mt. Adams, to forage for mushrooms and other edible plants along the way...but the cabins were all reserved and it was running around 40 degrees up there, so never mind. Luckily, we live in the Pacific Northwest, where there’s always a farmers market open and you’re surrounded by parks, woods, and beaches. Our consolation prize was still better than okay: Me, EIC Holly, and chef Aaron Adams tooling around Portland, Oregon, for the day. We swung by the farmers market first, in the Montavilla neighborhood, where we loaded up on produce and the hugest vegan tamales you ever did see. Then Aaron threw together a little off-the-cuff picnic for us at his restaurant, Farm Spirit. And finally, it was off to a beach on the Columbia River, where we baked in the sun, snacked on radishes and grainy rolls, and gabbed away until at least one of us passed out. (We’ll blame the sun, not the wine.) Sure, I’d sat down for my formal interview with Aaron, and had a few meals at his restaurant, but you never really know someone until you’ve spent some quality van time with them. And putting together all of Aaron’s stories, some of which just wouldn’t be fair to print—we all have those embarrassing, awful moments we accidentally share in the comfort of the van—at the core, he’s just pushing for better for this world, starting with himself. He would probably definitely brush this off, but Aaron’s role as a vegan chef has allowed him to touch thousands of lives (and of course save even more) as an artist and activist. And I use the word “role” rather than “profession,” because it’s more than a job; it’s what he is—you can’t separate the man from the chef. Even while standing at my yard sale, he couldn’t help but check out the edible plants I was accidentally growing and make plans for my plum harvest. (I’m gonna be rolling in jam.) Pretty much
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anywhere around town, Aaron can take a walk around the block and come up with a solid list of herbs, fruits, and edible flowers. And one track of his mind seems to be dedicated to all the things he can do with those plants. That’s because what Aaron does is art. Most of us cook. We plug ingredients into recipes, and out comes food that we eat and maybe stuff leftovers into a tortilla the next day. Aaron throws away the recipes and approaches his ingredients as an alien or child would. A carrot has no history, only possibilities. Aaron examines the carrot, plays with it, combines it with other ingredients, experimenting, building, starting over, until he’s created something new, interesting, and delicious. That’s challenging enough when you have as your ingredients all the foods in the world. But Aaron has a few constraints he’s placed on his selection: vegan and within his bioregion. What’s a bioregion? It goes beyond just saying where you can acquire fresh ingredients. Your bioregion can include different ecosystems, but the border lies along natural boundaries. He sources his ingredients not from distributors or monoculture farmers, but local, individual farms. He’s worked hard to replace or eliminate anything that has to be shipped in. He’s down to sugar and some spices, and won’t be satisfied until Farm Spirit is completely local. Luckily, Aaron’s bioregion, known as Cascadia, is pretty damn bountiful, and aside from a vast array of fruits and vegetables, he’s been able to locally source beans and grains—even quinoa and olives (which he is of course curing himself). Aaron points out that while his bioregion is particularly rich, few places are denied this privilege. New York has the Hudson Valley. In Scandinavia they build food tunnels and do lots of cellaring. If your restaurant claims it can’t do local, organic produce, chances are what they are really saying is they don’t
care to. While it can be a challenge, the only areas it would be super tough in would be those in big agricultural centers. When you’re surrounded by monoculture farms—those specifically focused on produce meant to be shipped—nobody’s filling in the gaps. Your locally sourced menu becomes quite limited. But, “there are always people to grow. You can always grow yourself. And you can always find some backyard.” Local sourcing has benefits that go far beyond mere “farm to table” bragging rights. Concentrating on and marrying together local ingredients is how cuisines are born. For instance, when you have no access to citrus, how do you get those acidic flavors? You use what is available to you, and that becomes part of your cuisine. You form your own heritage, your own traditions. What you produce becomes part of the culture. The dishes served at Farm Spirit are Cascadian horticultural cuisine, which tends to present local ingredients in a clean, simple way. Aaron celebrates the amazing breadth of flora produced in Pacific Northwest soil, enriched by everything from rainfall and coniferous trees to ash from Mount St. Helens. So along with beets and garlic and hazelnuts, you’ll find fir needles and lovage and flowers on your plate or in your broth— and every bit of it is meant to be eaten. “I don’t get garnish,” Aaron says. And it really is silly, when you think about it. Why would you put something edible in or on a dish if it’s just meant to look pretty for a minute then be thrown away? Looking pretty is not an issue for Aaron’s creations. His team assembles each dish right in front of the diners (seated along a bar, perched over the cooking and working surfaces) with care, sometimes with tweezers, to make them just right. While this is beyond a doubt fine dining, elevated cuisine, Farm Spirit comes with zero pretension. How pretentious can it be when the menu includes choco tasty paste? You’re invited to eat with your fingers, ask questions, and sing along to whatever’s playing, whether that’s Lee Scratch Perry, Madness, Love & Rockets, or the Velvet Underground...because if you feel like singing, you’re probably not alone. You should feel at home here. The interior looks like a pantry for a reason. These chefs have invited you into their kitchen— sometimes Aaron will be right there at the DRIFTWOODMAG.COM 19
