Pulpmag Issue 1 by Pulp Magazine

Spring 2012 Volume 1, Issue 1

masthead

volume 1, issue 1 March 16, 2012

Jeff Groat Coordinating Editor coordinating@pulpmag.ca Claire Matthews Managing Editor, Literary Editor managingeditor@pulpmag.ca Debbie Langtry Publishing Editor publishing@pulpmag.ca Andres Salaz Associate Publishing Editor publishing@pulpmag.ca Chelsea Lawrick Arts Editor arts@pulpmag.ca Rhea Paez Associate Arts Editor arts@pulpmag.ca Connor Doyle Associate Literary Editor writing@pulpmag.ca Weronika Slowinski Web Editor support@pulpmag.ca Victoria Almond Office Coordinator office@runnerrag.ca Pulp Magazine Standing Committee: Taryn Pearcey, Simon Massey, Courtney Burt, Alex Hawley. Arbutus 3710/3720 12666 72 Avenue Surrey, BC V3W 2M8

Process…What it’s all about. It

starts with an idea. Intangible wisps of fleeting thoughts attempt to coagulate together into something that can be constructed – into a chain of words or a visual form. The very first annunciations begin to make it real. Rough marks are made on scrap paper, allowing it to become something that can be grasped. The blank page, or freshly gessoed canvas, or that nice, soft mound of clay all wait to be touched. Waiting to become something more than a generic space. Scrumpled pages, reworked paint or smashed clay studies…

Edits, edits, and more edits. This is the process—a creative journey that is more important than the end result. This is the element of art making that we, the editors of “pulp” want to celebrate with you. Without your creative processes there wouldn’t be anything to share. Kudos for reworking your craft and letting your muse guide you here. Thank you for your submissions. Thank you for your engagement with our magazine – and for being a part of the process. – pulp Editors.

Visit our website at www.pulpmag.ca and check out our blogs.

778-565-3801

We’d love to hear from you, making you a part of our creative process.

Views expressed in this magazine are not necessarily shared by the editors.

pulp magazine is student owned and operated by Kwantlen Polytechnic University students, published under Polytechnic Ink Publishing Society.

Cover: Andrés Salaz & Debbie Langtry

Funds are collected by the university and channeled to PIPS via the KSA.

table of contents pulp Intro: Process . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

Jay Cabalu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 31

Table of Contents. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Chelsea Lawrick . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34

Shelly Leroux . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

AndrĂŠs Salaz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35

Jasmin Nguyen. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

Debbie Langtry. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 36

Elizabeth Anderson. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Connor Doyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 37

Donia Strand . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Claire Matthews . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 38

Donovan Phillips. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

ROZ. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 40

Kelsey Lacroix . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13

Josh Elford. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 43

Kirsten Sedore. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14

Lee Beavington. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47

Kenny Chui . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15

Debbie Langtry & Chelsea Lawrick. . . . 49

Patrick Javier . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

Wei Heng Liu. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 50

Simon Massey. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17

Daryl Markiewicz . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 52

Weronika Slowinski. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20

Marlow Gunterman. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53

Connor Doyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21

Taryn Pearcey. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 54

Mark Barton. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22

Chris Snell. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57

Rokzanna Basi. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

Tara Hallquist. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 58

J.C. Doyle. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 24

Cody Lecoy. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60

Debbie Langtry. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

Vivian Pencz. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62

Rhea Paez. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 30

Editorial. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 63

This magazine would not have been made possible without its contributors. If you, our readers, are interested in becoming contributors, please email your work to submissions@pulpmag.ca

shelly leroux Chelsea Lawrick: You talk about pharma culture a lot in these works. Have you ever had an experience that drove you to comment on pharma culture? If not, what drew you to it? Shelly Leroux: I work with children that require support in the school district for a variety of reasons, but mostly children labeled with special needs. A lot of those children are diagnosed with psychological and physical disorders that require medication. The medication has huge affects on them in good and bad ways, and seeing the process for me makes me question the process altogether. Because a child’s brain is not fully developed, medication can cause long-term effects, and because a child has no legal voice, it’s up to the parents to make that decision. I’m not suggesting that medication is a bad thing, but I am concerned about the overuse of it, and want the public to engage in conversations around these issues. CL: Could these works have been created in different mediums, or was the chosen medium integral to communicating the specific ideas? SL: I think the ideas around pharma culture can be created in any medium, but for this particular installation [Sweet Pills] I chose found objects to create a kind of narrative scene. I replaced the pills with candies and overfilled the prescription bottles to show a flowing movement of the pills. I liked the contrast between the clean white environment that duplicated a laboratory feel, with bright coloured candies that pop out.

This made me feel like it was the same type of marketing strategies that photographers would use in the pill advertisements that you see in magazines and in commercials. It is really a comment on how it has become so socially acceptable to medicate that we have become desensitized to it. It is easier to just take a pill —but is that really what we should be doing? CL: What was it like exhibiting at Gallery Gachet?

