ERIN WALLACE, 18, SEATTLE, WA
The Deep-Six, Baby OK, sure, so traditionally to deep-six something means to get rid of it, to bury it at sea, six fathoms below. But to us, when we’re musing about our sixth issue, it feels a little more like the deep-six is an accurate description of how deeply you’re feeling it or how deeply we’re feeling you or whatever. Anyway you cook it, it tastes deep fried. Now don’t get smug on us, we all like the taste of fried food even though we know it’s bad for us. And deep is the theme here so embrace it. We’re getting like a broken record around here with the yay us! We made it this far and we couldn’t do it without you schtick, but that’s the truth. And since we’ve been peering deeply into your souls from our perch here in Satan’s playland, Los Angeles USA, we think it’s only fair that we continue down the honesty path and tell you we like what we see. Your souls are fresh and come in a variety of colors, some of which would look really, really nice on our bedroom walls so keep those original artworks a-coming! Oh, just joking. We would never hang your art over our beds without your permission. One more thing before we sign off here, if you feel that we deep-sixed your work in the traditional sense of the word, remember that we only have so many pages. Do not despair, you work lies not in a watery grave. So please, please keep floating it past us. Yo Ho Ho, Look-Look
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LOOK-LOOK CONTRIBUTORS
YOU: THE PHOTOGRAPHERS, WRITERS, AND ARTISTS.
ALEANDER DRUM, 24 Brooklyn, NY
ANDREA GILKEY, 23 Brooklyn, NY
ADRIAN SHIRK, 17 Portland, OR
BRANDON PORTER, 23 Evansville, IN
CRAIG ANGEVINE, 21 Lewiston, ME
CHRISTOPHER LEAL, 19 Fullerton, CA
DEIGO HABOBA, 26 Buenos Aires, Argentina
ASH CARTER, 21 New York, NY
DUSTIN PARKER, 25 Wichita, KS
DANNY VOLK, 26 Kent, OH
EMILY COMFORT, 15 Issaquah, WA
ELY PHILLIPS, 19 Chicago, IL
ERIN WALLACE, 18 Seattle, WA
FERNANDO VARGAS, 21 San Francisco, CA
GEOFF POWELL, 22 Corvallis, OR
DANIELA MENDOZA, 22 Andover, MA
JEFFERY HAHN, 16 Hong Kong, China
JASON ASATO, 24 Honolulu, HI
JUSTIN COIT, 24 Los Angeles, CA
JOHN ELLIS II, 21 Savannah, GA
FRANCIE VASQUEZ, 23 Burlington, Canada
With a Rebel Yell The net profits from the sale and sponsorship of Look-Look Magazine go to the advancement of young people in the arts. We’re getting ready to send some more art student types off to SVA’s “Summer of Art” Residency Program in New York City so they can have life changing moments, make some great art and possibly become new BFF’s with the guy who works at the Korean market around the corner. So if a summer in the city sounds like something you’d dig, go to look-look.com and fill out the application. Regarding the whole censorship beast, we’ve got it licked. Without even having to resort to anything remotely resembling super powers, we continue to print it the way you send it, without changing a single thing except for glaring spelling errors. Um, what’s up with the bad spelling? One word: Spellcheck. Which, apparently, is actually two words. Spell check.
look-lookmagazine.com
JOSEPH HENSON, 20 Northport, AL
JIM HOLYOAK, 27 Pacific Palisades, CA
JESSICA LIEDTKE, 27 Brooklyn, NY
JEREMY PELLETIER, 23 Phoenix, AZ
JILL SPRADLEY, 26 Las Vegas, NV
KRISTEN BEAMAN, 23 Athens, GA
KUUMBA COBB, 25 Ellenwood, GA
KEVIN ROMANIUK, 24 Vancouver, Canada
KATHARINE VINGOE-CRAM, 17 Dartmouth, Canada
LEONARD FRESQUEZ, 24 Los Angeles, CA
ROBIN BARNETT, 16 Tuscaloosa, AL
MARK RUBENSTEIN, 21 Savannah, GA
NATALI SHRIKI, 27 Givaa’taim, Israel
NICHOLAS KIEHLE, 19 Anaheim Hills, CA
NICOLE MARTINS, 17 Fullerton, CA
NICHOLAS FANCHER, 25 Columbus, OH
MIKE BRODIE, 20 Philadelphia, PA
ROXIE PERKINS, 15 Albany, CA
STEPHANIE CINELLI, 25 Jersey City, NJ
URSULA ELLIS, 16 Madison, AL
QUINN PLAMER, 17 Delta, Canada
KRYSTAL LONG, 22 Mississippi State, MS
KATIE LUCAS, 18 San Anselmo, CA
TIMOTHY OWENS, 19 Altadena, CA
Contributors not pictured: Alexader Burkat, 20, Ambler, PA; Hunter Geer, 17, Jacksonville, FL; Jonathan Zizzo, 21, Beckville, TX; Juila Wick, 16, Los Angeles,CA; Kristen Faw, 15, Bosie, ID; Leanna Kaiser, 19 St. Louis, MO; Michael Echeverry, 19, Anaheim, CA; William Huberdeau, 18, Woodbridge, VA
Created and Published by: DeeDee Gordon and Sharon Lee, Creative Directors: Lisa Eisner and Román Alonso of Greybull Press, Editor: Cat Doran, Art Director: Anna Agapiou, Look-Look Crew: Emily Bronkesh-Buchbinder, Nancy Callahan, Melissa Cunningham, Shayne Globerson, Karina Kogan, Liana Morgado, Allyson Minteer, Alycia Rican, Eric Webb, Dana Turcotte, Caroline Caselli. Magazine Interns: Alyssa Glaspie, Amity File Front and Back Cover Art: Mike Brodie, 20, Philadelphia, PA. For PR, please contact: Brandy Fons, brandy@look-look.com. All other inquiries: info@look-lookmagazine.com. To subscribe or for further information on how to contribute to Look-Look Magazine: www.look-lookmagazine.com.
Š 2006 Look-Look Inc. All worldwide rights reserved.
look-lookmagazine.com
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STEPHANIE CINELLI, 25, JERSEY CITY, NJ
MAILBOX ETC Hi to whom this may concern. My name is Sophia and I’m from New York. I just wanted to say that I love your look-look magazine and I also love the funky, sassy and unique style to your photos. I was hoping to get a chance in being photographed and having the chance to be featured on the look-look magazine and also using those images to advertise on virgin mobile site, which is pretty kool by the way. Just incase your wondering who I am well then here is a picture of me, thanks. You guys rock! -Sophia hello. i am a paratrooper currently deployed to Afghanistan and i received your cool magazine in a care package from my family. It’s been a busy and hectic time here but, i still had some time to do collage-style pictures, drawings, and a bit of writing. I’d really like to submit, but when i went to your site the instructions wouldn’t come up. Could you please give me the guidelines and info for submitting? Thanks that would be awesome. In ‘07 I’ll be getting out of the military and I’m real excited to start looking for some creative jobs. Thanks again -Andy 82nd airborne Hey Andy, Instructions for submitting are on the website but since that clearly didn’t work for you (sorry—we’ll get the tech guys to check it out), they can also be found at the back of this issue. We look forward to your safe return home and to your submissions. —Look-Look Is look-look magazine affiliated with Christianity? Do you empower Christianity or God? Or is the magazine just a general magazine that empowers the voice of the youth without pertaining to God? Do you focus on just more than one religion or don’t really include religion at all? -Ayami
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think you’d like some of my stuff. I hope all is well in sunny California, I live two states up from you where the daily forecast says gloominess and rainfall. if you would email me back I would appreciate it and it would nullify my suspicions that you guys don’t read this stuff. Without ambivalence, -emme one more thing, have you ever thought about making it possible for people to add their contact information when they submit work? Just think about it. Hey Emme, We’re stoked that you could write to us without ambivalence. As far as adding peoples’ contact information, there’s enough of that kind of shenanigans going on over at My Space, don’t you think? —Look-Look I want one. Where did you guys get the ones in your last magazine with the Addidas- wear? I searched all over the web, and there’s MAYBE one or two 1970’s style ski masks on eBay, but it’s really hard to get them the way they used be done in the 70’s. And that, Look Magazine, is a crying shame—cuz magazines should help a person find things to buy that are in the magazine!