door to usher you in: “You eating with us tonight? Come on in!” You pull up a chair and chit-chat while they prepare course after course in an hours-long show that goes beyond any fancy-pants dinner party. And at the end of the night, they send you home with one last treat, breakfast bread, for when you wake up wondering if it was all a dream. Oddly enough, the practical, utilitarian feel of the restaurant can underwhelm some guests. “It’ll be pedestrian to them, ‘cause if you go to a restaurant… I was just in South Beach. You go to a restaurant there and there’s practically flames shooting out of the walls and people doing cartwheels and stuff—it’s, like, exciting. And our place is really farmy.” That’s not to say the space is put together thoughtlessly. The dishes and light fixtures are handmade by local craftsman Steve Kelly. The bar was made from an ash tree felled right in Portland by another local, Jon Neu. Everything in this tiny space has intention behind it, and it embraces its homeland of the Pacific Northwest. That’s another, and perhaps wider-reaching benefit of buying local: getting to not only financially support your neighbors, keeping money in your region, but getting to know those farmers, those craftspeople, and “also just emotional issues like knowing the name of the person you’re buying plants from and being friends with them and caring about whether they’re making a living or not because they’re an individual you know. That’s kind of an amazing feeling, being happy to see a farmer you haven’t seen in a while, being so appreciative of their work. I idolize those people.” This is clear, walking the farmers market with Aaron, where he can’t keep from chatting and hugging his way through. Financial support and social justice are other areas in which Aaron strives for improvement. He’s worked in restaurants a long time and has seen (and felt) how many workers are treated and how poorly they’re paid. Farm Spirit is a no-tip zone, where people pay a fixed price for dinner. There is no front of house/ back of house class distinction here. Everyone takes part in the weekly deep clean. Diners leave the restaurant knowing everyone’s names. The chefs, the dishwasher, they’re all part of the team and they all make a true living wage. This fixed price is also set with an eye to accessibility. Aaron admits this comes from a privileged position, but the price is something many of us can manage. So while $70 is a lot more than $7, this is special, more like a night at the theater than a carry-out burrito. Many come in for special occasions and celebrations, but he’s seeing an uptick in tourists and just the plain ol’ moneyed foodie crowd. Whoever is sitting next to you, you’re all served the same thing, and its quality is apparent— you can see how many hours (sometimes days) went into each component of each dish, all the sauces, the little details. To Aaron, taking care of people, treating them well, is part of being an ethical vegan. Single-cause veganism just doesn’t make sense to him. “The reason why I’m vegan is because I’m against systems of oppression.” Aaron is constantly tweaking the menu, the space, and the business to better align with his values. In the short time Farm Spirit has been open, we can see his dedication to “continual refinement,” from the shift from imported coffee to local tea, to that of box-store chairs with locally crafted ones. Those values took some time to come into focus, of course. Aaron has been cooking since childhood. Like many of us latchkey kids of the ’80s, he was nurtured by the likes of PBS cooking shows Yan Can Cook and The Frugal Gourmet. Living with 20 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
his mother after his parents divorced and moving around a bit— including a stint in Guam—cooking for family and friends took on a special importance for him. After culinary school, Aaron worked in restaurants in New York and Florida. These were omnivore joints, and Aaron, then an omnivore who had flirted with vegetarianism, has himself “processed” animals in the kitchen. “I’ve killed rabbits in the kitchen. From alive to dead, you know?” He says when that’s your job, your daily reality, that you simply don’t think about it. “I think you just don’t see what it is anymore. It’s product.” You become desensitized when you’re going through hundreds of pounds of fish and thousands of lobsters every week. When he headed up his own restaurant in Florida, Aaron focused on local ingredients—sourcing vegetables was tough, but he was able to have a garden on site, which helped. A friend pointed out that he had the first farm-to-table restaurant in Jacksonville, Florida, but it was before anyone cared. “They wanted to know if I could make coconut shrimp for them. They didn’t give a shit whether I was doing really nice food.” Aaron had to get out of Florida. Lucky for the Pacific Northwest, his brother was here and having a baby, a good enough lure to bring Aaron up. It was here he got his V-card. One night, sitting in the basement, his body decided it was time to take action for what he already knew in his mind. “I’m eating an extra-meatza pizza kinda of thing. And I flipped out and threw up.” It was a literal and figurative purge, and he never looked back. He opened his first Portland restaurant in 2008, with his thenpartner Dinae Horne. Back then, Portobello Vegan Trattoria was one of the very few vegan restaurants in the city, as opposed to