Sweet Pills 6’ x 2’ x 2’ Mixed media installation

SL: Exhibiting at Gallery Gachet was a really fun experience. I met a lot of artists who I would normally not have had the chance to meet, and it was great to see people who were dealing with the same subject matter, but using different mediums. It felt nice to know that I was not the only one questioning the ideas around medicalization.

CL: It’s my understanding that the exhibit was complimenting a conference happening in Vancouver. What was that about? SL: SFU was hosting a conference called “Medicalization of Sex and the Big Pharma Culture”. This conference included professors from around the world in different subjects to come together and share ideas/research/comments on this subject. The art exhibition was called “Antidote” and included local artists that were dealing with the ideas around medicalization of sex. I altered my artwork to include pink and blue candies to represent “Viagra for her” and “Viagra for him” so it would fit the theme of the exhibit.

interview

CL: What was it like doing your piece Pill Popping Experience? Had you done performance before? SL: Pill Popping Experience was a great experience for me. I was really anxious about performing in

public—so anxious that I think the combination of my stomach acid, the water I was drinking, and all the candies I was swallowing made me feel nauseous. I had no idea what to expect while I was performing and I was just focusing on keeping myself from smiling or laughing. During my performance, more and more people were staying and watching, taking pictures of me, and so on. I really noticed this one particular woman that looked so stressed and confused, and I was worried she was going to call 9-1-1. I just remember feeling that I wanted to tell her that I was okay, but I couldn’t because I was performing. I was also really surprised that nobody came up to me to see what I was doing. If they had, they would have seen the obvious candies that I was swallowing, but from the viewer’s distance they would not have been able to tell the difference.

Pill Popping Experience • Performance

I learned a lot from this experience because although my artwork was commenting on prescription pills, it hadn’t occurred to me the medicalization of surgery that has evolved in sexuality as well. Breast augmentation is a popular surgery that has been around for a long time now, but newer surgeries including labiaplasty and vaginoplasty are now making headway into popular culture. It’s a really weird thing to imagine that we are all born with differences, and yet with technological advances in medicine and psychology, we are all aiming to be the same.

CL: Do you think awareness on these issues you’re discussing is increasing? SL: The medical technology is changing so rapidly, and honestly a lot of it is life changing and very positive, but at the same time I think our society has become desensitized to the side effects of these drugs. It is not unusual for people to take cocktails of pills that help a problem, and then fix the side effect of that pill, and then fix another side effect of the other pill, until next thing you know, it’s not just one pill but three or more. And this is normal to some people because they have to do it day after day after day. My hope is that the awareness will increase and more people will look at the original diagnosis and come up with alternative actions. Sometimes a pill can be replaced with a lifestyle change.w

jasmine nguyen

Me and H.E.R. (video stills) Video

no boundaries

Untitled no. 7, Digital photography Hybridity of Sexual Identities 18” x 24” Screen print on paper

Intoxicated lips 18” x 24” Mixed media

elizabeth anderson first BFA graduate to use imagery from Allan Ginsberg’s poem, Howl for the series’ title. This disaster elicited a global howling of shock and despair, which questioned whether nuclear power was an answer for clean energy. The question is how long will we remember this truth.”

Fragments of Light (2011), (Detail). Elizabeth: “We all grow old each day from infancy till death. My pieces are a self-confirmation that a life is important to both experience and remember. Life doesn’t disappear because one is ‘old’.”

Elizabeth Anderson is the first official Bachelor of Fine Arts graduate at Kwantlen Polytechnic University as of the 2011 Fall semester. Personal and cultural memory is a recurring theme in her work. Elizabeth’s current work, Fragments of Light, an installation of digital images framed by sheet metal light boxes, was influenced by her experience at the White Rock Museum and Archives. She said, “I was struck by the passing of time in one place. How many people lived their lives and the only evidence are photos, some with names, but many without. Why is it important to a culture to preserve these experiences that are many times anonymous and mundane?” Global events like the nuclear disaster at the Fukushima plant in Japan also affected and inspired Elizabeth. “I was working on a series which examines how global devastation may look when I was totally taken by the natural and manmade disaster in Japan which had both local and global consequences. The result was the ‘Moloch Series,’ four oil and wax abstract paintings representing the disaster: Quietude, Disturbance, Maelstrom and Extinct. It seemed fitting

Moloch Series from left to right, Quietude, Disturbance, Maelstrom, and Extinct. Encaustic paintings.