As much as we wish we could say that we were affiliated with a religion or an Elk’s lodge or a scout troop, we have never really been much in the way of “joiners”. If you, on the other hand, have a hankering for Jesus or Allah or Buddha or the Angel Moroni or even L. Ron or his arch nemesis Xenu, more power to you. If you think of it, pray for us. —Look-Look
Hey Jack, We’re not trying to promote consumerism although if someone were to send us some free swag, we might rethink our position on that. The track suits in Issue 5 that you so wildly covet were part of that artist’s work and they were his personal collection. Regarding the bird on this cover, no clue how you could make one of them sit in your hand either. —Look-Look
It’s 11:11 right now and I guess if I were me when I first started reading your magazine I would be wishing right now that this email would actually be read. anyways, I like your magazine, it is the only one I subscribe to and I was wondering when the application for the NY summer program is going to come out because I would like to apply this year. also, I was wondering if you actually look through all the art that is submitted through the website, because there is a lot of it. If not, I will start sending you emails and mail because 1. getting mail in the mailbox is awesome. 2. because I
Dear Look-look magazine, The other day the newest issue of your magazine caught my eye when I went into a convenience store to buy batteries. I used the rest of my money on my debit to buy it and was definitely worth it. I have been glued to it ever since. In fact, I was so amazed by your magazine that I left it in my comm. tech. teacher’s school mailbox. I’m sixteen and attend Innisdale Secondary School and would like to move on to photography at Ryerson University in Toronto. Our school has had an amazing reputation for it’s
communications technology program, but we recently got a new principal who has turned around funding. So now instead of having enough funding for subjects like comm. tech., cyber arts, interior design and we can’t have such programs as film studies and photography because our new principal put all of our funding towards math and English. Anyways, to get to the point, I also ended up reading the “foundation” part of your website. That is what gave me the inspiration to write this letter. I’m not directly asking for funding or anything like that, but if you could email me back with information of how I could find funding. -Terra Dear (whomever at) Look-Look, My inquiry concerns the next issue. When is it scheduled to be released? I have been recycling the previous issue over and over and am anxious to see new content. Also, how strict or stringent is your screening process of submissions and do you try and look for a theme among submissions to assemble the issue with? Thank you very much. love, -Justin Life seems longer when you are waiting. and this is how I feel concerning look-look. I cannot wait until then next issue comes out. no not literally. I am stable, and I will wait, but I start to get a little itchy, and a little pissed. for no reason. and I thought WTF mate? but now I see that it is only a biannual magazine. and here it thought that it was a quarterly. any chance in getting that changed? huh, huh? looks like you have enough submissions for it. anyways, thanks for your genius. there was something else that I wanted to either mention or ask, but scene. Yeah, we feel your pain. We also feel our empty pockets. Unless some Daddy Warbucks comes along and gives us a ton of loot, we’re going to have to stick with our current bi-annual schedule. —Look-Look
MIXED MESSAGES ANYTHING GOES
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JASON ASATO, 24, HONOLULU, HI
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JEREMY PELLETIER, 23, PHOENIX, AZ
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KATHARINE VINGOE-CRAM, 17, DARTMOUTH, NOVA SCOTIA
DUSTIN PARKER, 25, WICHITA, KS
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LEONARD FRESQUEZ, 24, LOS ANGELES, CA
FERNANDO VARGAS, 21, SAN FRANCISCO, CA
OUT AND ABOUT
STREETS STREETSOF OFTOKYO TOKYOPHOTOS PHOTOS BYBY JULIA JULIA WICK, WICK,17, 17, LOS LOS ANGELES, ANGELES,CA CA
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HOW TO
MAKE A DUCK TAPE DRESS
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BY KRYSTAL LONG, 22, MISSISSIPPI STATE, MS
As a true child of the South, I learned about Duck Tape early in life. My dad holds a PhD in Duck Tape engineering; he used it to repair my bikes, to hold our screen door together, to stop a leaky pipe, and to fix a broken window just to name a few. Not to be outdone by my dad, some of our neighbors found even more uses for this multi-purpose product. I have seen Duck Tape used to hold a bumper on a car, to mount a gun rack to a four-wheeler, and to hold glasses together when more aesthetically pleasing options were unavailable. Everywhere you look in my hometown that silver tape shines as a symbol of our heritage. A Duck Tape prom dress seemed to be a perfect fit for this southern girl. The first and most difficult step in creating a Duck Tape dress is deciding upon the actual design. Once I realized that Duck Tape was available in so many colors (not just silver), the possibilities were limitless. Don Williams, my high school art teacher, was instrumental in helping me with the design plan. I love vivid designs with bright colors, so the Picasso masterpiece, “Girl Before a Mirror,� became my design inspiration. The model for this original artwork was Maria Teresa Walters. Maria Teresa was just seventeen years old when the two met in 1927. They fel in love and eventually became lovers. Maria Teresa was featured in several Picasso creations. Apparently Maria Teresa viewed herself as being unattractive; Picasso’s painting depicted her outside beauty in contrast to her own self-image. This painting was selected because the mirrored images translated well into a front and back for the dress. The harlequin design pattern in the painting was the element that tied my dress and my prom dates tuxedo together.
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The second design stage was actually piecing the dress together. Mr. Williams and I spent more than twenty-five hours creating the dress. I am not a seamstress and really had no clue where to begin. I decided to begin with a regular dress pattern that served as the lining for the dress and kept the tape from sticking to my skin. The dress pattern had to be duplicated to create both sides of the dress because traditional dress patterns only consist of one side. Piecing the paper pattern together was a critical step in this process; this is where I made sure the dress would fit to the contours of my body. Once I had the paper pattern taped together I put it on a mannequin to hold it in place during the taping process. When I began laying the tape over the pattern I really didn’t know what type of closure I would use on the dress since a zipper was not an option. I left a small slit open at the top of the skirt that allowed me to slip the skirt on and off, and decided I would deal with a closure later. My dress actually consisted of a skirt and separate top which made it easier to fit to my body. The first layer of tape on the skirt ran from top to bottom and I tried to ensure there was as little overlap as possible. This is important because Duck Tape is extremely hot when you are wearing several layers of it. A different technique was required when putting the initial layer of tape on the top. For the skirt I used long pieces of tape, but for the top I had to use smaller pieces that allowed me to follow my contours more precisely. I quickly learned that longer pieces of tape would cause the top to pucker in places I didn’t want it to pucker. Small squares allowed me to create a bust that perfectly matched my shape. Taking ones time while creating the bottom layer is crucial in determining how the dress fits when it is completed. Once I had my solid bottom layer I began cutting out and sticking on the pieces needed to create the faces in the painting. This was tedious and time consuming work but it was also my favorite stage. I drew the design out in the actual size and then began tracing each piece onto the colored Duck Tape and then cut them out using an exacto knife. Placement of the small pieces was critical. I purchased over forty rolls of tape in twenty-five colors and shades for my dress and my date’s tuxedo. The cost of both outfits was approximately $400. Once the actual design in tape was completed, I had to deal with the issue of how to close the dress and top so they would stay on. I initially tried a Velcro closure but the skirt was so heavy it kept pulling the Velcro apart. I finally came across a device called a frog closure which worked great for my skirt. The top of my outfit was designed to be backless, but I had to find a way of making it stay in place. I used bronze color grommets on either side and then threaded a red silk ribbon through them and tied it off. My dress was a time consuming endeavor but I came away with a one-of-a-kind dress that is actually a piece of art. I was able to express myself in a way that a standard, off-the-rack prom dress never would. For once, my dad was impressed with my choice in clothing. An added plus was all the left over Duck Tape that has allowed us to discover new and wonderful uses for this product. Of course he doesn’t know how much we spent!