vegan-friendly omnivore establishments. They brought the city 100% vegan Italian: gnocchi, (mushroom) scallops, and tiramisu. Over time, Aaron had hit a wall creatively, and while they made a shift in focusing on local, farm-direct produce and cutting out any processed foods, like Daiya on the pizzas and even tofu, it wasn’t enough. Plus, as is often the case, their blended business and personal relationship didn’t work out, and Aaron left Portobello. (It’s okay, everyone, they’re friends again, and Dinae is still rocking Portobello, so if you need a gnocchi fix, she’s got you covered!) Opening Farm Spirit was inevitable for Aaron. After getting a rundown of what his typical week looks like, I noticed there was no day off. Sometimes your day runs 20 hours, sometimes you’re not feeling it but the show must go on, sometimes you burn out. So why bother? After a long pause, he says, “I guess I kinda just have to do it… I spent a lot of years not getting it done. I spent a lot of time finding excuses and not developing myself how I want to, and I just kind of woke up last year, you know, and I was like, ‘I need to do something that is amazing.’ And I haven’t gotten there yet. I don’t feel it yet. But we’re working on it. Yeah, I’ll take a break when we get to amazing.” Finally opening his dream restaurant is—no surprise—not enough for Aaron. His future plans include a professional organization for plant-food chefs. That’s right, Aaron uses the oft-dreaded “plant-based” label. And yes, he knows it pisses you off, but when he thinks of “vegan” foods, it’s vegan versions of animal-based foods: analogs, vegan meats, vegan cheeses, you know, the stuff we all freak out over because they allow us to enjoy those things from our childhood. Plant-based food, for
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Aaron, is the food that presents plants in the best way possible. Because being a vegan restaurant is not enough. “We want to have our foundations in our own nostalgia. We want to have our foundations in our cultural influences of our families. But it doesn’t have to be nostalgia steeped in food. It can be nostalgia based on emotions or memories, and we try to figure out how we can put that on the plate.” He and L.A.-based Matthew Kenney chef Scott Winegard have been looking at Copenhagen, Denmark’s MAD Symposium, and they think a gathering like that could help evolve the state of plant foods. They want to hold a gathering where chefs could share ideas and inspiration, as well as set up a central support system for vegan chefs. Aaron is big on working together with plant-loving chefs whether they’re vegan or not, and he often has outside chefs stage at Farm Spirit (pronounced stazhj, it’s like an internship, where often less experienced chefs come work at your restaurant for free, even for a few days, to pick up techniques and such), and he also does special events with other restaurants. Crossing the vegan border can be great for exchanging techniques, but it’s also outreach. It shows that vegan restaurants are for everyone. Good vegan food is just good food. He’s got other outreach schemes for the Farm Spirit space. While small, he can host discussions, bringing together groups who can together effect change. He loves hosting benefit dinners for both nonhuman and human causes. When asked about classes, Aaron says that his space is too small to do it, but he does have an interest in one day opening a culinary school. “First I have to get people to want to learn from me, then I can give them a format for that.” I know, there are already plenty, but it’s Aaron, so he sees a lot more work, a lot more experimentation, and a lot more serving before he’d be confident in such a position. Until then, the crew at Farm Spirit will continue to fine-tune Cascadian horticultural cuisine and serve plant-based, finedining experiences to vegans and omnivores, some unwittingly! Sometimes it’s not until the end of the evening that a diner will realize that not only was there no meat—vegetable-centric fine dining is actually huge right now—but that there was no dairy or egg. Already, both Aaron and Farm Spirit are getting noticed. Aaron is increasingly seen as an authority on cooking with plants. Press, awards—not just vegan ones but appearing in mainstream channels and lists like the best farm-to-table in each state, beating out more-established omnivore joints. This type of exposure is impressive, as not only is the restaurant so young, but Portland is not yet the culinary hotspot that New York City or Tokyo is. And this exposure means more diners. The more diners, the better for the animals, as sometimes this meal can be the start of an open conversation about veganism. Aaron doesn’t see his primary function as that of an activist—“I’m not handing out pamphlets at the restaurant”— and he knows that most of the time, “meals don’t change people’s minds.” But he is honest and is always willing to have that conversation. He’s heard from diners who have turned the corner, taken that plunge, gotten off that fence and into veganism thanks to him. You never know what is going to be that catalyst. For some it’s a slaughterhouse video, for others it’s a night of tear-inducing food (I’ve seen it happen!) and a great conversation. 22 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
34 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
o t a t r s i t t ist r a ...in which we bring together two artists working from different parts of the world. In this issue, the legendary New York–based English artist and illustrator Sue Coe chats with Washington-based student, artist, and tattooer Zoë Kolln. Both artists use printmaking and illustration as a means to spread awareness and engage with issues ranging from veganism to social justice and human rights.