Her work also addresses issues related to aging both psychologically and sociologically. Elizabeth’s interest in this area stems in part from her experiences with Dr. Larry Anderson’s Ageism in British Columbia research study, as well as her personal experiences with aging. Elizabeth states, “I am interested in exploring how fear of death contributes to ageism. There is some research that there is a correlation between this fear and ageist attitudes. I definitely feel closer to death. There is a psychological shift when you have fewer years ahead than behind in life. There is a curiosity from my fellow students as to why I want to pursue new learning such as a BFA and I wonder sometimes if because of my age I’m not taken seriously Slippage. Encaustic and Mixed or considered not to deserve Media collage. the same support as younger cohorts. That being said I have received nothing but support and encouragement from the Fine Arts faculty. It has been exciting although frustrating at times to make art. Erdman Palmore, professor Emeritus at the Duke Center for the Study of Aging asserts, “… the good news about aging is you can grow bolder as you grow older.” I rather like that attitude.” Although Elizabeth is the first to officially receive her degree in the Fall term, she will be joined by more BFA graduates at convocation this spring.

donia strand

Desert Places, Robert Frost

The hills above Peachland are my living room: this rock, a chair, this stump, a table, this hollow--a cradle. He asks, “Where do you go?” I say I have no name for where elk go, but I go there too. A quiet nook, a book, I turn the pages, in the theatre of the wild, far from people and the sounds of traffic. Here, safe from small talk and blank faces. They cannot scare me with their empty spaces.

Solitude

They cannot scare me with their empty spaces Between stars--on stars where no human race is. I have it in me so much nearer home To scare myself with my own desert places.

I’ve found no answers carved in the pavement of the city, nor in bars or cars speeding along highways. I do know if you listen while lying in a quiet thicket you can slow your heart pace. I wander to the window at dinner parties, aware I’d be content as a hermit or in space between stars--on stars where no human race is. Where the sun strikes the ridge rising over the valley like a sleeping beast is where I want to be. A patch of sunlight on mountain-top becomes my ideal, the fruit out of reach, the zone unknown except to coyotes and elk. How I envy them, fur, teeth and hoof free to roam. I have it in me so much nearer home. I wake early, eager to see day break on sagebrush. I fling off sheets, his arm, pull on shoes. He asks, “Where do you go?” I say I go where bobcats go, wild spaces, feral traces, on ridges above the valley. I climb the spine of the mountain, look down to rock teeth at its base, to scare myself with my own desert places.

donia strand

Hollow Bones Once hunger’s maw widens it could black out the sun. Hunger has memory; spaces it gouges leave a basin like a glacial hollow. The birds with their hollow bones alight on the frozen lake to feed between ice floes. A coyote hides in the withered rushes at lake’s edge and watches the birds with avid eyes. A bottomless lake and hunger are twins; immeasurable, vast as underground caverns. Hunger reaches for the fruit in the tree but like Tantalus, never touches it.

Discordia A white birch stands at field’s edge and gazes over the wood, thin as a cloud tossed against the bowl of the sky. Across the field, the city lies. Its shadow looms over the wood like a pagan deity. The city’s machines whirr and clunk, the car horns blare, so the dryad in the birch cannot think. The city advances its queen at the edge of the field; knights and rooks move into position. Eris walks the hushed field; daughter of Night, she extinguishes the starlight. The spells have unraveled, even in the darkest part of the wood. Night falls.

donovan phillips

If Only If only glass milk bottles were never knocked over, and with a chipped rim let that cool liquid escape, slip down the front steps, and pool in the grit from passing peopleâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s heels. If only the white seep of hope did not curdle on the sidewalk

The Beauty of Mathematics

in the heat of the afternoon.

So much is made of the beauty of mathematics. When the textbook runs circles around my mind and then straightens into geometry, the sine of the book spine lays out for me. I can trace the angle of incidence of Narcissusâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; gaze back to his face, he had to have been perpendicular to the surface of the pond.

donovan phillips Whitewash The slop of the bucket swung soundly in my hand, and the brush rattled against the brim as I walked my kit to the whitewashing. Specks of lead-heavy paint flecked into the grass and the white line against the outside of my bare knee where the rim had passed was already visible when I made my way across the yard to the fence, where I’d begin to scrub the moss grasping up the youth of the graying panels. Suds and a brush, my mother’s cure for everything, and a stiff elbow, water from the hose, not the ditch water full of the farms’ run-off, soaking stiff bristles raked over the pale green reflected from the lawn. The grime would grow dark from the water and then fade away with another pass of the brush. From the end to the beginning, where the first board, clean and dry in the sun while I worked myself wetter, was ready for the new coat and stroke of my weighted brush thick with enamoured enamel. The splits in each panel, sealed and mended, each looked less like the one after it in turn until the final piece was painted and my face was burnt from the sun and my soles dark with the earth, and my hands encased in the same white as the fence; calluses hardened, knuckles coated, I paused at the end to look at my work, then to the opening cracks in my hands.

kelsey lacroix Drifted • installation • mixed media “My influence, for the formal and sculptural qualities of my work, is Andy Goldsworthy, a British sculptor who only created art from nature’s natural resources that surrounded him in his landscape”

latest work is the result of an exploratory process, in which I created sculpture and drawings, on the theme of personal legends and life journeys. The dome sculptures are made out of driftwood I collected from White Rock Beach where I go to contemplate and reflect on my thoughts and self. I chose to work with driftwood because it is what I believe to be the perfect symbol as a metaphor representing life journeys. Each piece of driftwood is not only beautiful but is aesthetically individualized. Driftwood is like a person: each distinct feature shows the personal journey it has travelled. It reveals that it is from an island or another land across a body of water, is from a particular tree in possibly another climate and has fallen off a boat or somewhere else in the world to drift and land on the shore. I am interested in the theme of journeys because I question the journey that people travel in their life span of less than 100 years and am lost to where I may go in mine.