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WORD UP
POETRY
BOHEMIAN GEORGIA NOW
John Ellis, 21 Richmond Hill, Georgia
LEFT TURN THRU THE YELLOW LIGHT; THE SYSTEM BLASTS AMPHETAMINE FUNK SITTING AT RUSTIC BAR W/ THE HIPSTER GIRLS TALKING BOOKS AND KANDINSKY, FREE IMPROV AND JESUS MYSTIC RAMSEY EDEN COAXING SMILES OUT OF SUITS AND SQUARES WHO DON'T KNOW NOTHIN' 'BOUT IT YVES SAINT LAURENT, JOHNNY RAMONE, AND J.C. PENNY ON EQUAL FASHION FOOTING MAKING APPEARANCES ON THE ORANGELIGHT SIDEWALK AND OLD WOMAN IN A DRESS ON A BENCH WITH A MAGAZINE CATS FROM OUT WEST AND UP NORTH WHO STILL THINK THERE'S MEANING IN THE WORDS 'ARTIST' AND 'INTELLECTUAL' ROUND HERE EVERYBODY KNOWS A LITTLE SOMETHIN' WHETHER IT'S THE LITERARY HISTORY OF ANDRE BRETON OR HOW TO TELL A FOUR WHEEL DRIVE F-150 JUST FROM LOOKING UNDERNEATH ROUND HERE EVERYBODY DOES A LITTLE SOMETHIN' WHETHER IT'S MANIPULATING 80-WATT SOUNDSCAPES FROM SECOND FLOOR OR MASTERING THE ART OF MARKSMANSHIP WITH HATCHETS IN THE BACKYARD YR IN GEORGIA NOW, BOY YR IN GEORGIA NOW
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THE CHAMP
William Huberdeau, 18, Woodbridge, VA
Tonight's the night of the really big fight. Boxer on boxer: Johnny T. versus Vincent D-Lite. Fist on cheek Makes for red meatTender pink flesh entangled in a muscle swelling feat. T is out!-legs sprawled, nipples course against the ground. “D-Lite is the champ!” from the microphone sounds. And I In a post-love slouch, Leather-slipping off the couch, Triumphantly moan and mutter, “Everybody wins when men beat at each other!”
COLLEGE BOY
Roxie Perkins, 15, Albany, CA
Dumbass brother whines Failed Spanish taking Arabic College boy come home
SPRINGTIME
Hunter Geer, 17, Jacksonville, FL
springtime. connor punches his dick all day and scopes downtown for dudes. springtime.
PHOTO BY CHRISTOPHER LEAL, 18, FULLERTON, CA
TEXT BY ADRIAN SHIRK, 17, PORTLAND, OR
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HOW I FELL IN AND OUT OF LOVE IN 3 MONTHS, 2 WEEKS, AND 5 DAYS Ursula Ellis, 16, Madison, Alabama Step 1:
We met, prearranged. I broke my vintage turquoise flats in the courtyard, running to meet a friend. You just laughed. You held open the door to the school. You tried to drive me home. I said no, pretending to be the kind of girl who plays hard to get.
Step 2:
Our first date. Football game. You spieled some bullshit about how wild/free, etc. etc. you are. Oh, and mature. Aha. I pretended to believe you. I didn't. Some other girl was there. Cute. I should've dated her.
Step 3:
The formal announcement of boyfriend/girlfriend status. Two days after we met. I saw right through you, and I loved that about us. I always was in control. 28
Step 4:
Beautiful love. You came to my gig at the fair. Brought me flowers. Took me to homecoming. I had cracked your shell completely. Bev said you were whipped. You were.
Step 5:
You became possessive. Annoying. Presumptive. Stalking. Frightening. I put up with all your drama, like a fucking saint.
Step 6:
You couldn't take my having a life outside you. You caused a scene at my best friend's birthday party. I broke it off. You didn't admit it was over until a few weeks later. You got drunk/screwed around to get back at me. Didn't work. Hope your AA meetings are treating you well.
Step 7:
Now you look the other way in the hall. Pretend to be happy. "Ursula? Who's that?" I still see right through you. I've moved on. Yeah. I really have. Because I don't think it was really love, especially since I can break it into steps, analyze it logically, and do this allwithout emotion.
PHOTO BY JEFFERY HAHN, 16, HONG KONG, CHINA
JOURNEY TO THE GROCERY STORE By Geoff Powell, 22, Corvallis, OR
I.
children screaming.
Some guy in the window, just his big fat arm.
Beware of dog, since after all he will bite you
Then a little orange fire hydrant, like stout chinese man, on the corner, American flag jabbed into a.......Tree, nails five and a half inches deep. Outside jittery family gatherings and pale grey cats in windows and curvy worn out basketball poles. grass grow grow grow, get cut. At least until they disappear behind the next corner, old man gardener, he pops out of nowhere rain drops from the fingertips of pine needles How badly I don't smoke and want a cigarette Want a fast red sportscar to drive through the park A red fast sportscar to drive through the teething playground,
Atwood, Elmood , Englewood, Late orange clouds reflected in puddles, their siblings also, the scraggly skinny limbs of trees Just the whole purpose of this all, which is really just to get a couple kitchen towels from the store to dry my dishes. Little orange chinese man you have a blue mouth! and little tiny arms straight faced woman in white car unhappily driving by and splashing puddles at me, cross-eyed man waved, he must be lost,
trees tangled with 2 month old christmas lights, signs with slanted lines signify a bridge. dirty water gurgles underneath. It's the sound of thousands of cars moving up and down a ghastly vein called a road, on the south end of this town. bums ride by on bikes with their mouths and grimacing tweaks of methamphetamine cracks and beards and grease and... everywhere's a new idea so no need to hurry rush Do they give a shit I'm holding a black box to myself, talking to myself? Leave me alone you cock-eyed driver meat, driving your steel monster down your concrete vein. Now I hide in my little black back pack, as I walk into my grocery store to buy my few kitchen towels to dry my dishes later on.
II. That was all pretty much painless. the sun goes down but what's new... even zippers know that, by not gleaming in the dark Don't ever go the same way back home, you'll find it's not a pretty resonation. I return, along the vein, along with all the other red blood cells, more like, big gigantic steel red blood cells in the concrete vein, and me this, uh, scribbling virus no, wrong, scratch that I'm not a virus anymore than blackberry bushes and I will say there's a recliner in this creek here. better turn your head lights on or how can you see at night and I will say, kick over these road construction cones, the things I'm looking at now are the obsolete things, like store signs and company logos and cars and wheels not splashes in the puddles or bushes in a row, anymore. There's my old house, I could have lived there a thousand times... And now the people there are selling a VW Golf for 900 dollars.
That man didn't look me in the face and that old man is riding a bicycle. Waving to an old friend. Handicapped parking no parking 7:30- 4:00 school days one way speed 25, red pickup. Hello my friend, my little orange chinese man friend. Your mouth is so blue. Mail. Chevrolet. Electric transistors. Brick chimneys Neighborhood kids. Ford. Alexander, Lincoln, Marshall, 2 story, three bedroom flat, white picket fence, chrome alloy, spinners. Here's the reflection of the black night sky in a puddle. Don't step on the cracks, or you'll fall and break your back. Trim that grass because the edge is getting a little overgrown. Weeping willows. Another one, not a Chinese man, maybe he's a heroic mushroom this time, he ejaculates water when your precious house is burning down. Chevrolet, Yard debris, Garbage, goes out Tuesday nights. Joseph Campbell. Scratch. Campbell is ambiguous. Campbell was a man who wrote about the epic journey story, and also happens to be a can of soup. I think I just walked through the front door of my house, sort of. I have my dishtowels, ready to dry my dishes.