ZK: How did you get started painting, printmaking, and illustrating? Have you always identified as an artist? SC: Yes, always identified as an artist and socialist, since I could think. I’ve worked as an illustrator since age 17. At 19, I was illustrating Watergate for the London Times, and then went over to the New York Times at age 20. UK art schools were highly competitive, and I alerted myself to the appalling reality that there was another student who was better than me at the Royal College. I vowed to beat him in how many magazine and newspaper jobs we could get. It was fun, as I won. He was very very good—a naturally better artist than me—but he didn’t have the heart. How about you, Zoë? ZK: Yes, I’ve also always identified as an artist. I’ve been making since before I can remember, and I especially started to hone my interests in illustration once I was about 8. I got started because I 28 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
was so intrigued and inspired by all the art around me in my schools, in books, movies, entertainment. As far as painting and illustrating, I have been doing both for a long time, since I was very little. Printmaking, on the other hand, since it is a much more intensive craft, I began much later in my artistic exploration. I started working in serigraphy when I was in high school, but then got into college and did much more printmaking. I am now skilled in woodcut, linocut, serigraphy, and intaglio processes. SC: Back in the day, women were not encouraged to be painters or printmakers. The category alotted for us was illustration, as it was assumed we would breed and therefore be interested in children’s books. My first job was at a Mars Bar factory in England, at age 15, and I would draw workers’ portraits in the lunch break. One of them said to me I could go to art school for free. So I found the forms to apply, filled them out, lied about my age, and
gained entry into the wonderful world of art school. It was a magical world to me. We drew all day. None of the teachers were women. The male teachers told me it was a waste of money educating females, as they got married and had children, ignoring the obvious: that they were married with children. How do you think it’s different today for a younger artist, as regards the education you are receiving? ZK: That’s very ironic that your professors didn’t realize their contradictions and double standards for their treatment of women. I would say from my experience I am far less discriminated against in school than what you described. I don’t go to an art-specific college; I go to a liberal arts school to study art at The Evergreen State College. It certainly wasn’t hard to get in; however, I don’t know about in artspecific universities. We’ll see once I go to grad school. I would be curious to know how many other women were attending the school with you, and I would also be
SUE COE (from top left): Abolition, Humans Only Party, Auschwitz Begins Whenever Someone Looks at a Slaughterhouse and Thinks: They Are Only Animals, Loading Sheep, She Escaped the Circus and Was Shot 98 Times
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ZOË KOLLN (from top left): Legislation ≠ Liberation, Dairy Calf Separated from Mother at Birth (They Will Never Be Reunited), Happy Deception: Female Chicks Prepared for Laying, Male Chicks Culled, River Lobster, Bee & Moth
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curious to speak with other women artists born in the ’50s about their experiences getting into and attending college. In my art classes, I have found we always have a lovely mix of female, queer, and male-identifying folks, so I never feel outnumbered or isolated as a woman. However, there are places on campus that have presences of being “old boys’ clubs,” such as some shops on campus. What makes you attracted to social justice-engaged images? Why do you like making them? SC: I have always had the gleeful perversity of wanting to expose what is being denied or ignored. But the engine that drives my work is outrage at the destruction of life for profit—it’s like a looming constant of injustice, something that cannot be ignored. The more I know, the more I can’t unknow. As the majority of my work is for print, it’s hard for editors to deny reality, although they try their hardest. It’s the same with publishing and museums. This is for multiple reasons, usually economic. It’s only when a cultural worker tries imagery linked to social justice that one realizes the massive forces against any truth coming out. This is how we learn. As Rosa Luxemburg said, “Those that do not move do not notice their chains.” I could ask you the same, and I do! ZK: I am also attracted to social justice imagery, because I feel the need to use my passion to expose things I have learned and things I think are worth sharing, regardless of how much people don’t want to see them. I think it drives my work and puts it in an interesting place historically to make images about current and ongoing cultural issues in society. I see it as a way to document, explore, learn, and educate through my work—if my work doesn’t make somebody feel something, anything, then I think it’s time to go back to the drawing board. And ultimately, I think using our experiences as witnesses, we can expose injustice and exploitation no matter where it stands. But more than that, making art about things that are violent, taboo, forbidden, or hidden within our culture is something I have always been interested in. In particular, I always found the paradox between beauty and violence in art to be extraordinary and well worth pondering for a lifetime.
As a contemporary artist, how do you feel the art market responds to human injustice and animal rights-related work? Are you able to sell paintings and prints depicting such tragedy?
“
Using our experiences as witnesses, we can expose injustice and exploitation no matter where it stands.