Alex & Hannibal • diptych

kirsten sedore

Alex 24” x 36” Acrylic & charcoal on mylar

I am heavily inspired by film and psychology and I am interested in using certain characters to show the extremities of the human condition. I believe we can learn a lot by looking at someone’s facial expressions, particularly from the deranged and twisted, and I aim to reproduce the intense, psychotic aura these characters embody. With this work, I used classic film antagonists Alex DeLarge (from A

Hannibal 24” x 36” Acrylic & charcoal on mylar

Clockwork Orange) and Hannibal Lector (from Silence of the Lambs) to represent the deranged human condition. In the foreground, a terrified victim, and the background, a psychotic killer. Both killer and victim are done on separate sheets of mylar and when pressed together, create a dynamic duality- image of predator and prey.

kenny chui The Existence of Absence

The Existence of Absence is about my (non)existence to my family. My family, especially my parents, have never been interested in my artwork, even though my artwork has always been about my personal life. One heart-crushing comment from them has caused me to fear and eventually stop painting. I have then moved on to creating digital art, injecting myself more and more into my videos and other installations. However, my family has still shown no interest in my artwork. As a result, I wanted to make an art piece that will not last. I want this work to become “nothing” after the exhibition is over. The perfect medium for that is projection. I am only “alive” when the projection is on. Once school ends and the projector is turned off, I will no longer “exist”.

The Existence of Absence Projection installation, 4th year BFA Fall Exhibition

Patrick Javier Adam and Eve 60” x 48” Oil on canvas

Option B: Grow up showing a slight interest in politics. Pay attention to your beliefs that smaller government is better, but be more concerned with knowing who to blame for any given situation than what the solution is. Underachieve in school, fall short of your social expectations. Do not attend post secondary. Steadily work simple jobs like moving inventory in a warehouse or stacking produce in the grocery store but don’t work any jobs that are meaningful or have possibilities for advancement. Blame the government and others for your situation. Discover and listen to Alex Jones. Become a conspiracy theorist and consider yourself enlightened to the true nature of the world. Define yourself as having an “alternative point of view” and wear it like a badge. Examine your old beliefs but not your new ones, treat new beliefs as undeniable facts. Convince yourself that government and democracy are a sham and that the same collective pulls the strings behind all parties and

Option A:

Grow up with a slight ambivalence toward authority, picture yourself as “hard-edged.” Listen to punk-rock and worry about “the man” trying to keep you down. Read the Wikipedia page on Bakunin and start wearing clothes with a red “A” in a circle on them. Hang posters of Che Guvera on your wall but know next to nothing about him. Believe that government is the problem and that society would be better without it. Declare yourself an anarchist, pass high school but don’t care what your grades are. Take a year or two off and become more politically active. Go to rallies and protests, the more the better, you can figure out what you’re protesting later. Possibly grow dreadlocks and tweet that Rage Against the Machine wrote the soundtrack to your life. Interject yourself into politically minded conversations by shouting “legalize it!” Use the time you don’t spend protesting Wal-Mart’s attempt to set up a location in your city to work a customer service job at a

Grow up in an upper-middle-class family. Extol the virtues of your parents’ preferred right-wing party, be sure to always have a clever comment for why you support this party ready in case anyone should ask. Wear a tie to high school and strive to always be somewhat overdressed for any given situation. Support the political party you think will gain you the most respect from other students. Do not over-achieve in high school but do well enough to be accepted into the general studies program of the most prestigious local university. Wear your admission like a badge, ignore the fact that many of your peers have gone on to far more prestigious schools elsewhere. Flirt with religion, choose the one that is most accepted among the majority of people you know. Strive to gain as much status within this religion as fast as possible, have a 6-month plan to be wearing whatever robes, hat or garment that will set you above the other commoners who attend

Option C:

simon massey

Questionable Methods Of Political Socialization

multinational chain-store. Become “that” co-worker, the one who refers to customers as consumerist sheep but oddly has no qualms with taking full advantage of the employee discount. Watch in horror as your fellow revolutionaries all grow up and get careers. Attend university as a last ditch effort to find people who “get what you’re saying.” Take political science and realize how completely ineffective an anarchist government would be. Use this revelation to explore alternative points of view. Consider adopting Buddhism or Hinduism in order to prove you’re not stuck in the cookie-cutter mold of the Western world like your parents. Read Ayn Rand but only The Fountainhead. DON’T LISTEN TO ALEX JONES! He’s crazy and no good will come of him. Define yourself as a social libertarian and vote for the Marijuana Party, though the Green Party is an acceptable substitute if they aren’t running a candidate. Spend your life maintaining that virtually all problems facing any given government would be instantly solved by legalizing