PHOTO BY KIRSTEN MICHELLE FAW, 15, BOISE, ID
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OPEN PAGES
INSIDE MY HEAD: ONE PERSON’S PHOTOS
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PHOTOS BY MIKE BRODIE, 20, PHILADELPHIA, PA
MIND’S EYE PHOTOJOURNALISM
APPALACHIAN TRAIL
EMAILS AND PHOTOS BY BRANDON PORTER, 23, EVANSVILLE, IN
Family and Friends, Its great to read all your email, I haven't been able to hit the internet in a while. Right now I'm at mile 1560 in Dalton, Mass. I've had so much adventure since Delaware Water Gap, I’ll try to remember most. Jersey was pretty neat. I got my first taste of the deer flies that drive me crazy here in Mass. It was very swampy in areas and the skeeters were kinda bad, but nothing like Mass again. There was a great swimming hole in Jersey called Sunfish Pond and the water was really clear. Elevations stayed pretty low and the rocks got better. I saw a few more bears and no more rattlers. Then I went into New York and it was maybe the one state that kinda stunk. The hills were horrible, up and down, up and down, and usually real pointless. There were some beautiful lakes, though and I got a great view of the Hudson. I could even see NYC from about 40 miles away. It was crazy lookin’, like somewhere I didn't care to go. I ate a lot more calzones in Jersey and NY. I've been hikin’ with Naked Son ever since Penn/Jersey border and we've hit some awesome trail magic. One lady offered us a place to stay for free and shower and got to watch “The Matrix.” I also stayed at a Friary (monastery) called Graymoor and they fed us a real nice dinner. At Graymoor I got to watch the fireworks from the top of the hill and could even see NYC's fireworks. Peekskill had a good show too (West Point's show). All in all, we could see 8 or 9 different firework shows. CT was a short but fun state. I got to go to the beach with Naked Son and his parents and had a good time. Girls in bikinis were nice too. Then we met a guy in Kent, CT named 4 Winds who Southbounded the trail last year and he offered us his place. We had just finished 10 miles in some everlasting hard rain. We got the rain from Hurricane Cindy and gave us 3 inches of it. It was fun for the first hour. Anyway, everything I had was wet and 4 Winds let us dry out. He cooked venison stroganoff for dinner, let us do laundry, watch a movie, and a half gallon of ice cream. I've consumed many half gallons now in the last 300 miles. Last night was white choc with raspberry swirl and choc cups filled with raspberry. MMMMMMMMMmmm... I'm now in Massachusetts, or Taxachussetts, or Assachussetts. This state is muggy and buggy. It has rained every afternoon and the mosquitoes are the worst part. But I've met some great people here. There was a woman named the cookie lady who lives right off the trail. She wasn't home, but the cookie man was. Real nice old guy who gives hikers cookies and a coke and offers tenting in his yard. I helped him mow around his 1200 blueberry bushes for about four hours and he gave me a little extra food to make it here to Dalton. I also met a girl last week who took Naked Son and me to a grocery store and theater and we saw “War of the Worlds.” That's two theater stops now since I've been on the trail. The last 3 nights a big group of us have been staying at this guy’s house named Rob. Supercool dude who just lets hikers come in and do whatever. Laundry, shower, movies, bunks, rides to town, and even slackpacked a bunch of us. Slackpackin’ is hikin’ with just a little day backpack with a snack and water. People are just incredible! Well, I gotta get movin’ before I get sucked into this vortex. I'm hoping to be in Vermont this evening and I think I might finish the trail in early September. 3 more states to go. I'm still missin’ everybody so much and can’t wait but another month and a half to see everyone. Love y’all, Brandon (Morel)
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Dear Friends and Fam, Things are goin great, I'm at the foot of the White Mountains in NH. Not sure what mile
I'm at exactly, almost 1800.
I ended up staying 5 days in Dalton, MA and was awarded by some past thru hikers in VT who must have caught word and left me a king sized snickers for most days stayed in Dalton. Word of mouth travels fast on the trail. I just couldn't get motivated to leave and the day I’d planned on leaving it stormed real bad. Vermont was beautiful, never saw so much green. I took a side tour to the Ben and Jerry's factory in Waterbury from Wallingford, VT. It took 8
hitches there and back (almost two hour drive one way). It was really rewarding, I got to
see a 7 minute film on the history of Ben and Jerry, watch the ice cream being made, and then try samples. I tried a new flavor, The Last Straw, strawberry ice cream with fudge truffles and choc swirl. I even got a question answered I've had for a long time. How do they get the chunk evenly dispersed? 22°F is the perfect temp for mixing in the chunk, so it doesn't
sink or float. I still managed to do 5 miles that day. New Hampshire has gotten a little tougher, and I can feel the White Mountains coming up. It’s supposed to be the toughest but most beautiful terrain on the trail. I've heard the same for Southern Maine. Its kinda hard to believe there's only 400 miles left. I think I’ll finish somewhere between
Sept. 6-11. I haven't seen a moose yet, but hope to. The mosquitoes are still bad, but not like MA, and the deer flies are a lot less numerous. I'm staying at a hostel tonight in Glencliff. It’s nice to have clean clothes. I ended up going the whole state of Vermont without doing laundry and when I entered NH, I'm not sure if it was my socks or the Indian food I had for dinner but I felt nauseous all night. I'm meeting a lot of Southbou nders, its weird to pass
so many people. I'm getting very excited about Mt. Katahdin, and coming home too. It’s
going to be weird jumping
back to a "normal lifestyle" where I don't wear the same thing everyday, use a microwav e rather than a fire, and drive rather than walk or hitch. I miss you all much and look forward to seeing everyone . Love ya’ll, miss ya’ll. Brandon(Morel)
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OPEN PAGES
INSIDE MY HEAD: ONE PERSON’S DRAWINGS
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KUUMBA COBB, 25, LELAND, NC
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WORD UP
PROSE
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TEXT BY JIM HOLYAOK, 27, PACIFIC PALASADES, CA
Jamie, I have liked you ever since the beginning of this year. Part of me really wants to go out with you. But the other part is too… scared to. I have spent a long time thinking about what I should do. I have never gone out with anyone before in my whole life. I have always been too shy and scared. I hope it makes you feel good to know that I have never felt as open, confident and relaxed with any other girl that I have liked. If you still want to go out with me I would like that. This note has taken almost half an hour to write because I am not very good at writing them. I hope this letter doesn’t sound too stupid. Before I met you and Jade I didn’t know what W.B. means. Well, anyway I do now, so W.B. “K?” I am scared to go out with you because I don’t know for sure what I am supposed to do when I am going out with you, and am afraid I will make a fool of myself. But how will I ever learn what do to if I never try… If you still want to, yes, I will go out with you. I don’t know if it makes any difference that I have never gone out with someone before so I won’t be mad at you if you don’t want to go out with me anymore. But I hope (a lot) that it doesn’t matter. W.B. or just come tell me please. From, Jim
PHOTO BY LEANA KAISER, 19, ST LOUIS, MO
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HUSH PUPPIES By Adrian Shirk,17, Portland, OR I am sitting on a fiberglass table top with decades of other families doing the same, in a shallow white room with white linoleum and a rusted slide show screen projector suspended from the ceiling. Totally blank. Two U.S. Army officials stand erect in front of us all. On my right is my mom and my eight year old sister. To my left is my stepdad, John. Our legs dangle childishly off the table. The officials ask everyone to rise off our important seats and sing the National Anthem. Everybody does. I don’t because maybe I am almost fifteen and I need something to be angry with. When the singing stops, one of the officials, a fit, black man who looks as if the tough-shit has been beat out of him, addresses the families. All the mother’s faces look pursed and ready to emote. I’m almost fifteen and it’s the end of July. “Your sons and brothers and husbands have endured more than you can imagine these last nine weeks…” That’s what he says first. Its what I am most afraid of. I know that line will feed into another one about how “our soldiers” have changed. And it does. The lights dim and picture after picture projects onto the screen. Robotic images of our sons and brothers and husbands in assembly lines, running, yelling, drooling out of the tear gas hatch. Bad music accompanies the slides. The fit, black official who looks as if the tough-shit has been beat out of him is smiling. The lights come back on. An oppressed silence fills the room because nobody knows how to comment on what we have just seen. People’s mouths drawn in perplexed ‘o’ shapes, their eyes glossed over, but finding that they aren’t
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really sad. I turn to my mom and press my lips together. She widens her eyes, but keeps the rest of her face neutral. It’s a gesture she uses all the time, because it can be in response to just about anything without actually voicing an opinion. She isn’t letting her dread show. “Don’t be surprised.” The official concludes, “If your soldier calls you ‘sir’ or ‘ma’am’, its what they’re conditioned to do. They may be quieter, more polite, at a loss for words,” he chuckles at this point but I don’t find it very funny. “Take your soldier out for the day, have a good time. They haven’t had this kinda luxury for a while. They been workin hard.” There is a great clattering of instruments when suddenly a procession of soldiers, all new and young and toughshit, comes trumpeting by the door. Families gawk and titter and then scurry out to follow the band. I step out after them, into the thick Georgian air and the vast, brittle fields of training terrain. My heart races and I cup my and over my eyes to look for Adam. Unfortunately all those boys look the same. The only difference, and I have to look kind of close to see it, is some of them look like they still have a hold of their souls and some of them don’t. The lines of yelling soldiers, chanting their platoon logos, circle around and face the crowd of people who are settling into rows of plastic chairs. The soldiers belt out vulgar, masochistic jingles, rhyming with things like ‘destroy.’ The crowd looks vaguely appalled, not knowing how else to react. Some awards are given and then I see him. In the back, back center of all those young men, in those stiff green suits probably made of recycled milk cartons and recycled casualties of war. I see him. With that terrifying, complacent line for a smile, tilted barely up at the corners. My stomach plummets six feet under and tunnel vision from a horror flick closes in around me. I get dizzy as I watch a glossy eyed, vacant shell of my brother amble through the crowd. Seeing a whole lot, but not really looking for anything. In a flurry of different speeds, my family pushes through the people to find him. Rushing. Rushing. Our hearts pounding for different reasons. Rushing. Rushing. I get to him first. I step up and throw my arms around him before he has a chance to recognize me, closed in by fat, Southern mama’s fat, Southern laughter. And suddenly, for a split-second, sharper and brighter than a falling star, I look between my arms and realize they aren’t holding anything. Just an empty, empty box of things my brother used to be.