”
SC: This would be a book-length response, which we cannot do. To make it short, artists can create their own art world. Collectors and dealers create the art market, and without monetary value attached to art, it cannot be saved; unless a people’s culture is strong enough. I differentiate between People’s Art and Mass Art. What is saved, whether it’s from 500 years ago or now, is what is deemed relevant. There is a world of artists and the world of the marketplace. It makes for a very bad marriage. Censorship as such is rarely necessary, as censorship is primarily economic, and filters out artists who are poor at every stage. Artists closer to the heel of the boot are going to make art depicting their reality, which is not appreciated by the wealthy art buyer. So those artists are going to have to go feral. A social justice movement creates a social justice culture. The art and the struggle go together—eventually this embraces different classes, and what was marginalized and rejected becomes acceptable and supported. For example, in terms of animal rights, the social justice forces influence a judge and jury hearing an animal cruelty case, and may feel it warrants a serious response. Same with an art collector or museum that is touched by the animals’ plight. If animals are trivialized, then so is the art, and the artist. Until the animal rights movement spreads to levels of society that wield power, the animal rights philosophy is denied. But denial doesn’t imply people are silenced. Animals still make themselves
visible by escaping slaughterhouses and zoos, and activists still try and rescue them. This is the same with any social justice movement; everything starts at the grassroots and migrates upward or, as we prefer, downward. I don’t personally sell my own work—I would be rubbish at it and give it away— but a gallery does sell my work because it fits in organically with the history of art they represent, which is mostly German and Austrian Expressionism. Kathe Kollwitz and so forth. I have used my prints as fundraisers many times, as it’s something a working person can afford, and the money goes to where it is needed. ZK: What inspires and influences your work? Many of your drawings/paintings are created from life; is that your main source of reference material when creating images? SC: Yes, I do forensic research. I’ve worked for enough newspapers and magazines to understand this is critical for a mass audience. I call it visual reportage. After doing around 10,000 illustrations for various publications, I got a level of freedom from certain magazines to do a few series that were entirely images, and then moved over to writing my own books, expanding on the six- or eight-page theme. Many times, we think we have enough images to fill a book, and many times we don’t. We don’t know until we start. A book usually takes me around three years; it’s a big commitment. I have given up editorial illustration. One of my very large paintings came from a smaller drawing commissioned for a magazine depicting a very notorious rape case. The painting takes more liberties than the reality, but its inception was journalism. For the animal work, for the AIDS work, for the prison work, it was imperative that I gained access to slaughterhouses, hospitals, and prisons. Because we can’t snap our fingers and magically appear to start drawing in a highly guarded place, my work overlaps as to when I gain access, and stacks up over the years. One year I may get in somewhere and do sketches but not finished works. Getting access is the hardest part. I have sketchbooks of two subjects that will be used down the road. DRIFTWOODMAG.COM 31
SUE COE Unnatural Disorder
In the past, artists were fully employed making reportage type of work. Please look at examples of this magazine, Graphic Witness, amongst many. They did an entire issue on Vivisection, one on Homelessness, one on The Death Penalty—and this was in early 1900s. This is where you would be employed as a printmaker artist. Since these don’t exist now, we make our own. I sense from your work that you want to work in a series and address themes. Is this an artistic impulse for your own curiosity, or the desire to show people what they are not seeing? Your work interests me because it’s a rare balance of visually interesting art and content. Do you feel something you have directly witnessed makes for better art, rather than something you researched online, or learned second-hand? ZK: Yes, I do tend to work in series. Part of that is because I feel the need to explore similar ideas in different ways; it helps my thinking, learning, and artistic practice to feel more rich and rewarding. I also tend to do artistic research to accompany my work, so since I have something driving the work I am making, it is easy to want to make more than one piece about the same thing. I also like the idea of repetition— it’s so ingrained in our everyday lives, and for me that means repetition is also ingrained in my art practice. I tend to feel the need to repeat ideas also for my audience, whoever they are. I understand things better when I repeat them. As a viewer looking at other people’s work, I also understand them more if I see their work repeated. I think anyone who bears witness to cruelty in person can become changed from it—whether it’s from witnessing cruelty to nonhuman animals or abuse toward other people. I do think, though, that second-hand research can still help us to empathize, understand, and care for others’ struggles. 32 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
You seem to use a mixture of graphite, charcoal, and gouache or other paints in many of your illustrations. How do you find the media work together, and what do you like about using media in a mixed way like this? SC: I use graphite because when I started working, newspapers and magazines were predominantly printed in black and white, 150-dot screens; very crude for newsprint. There was no digital technology, and the work had to be very contrasty or it wouldn’t carry the message. It’s no longer necessary to work with that technique, but I prefer the urgency and immediacy of black and white. ZK: As a woman/female-identifying artist, have you struggled with finding and making your place in this male-dominated art industry? Has the art market/canon changed its attitude about representation of women artists at all since the beginning of your career? SC: No, I struggle with researching and making good art with strong content; content which is undeniable. It’s not my job to provide ease of acceptance. I am the nicotine, not the nicotine delivery system. Art directors and publishers don’t care about gender; they care that you can deliver up the work within the deadline. If they are professional and smart, they can get edgy work through the system. A good merchant can sell anything: a plastic shoe, or social, political art. The gallery that represents me says they don’t deal in “sofa art.” If the situation looks impossible, it just makes it so much more interesting to overcome. The market is dominated by capitalism, and as sexism, racism, and speciesism are systemic within the capitalist system, it certainly provides a barrier to anyone with integrity to run a gallery, magazine, or book publishing company. I have the belief that art finds
its own path. That could be naïve, but it’s worked so far.