governments. Become “that” member of your family, the one who at Christmas used your aunt’s innocent comment about Obama to launch into a tirade on the “soon to be” fascist state of America. Adopt conspiracy buzz words like fearbombing. Begin referring to those who don’t agree with you as “sheeple.” Stop brushing with fluoride and begin using an assumed name on Facebook. DON’T LISTEN TO THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY! They’re all in on it and would only try to mislead you. Deny global warming and insist anything with a lens or a microphone is being used to monitor you, but never explain how, or more importantly, why. Always assume the end is just around the corner, it will never be more than two years before the global elite or whichever secret society is pulling the strings rises up and kills off or enslaves all of humanity. Offer no explanation as to why you’ve been saying this for the last 20 years and still nothing has happened. Live a life of constant paranoia, get your news from choice

your place of worship. Change your preference in political party to suit your new- found religion. Now that you are old enough, vote, and vote enthusiastically. Wear a suit and gloves to the polling stations and announce your vote to whoever will hear you. When you finally notice the high extent of voter apathy among your peers, decide to stop voting as it is not the social boon you thought it to be. For future elections be sure to always have a clever comment you are ready to volunteer for why you didn’t vote. Decide to take some time to work even though your parents are covering your tuition fees. Get a corporate job with an oil or logging company and try to rub shoulders as high up the corporate ladder as possible. Change your political views to ones that favour your particular corporation. After a respectable semester of work return to school still on your parent’s dime. Finish your bachelors degree and end your flirtation with religion. See yourself as an “academic” and memorize clever quotes from respected members of the scientific

simon massey

pot. Find yourself a comfortable corner between mainstream and socially conscious, pretend it’s edgy and stand there trying to act aloof.

“enlightened” websites and talk radio shows. Demonize all progress so that the internet is “just another way they can track us,” jet engines become “an elaborate scheme to control the weather” and gun control is just “taking away our only means to fight back!” Accomplish little in life but don’t be bothered in the least by it. It’s clear that insurmountable forces have been conspiring to keep you down and there was nothing you could have done differently. Never live to see this end you’ve been prophesising, but worry for those who are still around as it is surely just around the corner.

community. Always have a pithy comment by anyone from Carl Sagan to Tesla ready should the opportunity to demonstrate your knowledge arise. Begin to read about authors who have written on political topics. DON’T READ ABOUT AYN RAND! A brief glance over her Wikipedia page will teach you everything you need to know to hate her and the people who read her. Read newspapers that you believe have opinions others will respect and quote them often. Provide heated commentary but never act to change the system. Spend your life thinking more about how others view your opinions than about the opinions themselves. Find yourself at 48 standing alone in a classroom and wondering what other paths you might have taken.

simon massey

Questionable Methods Of Political Socialization Continued…

weronika slowinski Three Cheers for Settling Scores

Lucifera deigned to slip back her filigree mask and show me her true countenance, sipping Chamomile from her fine porcelain cup, pinky up, reading lovingly the 1966 reprint of Hitler’s Manifest, smirking to herself, a plump newborn beneath her feet as cushion, dismissing the love labor of my yet inexperienced hands, burning my work slowly, piece by piece, for comfort, muttering sweetly, “I could do this better.” I’ll never forget how Vanity herself, drunk on the spinal fluid of those who’s backs she broke on her way to claiming her iron crown, chose each instrument for my live autopsy with care: a venomous tack to pin back each arm, the promise of three chances to plead my case, a lie, one blow each to my self-esteem, my dream, and my liver, to keep me from fighting back, an audience that could do with learning a thing or two about challenging her tact, and, as the final magnificent touch, she severed my tongue as the cherry on top.

Months I strained for the opportunity to please my queen, alas, Lucifera never stood on even ground with me, she took her work much too seriously, you see. Guiding my hand in a perfect pentangle, chiding me that it wasn’t right, as punishment sending her dogs on me: Envy and Gluttony, promised my limbs, the beasts, the putrid apples of her eyes, tore at me relentlessly, with the ferocity of a barbarian army, while I, contorted in a figure to her liking, drew ever on, never shaking, firm to my purpose as she breathed on my tender neck, the smell of hemlock and blood on her breath. Oh my heart, toxic and forlorn, heavy with the futility of it all, oh my knuckles aching to find her skull. I’ve taken back my hands, sewn back my tongue, and I am done licking my wounds, I’ll fashion a voodoo shiv from my pen and her hair (in tribute of her forked tongue) reinforcing it with the nails she had forced through my fingertips while she sat atop a throne of crushed poets bones, her horrid grating voice drowning out my exhausted moans— I would, and it would be for her throat alone.

connor doyle

This Poem

I am thinking of you as you read this poem right now – yes. In fact by the time you arrived at the first “you” in the previous sentence I had already swooned at the thought of you reading some of my poetry. I am right now hiding in this poem. Do you see me? Here I am! (I am resting on the middle part of the “H” in the tenth line) I hope you realize what you do to me when you read my work or think of me or decide “I will tell him about this when we talk and maybe he will write a poem about it.” You kick my brain from the inside and fill my fingers with tingling words. You sharpen my pencils and pose while I draw you in verse. When I am done the two of us sleep on the letters inside the lines you’re reading here. (Look closely in the dip of the following “u.”) Yes, you are to blame for all this. (But I am thinking of you now.)

mark barton

The Divine Female A carving of your face remained in the soil, I felt your body as I pierced the grass with my Calloused fingertips And the smooth layerings remain as fragments In the dirt.