PHOTO BY JILL SPRADLEY, 26, LAS VEGAS, NV
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Born to be Wild There are a lot of things to be done. I'm not doing any of them. I'm lying in bed watching a moth bang into its shadow on the ceiling. The moth lives in the kitchen pantry with the rest of them. Hanna, my roommate, calls it Shady Pantry, a retirement community for dusty moths. We don't know how the moths got in. We found the first generation dead in a bag of rice. These succeeding moths are nothing like their forefathers. They fly around with no purpose and are easy to kill. Hanna insists that I do the killing, presumably because I'm male. I refuse, making her a fly swatter out of a craft stick and a plastic square with holes punched in it. I tell her to have at it, claiming to be a Jainist. Like the fruit fly problem before this, they never seem to go away. This moth has balls. I've never seen a moth outside the kitchen. It was evidently looking for adventure. It lowers nearer to me. I reach up and swat at it, knocking it around a bit. It's like I'm in a video game where I hit moths with a detached hand and an electronic sound symbolizing victory and destruction rings as the moth vanishes with a burst of light. If I hit a bag of rice I get an extra life. I played similar games as a kid though I never got beyond the original Nintendo. More advanced video games were too much for me. All those different characters and weaponry confused me. I liked very simple games with simple characters where personality's only determinate was red or green overalls and danger was limited to dangerous mushrooms. Watching a moth doesn't get any work done. I pack my bag for the library. “Where are you going?” Hanna asks holding a scarf she's been knitting for two years. It's a tightly knit, bright blue scarf measuring about a foot long. She's not slow, just inconsistent. “There's a moth in my room,” I say. “Oh. Want the swatter?” She laughs. I pull into a gas station to buy a pack of cigarettes. It's been a month since I quit quit smoking. As a way of compensation I only buy cheap cigarettes. At the grocery store I buy the patriotic pack. The marketing includes an eagle and the American flag. At the drugstore cigarettes are a bit more expensive. I like gas stations because you can find packs for less than three dollars. At that price, I'm mostly choosing the brand with the best name. They are all shitty cigarettes and all cigarettes are bad for you. I simply choose to pay less than the average smoker for my lung cancer. It's my dangerous mushroom. I light a cigarette and turn down Main. Main Street is beautiful. It's tree-lined and charming. The sidewalks are pretty sober in the early evening. Men in suits coming out of the bars after happy hour seem happy indeed. With ties loosened and a few buttons unbuttoned they lean back in laughter. A couple of bicyclists pedal past me at the red light. They are the boys from the hot dog shop a few blocks away. I go in at least once a week. They know my order by heart. It's the same 52
PHOTO PHOTO BY BY LINDSEY JOSEPH HENSON, PICKARD,20, 15,NORTHPORT, NORMAN, OKAL
every time: two not-dogs with onions, dill pickle relish, Tabasco, and an order of fries. Each time I see them their arms are covered in fresh scabs with dirt stains and grass smears only a mother knows how to get out. What kind of adventures do they find? They are a Nintendo game. A virtual Mario and Luigi in a material world. I'm tempted to turn down the street with them. We'll find the castle to unlock the secret of the labyrinth and fight Bowser, the great Koopa turtle king. Level ten kind of shit. While no castle, the library is a sort of maze with danger everywhere. Hours of staring at computer screens and hours of typing can lead to migraines and carpal tunnel. With all of those books you have to be careful not to get any paper cuts. I'm sure there are a few ways to lose lives through books. I look around the computer lab for a yellow question-mark box to jump up and bang my head against, like Mario. I could use a 1-up mushroom. Maybe it would counteract all the smoking. A fire flower gives Mario the power to throw fireballs. Would it help me write my paper faster? If a fire flower is too much to ask for, a sweater would do. It's chilly in here. An hour later I still haven't done much schoolwork. I've been doing some research in the Mariopedia, an online reference for Mario-philes. It's all very enlightening. It seems that what I've always called dangerous mushrooms have a technical name. Goombas. I'm amazed me to find out that Mario's last name is Mario. It's fascinating information. Mario Mario and Luigi Mario. Imagine that! The people on the fan-site have a page for misconceptions about the world of Super Mario Brothers. There are so many untruths going around about these guys. It says that the brothers do not hail from the Mushroom Kingdom, as many suspect, but from Brooklyn. “Where exactly in Brooklyn,” I say out loud. The guy next to me looks over. It's time to get out of here. I light a cigarette once I get outside. “Patrick,” yells a cartoon voice. Cartoon voice means Beverly. I turn to see her coming, arms stretched out to eat me. She's wearing tight capri jeans and a mint green bolero. She has a little hat on too, a thrift store find, no doubt, made of feathers. There is always a kiss on the lips with Beverly. From her unapologetic way of coming in for it, I assume it's expected of me not to put up a fuss. So I oblige. As I see her trotting over, head back with eyes closed and a pucker on her face, a word comes to mind: Goomba. “Let's go get wasted!” she hisses at me, the taste of her sugary lip balm on my lips. She arches back, knees bent, laughing, not unlike the suits at the end of happy hour. Her smile is contagious. Whether I'm smiling at or with her, I can't tell. She already seems drunk but I know it's just how Beverly is. She offers to buy me a drink so I go with her. She owes me one since I let her kiss me. A few hours and a few gin and tonics later, the bar is now buzzing. I'm buzzing too, like a big fat bumblebee bobbing
from bloom to bloom, from gin and tonic to gin and tonic. I decide to lose Beverly to the crowd. Having used up my free drink I find other people to talk to, people who don't require kisses. Unfortunately the new people bore me too, talking about how many carbs they had that day. “I have to keep it under 20 for the first two weeks,” one of them says, a very pretty girl. She's quite short, 4'9” maybe. She's wearing a lot of make-up and smells sweet. “Why's that?” I ask, squeezing the lime wedge into my glass. “She doesn't know,” her buddy interjects. “You haven't stayed with any diet long enough to find out.” The buddy takes a sip of his beer, a considerable portion dribbling down his chin and onto his lap. “You don't look like you need to diet.” I say. Her eyes warm up and a smile brews. The buddy's eyes narrow at me as the jukebox goes silent. He scratches his head; the Neanderthal is awakened. Evidently I am thwarting this dude's plan with his own Princess Toadstool. “That's just my opinion.” I say coolly, stumbling a bit for my footing. “I'm going to play some music. Any requests?” They aren't listening. They are having a hushed fight and can't be bothered. I hear mumbling about respect and “you don't think I'm beautiful.” At the jukebox I punch in 12-05. Steppenwolf. Born to be Wild. Get your motor runnin'. Get out on the highway. We're looking for adventure, or whatever comes our way. Where are those hot-dog boys? What castles have they scaled and princesses have they saved? Do I have what it takes to be Super Mario? I want adventure. I want to do more than just write papers and swat moths while I lay alone in bed. I take a swift swig of my drink dumping the last half down the front of my shirt. A high pitch beep pulses out of the speakers. A synthetic drumming now, and a low-fi computer sound, some error of a song is playing. This is not Steppenwolf. A child begins shouting something in Japanese. The music sounds like a video game. I set my drink on the top of the jukebox. “It's time to go,” I say to myself turning to leave. A Rastafarian is standing directly behind me, his web of dreads falling out of his sagging knit cap. It is white with orange spots on it. Like a mushroom. He stands looking at me, a bit of panic on his face. Beside him sits his friend, drunk and slobbering, with a Burger King birthday crown on his head. The Rastafarian says something to me. I can't quite make it out. º“Oh, it's terrible.” I think he says. “What?” I ask. He grabs my arm. “It's terrible! The king has been transformed. Please find the magic wand so we can change him back.” I stare back at him for a moment. “Ok,” I say. It's time for my