“
It’s not my job to provide ease of acceptance. I am the nicotine, not the nicotine delivery system.
”
ZK: Do you have any projects in the works right now? What do you see yourself focusing on most in the next years in your career? SC: Yes, I have a book deadline, and it’s something very different as it depicts a vegan world and is more positive imagery than I am used to. Given the choice between the crucifixion and the resurrection, artists suck at the resurrection part, as it’s a fantasy. They go wobbly and silly. When I give art talks to the public and discuss going vegan, and then ask the audience if they are going to go vegan, many say they will. I then ask those that will not go vegan after seeing all my slaughterhouse work: How can I improve my work that will make them go vegan? Of course, there are people to which animals do not matter morally, and there is nothing I can do to convince those people. But to the people who are open to change, how have I failed to convince them? The majority of people care about animals, so why are they eating them? One man answered: “You are showing me all the horror, but you are not showing me what a vegan world looks like.” I thought that was a good answer, and it’s something of a challenge, as there is no vegan world. There is no safe, nonviolent
place for animals or humans. So if we can’t even imagine it, except in the realm of consumer choice, how can we make it a reality? ZK: How do you cope and deal with making so much art that depicts violence and tragedy? I found myself becoming a bit depressed when making work that had me bearing witness to so much cruelty. I want to continue making work that deals with such intense issues, but I need to find ways to help myself through it and not become so down. SC: Zoë, as you are a younger artist, you have not accumulated the experience of seeing how your work can change people. You make activist art, as it’s in your nature, but it’s not been activated by being seen by many people. Once it has been, it will give you more of a balance in your life. You will know what works, and why. A great animal rights activist in the world today (and there are many of them) is a person called Lek. She rescues elephants in Asia. She gave the best talk I have ever heard…and I have heard some brilliant talks by activists of all stripes. She said, “If you are an animal rights activist, you will lose. But we shall win in the end.” We can stop breeding animals only to murder them, by refusing to consume their bodies.
ZOË KOLLN Busy Be (At Work)
We are moving out of the education phase of this movement to the next stage. Animals are already in politics, in the form of the meat industrial complex, which buys politicians, but the mass of people are becoming more aware, and they can do one simple act that is so empowering: Go vegan, and step away from the violence. Not everyone is going to become a vegan, but to slow climate change, the world economy will have to move away from animal agriculture. It’s our job to channel despair into change. Artists are the canary in the coal mine. We are compelled to give the warning; that is what culture historically does. However down we feel, it’s not as down as one of the trillions of animals slaughtered every year. We have the responsibility to tell their story, and to make it stop. If you make one vegan through your work, it saves so many animals from being born into a life of torture. And that vegan makes others. ZK: Absolutely, I agree. I remind myself of that always. Every animal killed and consumed in one way or another, for clothing, entertainment, or food, is suffering far worse than me making my carvings and drawings—only catching a glimpse of what it is like to experience what they go through. The least I can do is share their experiences and hope people take the time to listen to my works.
SC: Do you think that making art of these terrible scenes can be a therapy of sorts? ZK: I do think it can be relieving to make work like this. It is almost like because I have made this image, I have purged the experience of another voiceless creature into the public domain. I think once an image is on the white walls of a gallery, things change about its nature, its narrative, and its seriousness—people listen and people think when they are in museums and galleries. You just have to bring them the art, and make it interesting in the only ways you know how. Making work like this also does truly give me hope for the future generations of nonhuman animals, because it reminds me that I am just one of many vegans working to create a better world for animals, the earth, and for other humans. It is a gift, but it can also feel like the weight of the world—changing people isn’t always easy, and I feel for the animals who continuously suffer while they wait for the world to slowly change. SC: Thanks for the great questions, Zoë! ZK: Sue, thanks so much for doing this piece with me!
Find more from the artists at zoehk.imgur.com and graphicwitness.org/coe.