I buried my Saint Christopherâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s medal here, The reflection of the silver illuminated As pale light hit softly upon the dark soil.

I remember very well the shapes you would make On my lower back with your finger nails, Oval, circle, infinity, divinity.

rokzanna basi

To See the Stars

O, to see the stars on a cold, clear night; I could give my life, to ponder where I am compared to them. Whisper sweetly to them. Dream with them, and look upon the world like them. To have the chance, ask who they are, do you know who I am? and what we are meant to do, together, existing, in the same universe.

j.c. doyle Chasing Jay

There’s no point in telling the truth if you can spin a really good lie so I start my night off with jäger-bombs at Opium and tell the slim blonde tattooed punk-rock princess bartender I saw Rage Against the Machine once in Vegas after they reunited. Says she’s also seen them but before they broke up which means she’s too old for me so I bail but not without getting free vodka first. Then I head-bang with drunk longhaired metalheads at the front of the stage because it’s funny and I like the way the neon lights clash with the bricks, the hardwood, the mess of alcohol and the sound of screeching guitars to make everything look and sound like Satan’s version of Candy Land turned into a movie. I buy more jäger-bombs for a group of chicks at the bar and pretend to listen to one talk about architecture in Edinburgh. I’m bored but stay because of the way she speaks with a pique to her voice at the end of every sentence and a nervous laugh that means she’s fishing for something I might be able to give her. I tell her I’m Jay and a Canadian med student exchanging at St. Andrews and am planning on specializing in orthopaedics after I graduate next fall. She gets my attention when she says she has shrooms so we sneak into the mens’ room and eat them and she blows me while we wait for them to kick in. The bathroom looks like it’s ripped off the set of Trainspotting but she’s drunk enough to not be bothered and surprises me when I tell her I’m coming and she keeps my dick in her mouth. The shrooms start to make everything look like

I’m seeing the party from the bottom of a pond glazed over with that wavy water effect that comes off the wall of a mall fountain so we need to find somewhere that has more colour and isn’t just a bunch of metal freaks in black leather jackets head-banging to music with too much bass-kick. We bail onto The Royal Mile and I tell her I have to piss which isn’t a lie but afterwards I keep walking down one of those little narrow close streets with all the sets of stairs and tight-together shops that always seem to loom in their own little way. I leave her on The Mile because she’s a little chubby and already blew me anyway. I catch a cab on Prince’s Street and roll past shops and busses and cars and a girl walking down the street in a grey cocktail dress barefoot in negative degree weather, her high-heels in her hand. Did. Not. Sleep. Wish I could switch off the high the same way I switch off the persona. Ditch the carryover— stop the wavy pattern of the walls from melting in that gelatinous way they do when you’ve got a stomach full of mushrooms. The room is too small for this shit. The heating unit next to the bed is too loud. The curtains have a floral pattern that I can’t stop looking at, and the slats in the dresser at the end of my bed quiver like rows of thin, chalk-white lips. I don’t know why I even try to sleep. Tonight shouldn’t be any different than the night before the night before the night before. Five days now, I’ve had the same routine: chase Jay.

j.c. doyle

Don’t sleep, because Jay makes noise in my head like a toddler banging pots and pans in the kitchen. I wonder what city he should be from—Vancouver or Toronto or Halifax. Every time the sandman grips me and I start to drift off, he’s there to tug me back into consciousness: West or East? Does he say “Toronto” or “Tarana”? Does he even watch hockey, and if he does, who’s his team? I should have figured all this out before I went out last night—his back-story—and well before I started to wing it and made up the med school stuff. He has to be something authentic, something people can grasp, but he’s like a firefly buzzing two inches above the lip of my glass jar. I roll over, stuff the pillow down, try to rest on my side, but the bed is a car-battery short of becoming an Afghani torture device, so I switch and roll onto my back. It’s the little changes that are going to get me through tonight—a wellplaced shoulder jammed in a soft spot between the springs or the edge of the comforter tucked beneath me. Jay is a hard man to keep up with, a hard man to stay comfortable around. Five days, I’ve chased him around Edinburgh. Or maybe he’s dragged me kicking and screaming—through close streets, into taxis, to that secret Polish vodka bar, to Bar Kohl for mojitos and The Voodoo Rooms for B52’s. And I just go along, follow two feet behind him like I’m on a leash, dog-tired and dancing wherever we go, with a smile on my face stretched so big it hurts my cheeks, which keeps me alert and attentive and from throwing up or passing out.