adventure. I must save the people of the Mushroom Kingdom by saving the princess. A second wind kicks in. I burst past him and make my way as quickly as possible through the muck of the crowd. I step on a foot, a person screams. 100 points. I stumble into a guy with a pompadour, spilling his beer on both of us. 400 points. I'm almost to the door when Beverly stops me. “Where have you been? I've been looking all over for you.” She is now actually drunk. It would be hard to tell except she can't seem to stand. Using my shoulder for support she leans in to ask with her breath smelling of beer, “Are you okay?” I unhook her arm from my neck and run to the door. “Patrick! Give me a kiss before you leave,” she yells teetering, a look of need on her face. I turn around dramatically. “Get behind me, Goomba.” She looks around herself, confused. I make my exit. It's near the end of bar hours so the sidewalks are beginning to thicken as people stumble outside. They don't seem happy like the people of happy hour. These young women with massive cleavage double over with laughter, throwing up the disease of the night. Young men with ruddy faces and eyes keen on fighting look at me, my eyes ablaze with my own fire flower. “What's up crazy dude?” one of them instigates, swaggering. His woman leans against the brick building, laughing, head near her knees, gagging for breath. I scramble through the mob and yell a victory cheer. 1000 points. I run all the way home looking for coins or question blocks with invincible stars. I reach the fortress, anticipating Bowser. It's silent. It didn't expect a siege tonight. I run up the stairs and unlock the door. The lair is dark, the only light coming from the watchtower outside the window. I run across the first room. No sign of the princess. At the next room I turn on the light. It looks like a kitchen. I guess all princesses need to eat. I run to the next room. A bathroom. The next door is closed. Enter Mario “Saved!” I say. The princess awakens. “ Huh? What is it?” “Let's go before that big dragon-turtle gets us.” I go to her bed and lay down, exhausted. I feel an uneasy stomach setting in, and reality. “Patrick, go to bed” Hanna says. Her voice sounds annoyed. She kicks me off the covers and sighs, slamming her head back into her pillow. I stumble into my room and turn on the light. The adventure is complete. I strip my clothes off and smile. On the ceiling rests the moth. Lazy bitch. I look in the mirror at my tired eyes and crooked hair. Ah, the life of a hero. I jump over the pile of clothes on the floor and land on my bed. I fall asleep listening to the ting-ting sound of the bonus points racking up. Ting-ting. Ting-ting.
By Danny Volk, 26, Kent, OH
Alex and the Technicolor Dream Coat Alexander Burkat, 20, Ambler, PA
To be stylish is a difficult task. Stylish individuals require skills in aesthetics, coordination, and originality to define or redefine one’s own personal look. Fashion, much like any art, does not appreciate plagiarism. Styles and schools of thought can obviously coexist—and many times even compliment each other—but directly jockin’ one’s style is beyond blasphemous. If you do not agree, I suggest you don’t read further. January 2006: I’m studying abroad in Prague. The place is full of beautiful, apathetic-looking women and men, and one has to be prepped for the runway just to blend in. I’m not used to this high fashion culture. After all, I come from the land where poorly printed large Nascar t-shirts, mullets, and the phrase “morbidly obese” not only exist, but reign supreme. Aside from leaving my fanny pack and Hard Rock Café shirt at home, I had to 54
prepare for not only a harsh winter, but also becoming one of the beautiful people from a Slovak standpoint…I needed a new, cool jacket. After browsing through clothing rack after clothing rack, tight track jacket after tight track jacket, I found a pretty slick coat: classy enough and easy to work with my entire wardrobe, but edgy enough to get noticed. I was proud of my find. I returned home to my new group of fellow abroad students sporting my new jacket. To my surprise, not only did people immediately notice the jacket but also liked it. When asked to show it off, I spun around a few times like a brand new car spinning on a rotating wheel for “The Price Is Right.”
One particular girl in the program took an extra liking to the jacket. She made me open the jacket, tested its insulating ability, looked for the location of a possible inside jacket pocket, and compared her pant leg to my sleeve to test its color scheme matchability…the jacket passed all her tests. Astounded by my find she asked, “Where’d you get it?” Like a gloating master chef, I told the recipe but not the secret ingredient. Wait. Recipe:secret ingredient::location of shopping area:exact store? Ok, that’s a bit of a stretch. Never mind. She cheered enthusiastically. Apparently my find inspired her to finally go shopping in our new country. The next day, as I’m sitting lounging and reading, the same girl walks in and blocks my reading light. She bares a pad of paper and pencil then demands, “Alex, draw a picture of what the store looks like.” “Why?” I ask. “I’m going to go get your jacket.” “You want to buy the exact same jacket as me?” “C’mon, I’m going to get it. Write it down. Just do it.” Was she for real? Was she really going to go out of her way to buy the exact same jacket as me and integrate it into her own wardrobe? This didn’t seem real. “Wouldn’t it be weird if we had the same jacket?” “What the fuck is your problem? Just draw it.” Whoa, she just took this un-situation up an unacceptable notch. I personally thought it was a valid question. After all, if you see two people wearing the exact same thing in the exact same crowd, what do you assume? They’re brother and sister? Twins? An ice skating couple? The only people I see with matching clothing like this have been couples married for thirty years wearing matching flannel sweaters. I vowed early in my life never to become one of those couples, let alone with some girl I had just met two weeks prior. “Well what if we’re out together in public?” I ask. “Wouldn’t it be weird if we’re wearing the exact same jacket?” “I don’t even see you anyway. What difference does it make?” It’s true we didn’t see much of each other…hmmm, I wonder why? Besides conflict of interest and values, she was in a different program than me. Regardless, by publicly addressing the fact we don’t hang out or ever see each other, did she just imply that we’d never see each other again if she purchases this jacket? Did she just indirectly solidify that we will never be friends? Was that what she meant by her statement? If so, by her owning the same jacket as me, the jacket would become a symbolic representation of our split. Am I wrong? Just to double check, I proposed this argument to myself in standard argument form to assure myself that I was in the right:
(1) At some point, two friends are in the same place at the same time (2) If both Alex and Girl have jacket design x, then Alex and Girl agree not to be in the same place at the same time. (3) Alex has jacket design x. (4) Girl has jacket design x. (5) Alex and Girl are not friends. The term “friends” here does not include established, separated/long distance friends or—for you kids from the future—Internet friends I found this quite absurd, and the whole situation made me further question why I should even assist someone who is openly not my friend. I did the only thing I could. “I’m not telling you.” “If you tell me, I’ll get one in a different color.” I called her bluff. Why would someone who is openly not my friend be courteous enough to buy a separate color? She won’t find it, and if she did, she’d get the same color. “Sorry,” I reply. “Fine. I’ll get the same fucking jacket in the same fucking color.” And with that, she stormed off and finally got out of my reading light. One day later, I hear through the grapevine she apparently did find the exact same coat, but claims to not like how it fit her. “Boys’ jackets don’t fit me the way I like,” her friend relayed to me. Serves her right. I hope the length was too long, I hope the chest was too puffy, I hope the inside coating was too itchy, and most importantly, I hope every time she looked in the mirror while trying it on she could only see my cackling face. Now I have to tell you, I wrote this entire story during a very dark time in my life…literally. I was in the middle of Central Europe in the windy, bitter cold. Side effects of not seeing the sun for weeks on end include crankiness, passive aggression, and being a recluse eating large amounts of generic Czech brand corn flakes that taste curiously like nachos. I feel bad for anyone in my path during this embitterment period. As for the tension between me and the Girl, as soon as the sun came out, the coat and the beef against her retired. We hang out now, and after seeing her wearing a t-shirt from one of my favorite bands, I realized we even like the same music. I wonder if they sell her shirt in men’s small?