SUE COE Go Vegan and Nobody Gets Hurt
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ACCORDING TO... In our efforts to prepare for global travel, we reached out to vegans everywhere to share their experiences and tell us what to expect. Here’s some of the advice we’ve heard so far.
Philadelp hia, Pennsylvania, USA
Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands
~ David Thorne
~ Jessica Ramsey IS “VEGAN” UNDERSTOOD? Vegans are understood as vegetarian. “You may be asked if you eat fish or chicken.” Jamaicans make up a good bit of the Cayman population, so you might be assumed to be Rastafarian (or just healthy).
IS THERE MUCH OF A LOCAL VEGAN SCENE?
IS “VEGAN” UNDERSTOOD?
“A tiny one, but a very kind one! Everyone knows each other, since the island is so small.” The only vegan restaurant is Bread and Chocolate, but good news: “It is soooo good and is right in the middle of town, walking distance from the cruise ships. Island Naturals is great, too.”
Just say vegan! “But be prepared to use the food-allergy excuse, should you find yourself in a less vegan-friendly restaurant.”
BEST RESOURCE? Thanks to the Philly veg community, Yelp is a solid resource here. “Looking for Philly cheesesteaks specifically? Veganjawn.com has a pretty good list.”
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON IN THE VEGAN SCENE? There’s an annual vegan wing bowl around the time of the actual Wing Bowl. And several veg festivals take place in the city and surrounding areas.
24 HOURS IN PHILLY? • • •
•
Start at Vegan Commissary for breakfast (Vegan Commissary is only open on Saturdays now) Grindcore House for any type of vegan latte, cappuccino, or hot black coffee Make a quick trip to Blackbird Pizza for lunch (I recommend their wings—best in the country) while you take in South Street Finish off at Vedge or V Street for dinner and drinks right in center city
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24 HOURS IN GRAND CAYMAN? • • • • •
Breakfast and a juice from Island Naturals Hit Seven Mile Beach and spend the day in paradise (scuba diving and other water sports) Lunch at Bread and Chocolate, and grab a fresh cracked coconut to drink from a street vendor Sunset for dinner—happens to be a great place to watch the sunset (vegan options) Grab a drink at Royal Palms, then walk along the beach and enjoy the stars
Wellington, New Zealand ~ Yasmin
Ojika Island, Japan ~ Karina IS “VEGAN” UNDERSTOOD? “Not at all. Many people don’t consider fish as meat.” You really need to spell out all the animal products individually.
SO, HOW DO YOU FIND VEGAN FOOD? A fresh vegetable market is held in the town. Try to stay somewhere you can cook for yourself.
WHAT’S HOLDING THE VEGAN SCENE BACK? HOW VEGAN-FRIENDLY ARE RESTAURANTS? Not super vegan-friendly, but occasionally a menu will have indicators for vegan items.
“It seems that to the Japanese, meat is a sign of wealth, and not eating meat means you are too poor to afford it.”
ANY VEGAN SCENE? “I wouldn’t say so. The city is definitely accepting of vegans, but there still aren’t many.” But Wellington has it better than many cities, with a couple of vegan cafés.
24 HOURS IN WELLINGTON? • • • • • •
Flight Coffee Hangar for coffee and breakfast Cuba Street for shopping Visit the Wellington Art Museum and grab lunch at Te Papa or Midnight Espresso Friday Night Markets on Cuba Street Monsoon Poon for dinner CGR Merchants for late-night drinks
24 HOURS IN OJIKA? • • •
Check out the beautiful beaches Speak to a few of the locals, who are so friendly and welcoming, as you walk around and enjoy the temples There’s also a special strip of road with pine trees on either side, also one of this miniature island’s special wonders!
Lou isville, Kentucky, USA ~ Tiffany Bright IS "VEGAN" UNDERSTOOD? Veganism is definitely growing, but you might run into someone who thinks vegans eat chicken and fish. So you may need to do some clarification.
HOW’S THE VEGAN SCENE? Not really a scene yet. “About 30 miles from Louisville is a nonprofit farm sanctuary that we absolutely adore. Uplands PEAK Sanctuary is located in Salem, Indiana. Their mission is to unite people, the Earth, and animals in kinship. I cannot say enough how much we love it there!”
24 HOURS IN LOUISVILLE? • •
•
Visit Uplands PEAK. You can stay at their B&B or camp Eat at Roots or Heart and Soy (next to each other, with the same owner). One is more of a sit-down restaurant, the other a grab & go Half-Peach Bakery & Cafe This new vegan establishment offers amazing foods
We’d love to hear about your hometown or recent trip too! Go to our homepage at DriftwoodMag.com and find our survey, “Tell Us About the World!” for a chance to be featured in a future issue and receive a digital subscription.