10:30 AM and I transition through the west end, floating like a zombie on the search for brains. Up the mound, to work at Deacon Brodie’s Tavern on The Mile, I do it all with a wrinkled white shirt and ketchup stains on a pair of black trousers. No time for washing or ironing. I’m on Jay’s time now, which means I’m going to have to struggle through work looking like an ex-junky, unshaven, with bags under my eyes the size of two-pence coppers. Two hours into a slow shift: it’s break time. I look up from the page I’m reading from, past the bar to Jackie, who’s standing behind it. She has that smile she likes to keep when a customer argues with her over the bill. Not forced, but not loose—sort of a practiced half-smile that shows no teeth and shoves up her cheeks—two wrinkled mounds set below a bad blonde dyejob. She’s fifty, pear-shaped, and this is her go-to look, like what people have when they’re posing for pictures with friends. Like pursed lips or a peace sign, but special, because it says two things: she’s not listening to me and she’s trying hard to swallow her Glaswegian tongue. There are only three customers right now, all by the window—a man alone with a plate of beef olives that have been cooked to the consistency of a leather shoe, who works his jaw like he’s trying to chew a piece of Hubba Bubba to bits and, on the other side of the room, an American couple spooning sauced-up, low-grade cow cheek out of the bottom of their beef and ale pies. We ignore them, because we’ve checked their tables, and they seem to be fine with the food.

***

j.c. doyle

I continue reading. “I catch a cab on Prince’s Street and roll past shops and busses and cars and a girl walking down the street in a grey cocktail dress barefoot in negative degree weather, her high-heels in her hand,” and then I ask, “So?” “So who’s Jay?” When I haven’t slept in a while, it’s like I’m seeing from two feet behind my own eyeballs. My focus narrows until I can only pay attention to one thing at a time. Energy levels dip until I walk with my shoulders slouched and my head down, and customers’ orders start to sound like questions posed by parents from the Peanuts cartoon: Wah-wah-wah-wah-haggis-wah. Fish and Chips-wah-wah-wah. I barely have enough energy in me to explain: “He’s fictional. It’s fiction,” I say. “But didnae ye say ye were—” “Out as him,” I say. She still doesn’t get what I’m doing here, although I’ve explained it to her a few times. Character studies—I didn’t come all the way from Canada to be me, I came to dive into the shoes of someone else. Different names, different stories—just different. Studying Jay is important to me right now, but really, he’s just the spawn of a hard night out and my latest obsession. He’s marked with a number somewhere in the double digits, and impatiently waits to be written like all my creations before him.

Jackie’s face is twisted up into a look of incomprehension. She doesn’t get what I’m telling her. She reads books like The Power of You and Strong Independent Woman. She spends all her time trying to perfect herself. But I’ve studied her, I’ve studied more than her, and I know that perfection is as touchable as Jay’s face. I’ve never wanted perfection anyway.When I was six, my dad sat me down at the kitchen table for a “Dad” talk about tattoos and piercings. About how it’s my body and I can do what I want with it, but I should remember I might not want them there if I decide to run for Prime Minister someday. Someday. Perfection always seemed like a hassle, but that’s easy to say for a guy who’s so well-versed in mediocrity. The existence of someday is doubtful. Jackie snaps her fingers in front of my face. I’ve been zoned out and staring at myself in the mirror behind the bottles at the bar. The skin around my eyes is baggy. I’ve never looked this pasty. Jackie points out the American couple in the corner. They want more water. I bring it over with a lemon slice in each glass and head back to the bar, where Jackie is leaned over her cup of coffee and shifting her eyes around the room. Bored and tired—and unimpressed with my writing, even though she’s the one who asked me to read it. “Do you ever wonder about customers?” “Aye. Wonder wot they’re doin’ eatin’ here. Travellin’ here, too. Makes no sense ta me.” Jackie is always complaining about the weather. About Edinburgh in general, really: the bus

j.c. doyle

service that doesn’t run when it snows, the tourists that litter the streets like directionless, wide-eyed newborns. But she’s never travelled before. She doesn’t understand them the way I do. My gaze drifts back to the couple in the corner. She’s a blonde in a red Arc’teryx jacket, typical American skier-apparel, who I’ve noticed has a lazy left eye. He’s got a dark beard, a flabby stomach and a scruffy, greying head of hair. Even from over at the bar, I can see she’s too hot for him. “No, no. I mean, like... do you ever wonder about what kind of sports they play, or who their first love was, or what they look like naked?” I ask. “No.” “Never?” “Never.” *** 5pm rolls around, and I take my shirt and apron off and stuff them in the hall closet, before I head to the bar down the road: Sandy Bells is where my night kicks off again, it’s a warm-up area, where I go to drink enough to ride Jay’s coattails.Typical—spirits behind a wood bar, Tennent’s and Belhaven Best and Guinness on draught. A few tired old Scotsmen sit at the bar on the brown leather stools and have a conversation about football that I can’t eavesdrop on for lack of understanding the game. I sit at my usual table in the corner and have a pint. I need sleep, but Jay consumes me. Two semesters back, I never wrote outside my room,