PHOTO BY MICHAEL ECHEVERRY, 19, ANAHIEM, CA
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SMELLS LIKE... PAINTINGS UNDER THE INFLUENCE
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Eric Fischl
PAINTINGS BY DIEGO HABOBA, 20, BUENOS AIRES, ARGENTINA
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PEOPLE I LIKE
INTERVIEW WITH JACK MCULLOUGH AND LAZARO HERNANDEZ OF PROENZA SCHOULER
Jack McCullough and Lazaro Hernandez are the fashion designers known as Proenza Schouler, a combination of their mothers' maiden names. They met while they were students at Parsons, and collaborated on a senior thesis project, which wound up being bought by Barneys and brought them instant success in the fashion world. Every season they create a collection that outdoes their previous collection. Proenza Schouler has a distinct style and their ability to maintain that, while taking risks is a quite feat. Their clothing has a signature seaming, that when spotted can only be identified as being a "Proenza Schouler piece". I'm a big fan so you can imagine how excited and ok, a little bit nervous I was to meet them. But, it turns out, I had nothing to worry about. A few weeks ago, one Saturday afternoon in NY, I finally met up with the very tan (they had just returned from vacation) designers for coffee. My nervousness vanished instantly. Both, Jack and Lazaro, are incredibly cool, laid-back, and friendly. They have this casual put together style. I realize now, that their charming personalities have added to their staying power. They have a great dynamic and it's clear to see why, aside from the fact that they are extremely talented, they have been so popular. Jack and Lazaro talked to me about how they design as a team, what they've learned over the last few years, and what we can expect from them in the future. 64
22, Andover, DM: How do you work together? What is the process like? LH: We usually start with a mood or a feeling. JM: Like, what we are each feeling at that time in our lives. LH: It's always together though. JM: And it's usually a reaction to what we did before, too. And where we are in life at that moment. LH: We are always together, so we are usually on the same page. And even if the ideas are two opposite worlds we just find a way to make them come together. JM: We always go with the mood first and then we try to figure out the silhouette based on that. So like, if I am feeling darker, we'll look for silhouettes that are closer to the body, more sexy. LH: The silhouette evokes whatever the mood is, and then it starts to take form. And once we know that shape, we
MA
start again, like, where did this shape exist in history, and so then we'll take elements from different periods. Like a color or a detail that can be incorporated somehow. DM: Do you do experiments with the fabrics yourselves? Do you design your own prints and colors? LH: Yeah. We'll do lots and lots of samples. We work with these Italian textile mills and they're incredible. We'll work with them to design exactly what we want. Like, we can say that we like a certain fabric but we want to make it softer, but not thinner, or that we want a different weave, and they can do it. It can get crazy. And there are just so many details. They can do anything. JM: And also, we have to pick all the fabrics before we start drawing, which is kind of difficult because sometimes you will be drawing and then you will be like "ohhhh, this kind of fabric would be perfect for this, but it won't work for this and this". So we have to do that first and then we start sketching. Well, usually, we're apart for the first time we sketch... we will draw separately, and then, we get back 65
together and I'll look at his sketches and he looks at mine. Then we kind of incorporate his ideas into mine, and viceversa. JM: And it's so weird because we'll trade and sometimes we'll have, like, the exact same things. It's really weird. LH: And then we will take them and figure out how to make it work. DM: Do you make all the patterns yourselves? JM: No. Well, we have two pattern drafters. It's a fairly small staff. DM: Can you both sew, do you like sewing? JM: Well we both can... but... I wouldn't want to make an entire collection. Finishing a piece is really satisfying, but not a whole collection. DM: What's the best part about the process?
we develop more we have a stronger vision of what we like. A clearer sense of our aesthetic so what we like is more specific. There are so many talented designers. DM: What are you the most proud of? In life or design? LH: What we've accomplished in four years. I'm really proud of that. JM: I'm happy we haven't gone bankrupt. That we are still growing and that people are interested.
LH: Coming up with the ideas and researching. Sometimes choosing the fabrics gets crazy though.
LH: Especially because sometimes people will be really interested, but with fashion you never know. It's so short. It's cool that people like what we are doing and it's nice to know that people think that we're still relevant four years after we've started.
DM: Do you have words of wisdom for young designers?
DM: Do you feel more pressure now?
LH: Our interns that just left were asking us that.
JM: No. We don't feel pressure all that much. We get so focused on what we are doing. The creative reflection. We don't think, "oh we have to make this to satisfy that person", or "that person would like that kind of thing, so let's do that".
JM: Well, I like the drawing. I don't know.
JM: We told them that our best advice would be to intern. You learn things from working that you don't learn in school. Just being around the whole process. You see the whole concept from start to finish. LH: In school you just learn how to draw and sketch, but it helps to see the bigger picture.
LH: We make what we like. JM: I think that is why we have lasted this long.
DM: You both did internships right?
DM: Mistakes you have learned from?
JM: Yeah. We learned a lot just being in the environment. We did whatever we were asked to do. Even if it was just getting coffee, it didn't matter. You're still around all these great people and it's really cool.
JM: Sometimes we learn from past collections. Like things that didn't work. We just make sure to never do it again.
DM: What other designers do you admire? LH: Hm... Old Christian Dior. JM: Are we getting serious? LH: No..OK...I think Nicolas Ghesquiere... JM: I think there are tons of people we could say. But as
DM: There were some blogs that said you might be designing for Target. Is that true? LH: We hadn't really thought about designing another line. JM: I think we are still too young and inexperienced to handle two lines. And our company is fairly small. It's not like we have a lot of office assistants who can take care of stuff. So we really have to be there, for every part of it. Right now it would really hurt the business. But maybe
down the line, I think. It depends. DM: Who is your style icon or your inspirational woman. Both: Bonnie! LH: Naomi Campbell! JM: It changes daily. No, I think Kate Moss. She's really cool. LH: Yeah, I think so too. DM: OK. Biggest fear in life? JM: Being stuck in a situation. I am really claustrophobic. Not having the freedom to do what I want. LH: Failure... DM: What period in history were people at the height of fashion?