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40 ISSUE THREE › DRIFTWOOD
The
Driftwood book club The Most Good You Can Do by Peter Singer READER Leigh Matthews
If your only exposure to Peter Singer was a dry Philosophy 101 course at college, you’ll be pleasantly surprised by his latest book that expands the pantheon of pop ethics. The Most Good You Can Do is subtitled “How Effective Altruism Is Changing Ideas About Living Ethically,” and it does a fantastic job of exploring how a wide variety of people approach day-to-day application of their ethics, including being vegan. Effective altruism as a movement can be traced back to around 1972, when Singer wrote a paper called “Famine, Affluence and Morality.” One of the main takeaways from that paper was the idea that, “If it is in our power to prevent something bad from happening, without thereby sacrificing anything of comparable moral importance, then we ought, morally, to do it.” To paraphrase, eating that delicious vegan taco is a moral imperative. Simply put, effective altruism applies evidence and reason to determining the most effective ways to improve the world. This can mean donating a lump sum to a single, well-managed charity rather than dropping pennies in various donation boxes, as smaller donations lead to higher admin costs for charities. Or, it can mean making career and educational choices so as to better apply your energies and skills to a particular cause, learning to live more frugally so as to be able to donate more money or to reduce the time you need to work so you have more time to do charitable work. Singer demonstrates that a one-size-fits-all approach to ethical living is irrational and unhelpful. Take the case of a high-earner who considers giving up the well-paid job to work for a charity. Singer reasons that it may be more effective for this person to stay in their current position and donate a large portion of their income instead. Someone else will take the job at the charity, and the high-earner’s donation can actually pay for additional employees for the charity. Other case studies look at how seemingly rational arguments against social justice activists having children can backfire by removing a major source of potential happiness (parenting), leading to altruist-burnout and little enthusiasm to continue doing good deeds. This book is wonderfully accessible and is one of the best examples of effective, persuasive writing I have encountered. Interestingly, it barely even mentions veganism until about two-thirds in, at which point the reader is likely to be so well versed in how to construct a logical argument that it’s barely a hop, skip, and jump to realize that veganism is one of the simplest and most effective ways to practice daily altruism. Singer presents basic (horrifying) facts about animal exploitation, provides easy-to-follow arguments against many of the derailing strategies used by committed omnivores, and even gets into the nitty gritty of tactics such as leafletting by Vegan Outreach. Reading The Most Good You Can Do and giving copies to everyone you know is probably one of the most effective things you can do to not only promote veganism, but also to help yourself and those around you feel more in control when it comes to living ethically.
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FROm ThE stacks The Compassionate Chick’s Guide to DIY Beauty by Sunny Subramanian & Chrystle Fiedler The voice behind Vegan Beauty Review brings you 125 recipes for everything from deodorant to mascara. (Despite the name, the bulk of the recipes are gender-free!) The Fettered Flame by E.D.E. Bell A follow-up to The Banished Craft, the second volume in the Shkode fantasy trilogy of a shattered world explores themes of diversity, prejudice, compassion, violence, and identity. My Gentle Barn by Ellie Laks This autobiography follows Ellie from her troubled childhood into drug addiction, from which she finds redemption in her special relationship with animals.
A Vegan Ethic: Embracing a Life of Compassion Toward All by Mark Hawthorne READER Michele Truty
Mark Hawthorne is brilliant at collecting the brilliance of others and presenting it in a very accessible package. A Vegan Ethic draws connections between ethical veganism and other issues of division and privilege in animal rights, human rights, and environmental concerns. At the heart of the book, Hawthorne challenges us to look outside single-cause veganism and see the damage we may be causing in the way we fight for the animals. He reminds us that the assumptions we make and the campaigns we share, while well meaning, can be harmful to humans, such as body-shaming or our blindness to the fact that not everyone has equal access to fresh, nutritious food. Hawthorne opens our eyes to—or reminds us of—how our “cruelty-free” shopping choices can contribute to human trafficking, environmental devastation, and abuse/murder of marginalized peoples. He reminds us that being vegan is not enough. Hawthorne pools the knowledge and experience of other activists and authors, including Carol J. Adams, Dr. A. Breeze Harper, and his partner and Food Empowerment Project founder lauren Ornelas, whose varied backgrounds and expertise help widen our view of the world, making it plain to see that the same system responsible for speciesism and the subjugation of nonhuman animals is directly tied to racism, sexism, and other forms of oppression. A Vegan Ethic, while concerned with these weighty issues, is written in plain, judgment-free language, so as to not overwhelm the reader, and Hawthorne is open about his very long path to veganism and coming to terms with his own privilege. He has included some very useful, bite-size appendices filled with tips, resources for further reading, and answers to common questions vegans are posed, like “What would happen to all the farmed animals if everyone went vegan?” The book is useful for seasoned vegans and veg-curious alike.
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