LH: I think the time of Marie Antoinette. I just read a biography about her. I was really inspired to read about that period after I saw pieces of that movie with Kirsten Dunst. It looked really cool. It was such a crazy, lavish, opulent time. JM: I don't know. I think there isn't one time. It just ebbs and flows, you know, like it will be the height and then it will die down. It fluctuates.
have a stark quality that has always appealed to us. Cy Twombly has always been a huge source of inspiration to us (especially this season). LH: We love the sense of contrast between his "grunge" quality and the fact that he happens to be one of the most important artists still living today. In general we tend to like graphic modern work that focuses on color as a subject matter. DM: Do you think fashion is art? JM: Fashion has a place everywhere, including the art world. People dress as a symbolic gesture of who they are or what they feel. Art people tend to "feel" a lot and thus their choice in fashion is sometimes extreme. To us designers that is always inspiring and thought-provoking. LH: We usually are inspired by art for the two dimensional aspect of our work like embroideries, prints, seam lines, etc‌ There is a lot of crossover although we would never dare to call fashion art, we think of it as design. A much different thing.
DM: Are you inspired by art and by any particular artists? JM: We have always been attracted to Rothko. His sense of color and the rustic simplicity of his huge canvases
PHOTOS BY ASH CARTER,
21, NEW YORK, NY
64
PHOTO GEOGRAPHIC The people, places and things that live in your world
68
ANDREA GILKEY, 23, BROOKLYN, NY 69
STEPHANIE CINELLI, 25, JERSEY CITY, NJ
ELY PHILLIPS, 19, CHICAGO, IL 71
MARK RUBENSTEIN, 21, SAVANNAH, GA
NICOLE MARTINS, 17, FULLERTON, CA
KEVIN ROMANIUK, 24, VANCOUVER, CANADA
NICHOLAS KIEHLE, 19, ANAHEIM HILLS, CA
NATALI SHRIKI, 27, GIVAA’TAIM, ISRAEL
ROBIN BARNETT, 16, TUSCALOOSA, AL
CRAIG ANGEVINE, 21, LEWISTON, ME
JUSTIN COIT, 24, LOS ANGELES, CA
QUINN PALMER, 17, DELTA, CA
JESSICA LIEDTKE, 27, BROOKLYN, NY
FRANCIE VASQUEZ, 23, ONTARIO, CANADA
ALEX DRUM, 24. BROOKLYN, NY
KATIE LUCAS, 19, SAN ANSELMO, CA
JOHANTHAN ZIZZO, 21, BECKVILLE, TX
KRISTEN BEAMAN, 23, ATHENS, GA
NICHOLAS KIEHLE, 19, ANAHEIM HILLS, CA
NICK FRANCHER, 25, COLUMBUS, OH
94
EMILY COMFORT, 15, ISSAQUAH, WA
ANDREA GILKEY, 23, BROOKLYN, NY “When I first met Dr. Parks he was fixing the engine of an old Ford parked outside of The Mercy Jesus Synagogue. We talked for a while. I found out that in addition to being the reverend there, he also founded and ran the homeless shelter next door..”
NATALI SHRIKI, 27 GIVAA’TAIM, ISRAEL “Life - one way of looking.”
STEPHANIE CINELLI, 25 JERSEY CITY, NJ “I am interested in the way that people lay claim to the spaces in which they live.” NATALI SHRIKI, 27 GIVAA’TAIM, ISRAEL
ELY PHILLIPS, 19 CHICAGO, IL “The gnomes were a collection that a friend of mine had started. Once rumor got around to me about the gnome army that occupied his closet I knew I had to photograph it.
ROBIN BARNETT, 16, TUSCALOOSA, AL “This is my friend Lucy, who also goes by Chief Running Rainwater. She's neat because she plays a mandolin.”
FRANCIE VASQUEZ, 23 ONTARIO, C A N A D A “The things done for a cold beer.”
ALEX DRUM, 24 BROOKLYN, NY “Don't get my started, I'm indie rock-tarded, my girlfriend left me and my dog departed.”
KATIE LUCAS, 19 SAN ANSELMO, CA “The premise of the entire series is the different types of women in our society. The doll was sort of my Lolita- she's the girl who blurs the line between being an adult and being a child.”
MARK RUBENSTIEN, 21 SAVANNAH, GA “From the series “common place.”” ???
CRAIG ANGEVINE, 21 LEWISTON, ME “While living in Japan I fell in love with candid portraits. To capture one's face on film, I think, is to crystallize an entire language. It's like turning the page in a book and discovering a moment where every story collides in one ineffable emotion.”
JONATHAN ZIZZO, 21 BECKVILLE, TX “Learn to see the extraordinary from the ordinary.”
MARK RUBENSTIEN, 21 SAVANNAH, GA
JUSTIN COIT, 24 LOS ANGELES, CA “Rodeo is simple and pure.”
KRISTEN BEAMAN, 23 ATHENS, GA “Water is enjoyable.”
NICOLE MARTINS, 17 FULLERTON, CA “Savanna is a friend of mine who wants to be a model. This is her father's old Corvette.”
JUSTIN COIT, 24 LOS ANGELES, CA
NICHOLAS KIEHLE, 19 ANAHEIM HILLS, CA
NICK FRANCHER, 25 COLUMBUS, OH
NICHOLAS KIEHLE, 19 ANAHEIM HILLS, CA “This is my art, my art is my life.”
QUINN PLAMER, 17 BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA “Italy on a family vacation.”
NICK FRANCHER, 25 COLUMBUS, OH “When I shot this event, my aim was to capture subtle moments and quality of light. I wanted to take the documentary image and make it into my art.”
JESSICA LIEDTKE, 27 BROOKLYN, NY “Moana and Marla are enjoying a fresh summer breeze.”
EMILY COMFORT, 15 ISSAQUAH, WA
How to Contribute: Want to get published? If you have photos, writings, drawings, musings, insights, critiques, scribbles or anything else you can think of that you want to see in the pages of an upcoming issue of Look-Look, all you have to do is:
1. 2.
Be someone between the ages of 14-30 who does not get paid for your art (i.e. be amateur in the pure sense of the word).
Go to look-lookmagazine.com and follow the submission guidelines on the web site. By the way, your images MUST be at least 300 dpi in order to be reproduced in the magazine. So if you’re not sure, con tact us and we’ll set you straight.
OR
3.
Send your work via snail mail to: Look-Look Magazine Submissions Department 6685 Hollywood Blvd. Hollywood, CA 90028
Please note: We are not able to send any submissions back to you so you should be prepared to part with your work on a permanent basis. See you in the next issue! look-lookmagazine.com
LAST LOOK-LOOK A PARTING SHOT
LEONARD FRESQUES, 24, LOS ANGELES
The Ad Gallery. Did you ever meet a traveling salesman? Yeah, us neither. I mean, what’s snake oil anyway? Does it taste like chicken? Just checking. You see, a traveling salesman is the epitome of someone who’s selling you something you don’t need—in today’s parlance—marketing for marketing’s sake. We’d like to introduce you to some companies who’d never, ever do that. They are the kind of companies who have values like integrity and decency and they have the cojones to back it up by putting their dinero where their bocas are, if you know what we mean. We are once again, humbled at the feet of these companies. They keep giving us money to allow you to get your art published. And that is a phenomenal, almost unbelievable thing to us, that they trust us to trust you to trust them to all get in bed together in one happy trust circle of creation. Not only do they cough up the coin, they also allow you guys to design the ads that you see between the covers here. And that is, like, just two shades away from crazy. We love them so much, it hurts. We’d kiss them, if that was in any way appropriate behavior. But apparently it’s not. Look-Look
The Sponsors
The Artists
FREECITY Calvin Klein
Timothy Owen, 19, Altadena, CA “Into the void.”
Virgin Mobile
Nick Fancher, 25, Columbus, OH “This is a simple, 'Boy meets girl' scenario. I thought this simple image would capture the universal need to communicate, in this case, via a text messaging cell phone.”