I was still in my parents’ house in Cloverdale, walking fifteen blocks to school every morning, passing the same park, the same houses and cars. Do that long enough and the words will leak out your ears. Do that long enough, and you have to force yourself into something else. That’s where Jay comes in, but I still need to master the way he moves through a crowded club like a freight train looking to collide with anything that’ll have him: women, drugs, booze. And I still haven’t learned to shrug off the guilt that comes along with faking status as a med student, parading around like I’m going to help people someday, and acting like someday is tomorrow, when I’m shipping off to Africa to donate my time to AIDS-riddled orphans. Hell, I haven’t even mastered his taste for vodka and single-malt whiskey. I keep telling myself that I never used to like coffee, but I drank it enough to learn to. And I might not enjoy vodka or whiskey, but I know for a fact I enjoy Jay. It’s hard enough keeping track of one life, let alone two. Sometimes, I feel like I’m going to fall apart at the seams, like one day I’ll be chasing Jay and my arm will fall off and my head will roll off my shoulders and shatter on the ground, and all that’ll be left is this pile of dust and bone and I’m on my third pint and Jay needs cigarettes. Fags. Jay needs fags, and he needs to call them fags, because he thinks it’s funny. Needs cigarettes and cocaine, but he’s new to town and doesn’t know where he’s going to get cocaine yet. But it’s not cocaine, it’s just coke. He doesn’t call it cocaine and he calls cigarettes darts when

j.c. doyle

they’re not fags and he’s from Halifax. Or maybe tonight he’ll be from Texas, and he’ll talk with that Texas-Ranger accent he mastered as a kid. Y’all. He’ll say y’all and walk with his thumbs jammed down into the tops of his jeans and be rude and obnoxious and ask a pair of twins which one was starved of oxygen at birth. And he needs to grab me by the collar and haul me with my heels scraping across the cobbles to the next bar for single malts and then to the next for mixed shooters and to the next to play the field. Hook ups. He needs hook ups and he needs to hook up and he’s lucky he has me. He’s lucky I’m here to sort it out during the day, to decide the wheres and whens and hows that govern his existence and make the night seamless and perfect in a way that makes him more real than I could ever be.

For more writing from J.C. Doyle, check out his website at www.jcdoyle.ca

Journey into Abstraction

any of the avant-garde artists of the early 20th century expressed in their personal manifestos a similar theme: establishing new ideas for what is to be acknowledged as “real” or “the truth” with regards to art, and spearheading new ways in which to visually express this “truth.” Their subject matter evolved from identifying the realities of mundane, everyday life (and not just propaganda for the elite) to identifying (acknowledging) the reality of the materials used to create an image. Art became less about subject matter and developed more interest in process and materials. Testing one’s ability to be creative also became a prominent pursuit for art making, above the technical ability to render something realistically. The painting skill, when utilized at its best ability, began to develop a designation of craft or commodity and was not necessarily an ability for testing creativity. With less regard given to skill and more importance put on experimentation, the goal for those striving to be deemed as true artists, in the purest sense, has evolved from political or monetary pursuits to more creative and spiritual ones. This meant that the progression for art making was naturally going to take a turn into abstraction. Reality was at question (and still is), because no one perspective or opinion on any subject is the absolute “truth” given that views are dynamic and changing. Therefore, this quest for “truth”—because it is considered an elusive and impossible thing to define—became one of the formulaic aspects to creating good art. This journey to express a personal truth (because it is only one’s opinion and therefore personal) becomes tied to creative expression. With this purposeful dissolving of these defining matters, such as truth and skill, how is art then qualified or judged whether it is good or bad? As more artists strive to be free to express whatever “truth” they want, and not to be tied to formalistic or academic methods in order to be creative (deliberate deskilling), there is still the task of legitimizing their art as being of “quality.” In order to legitimize what is “art” and what is craft or crap, there still exists an elusive formula. There has to be. This formula for visual language seems slippery and dynamic, but like every discipline there still exists a floating framework in which to apply certain elements. Humans cannot escape the ability to name, justify, categorize—and ultimately limit— items (art) through definition. It is this one characteristic that current contemporary artists feel bent on trying to defy. This task in itself—to defy the ability to be specifically categorized

debbie langtry

as something that already exits—is another of the formulaic aspects to achieving “creative” art. To ultimately be creative means having to find a place to draw from in order to express an original thought, or perspective, or method. Despite the philosophies of many founding avantgarde artists, such as Picasso or Matisse—to toss aside previous knowledge or academic teachings in order to express creatively from an uncontaminated state—one still needs something to be inspired from. Therefore, imagination and personal views of a particular subject stem from some ignition of thought or experience that already exists. There is an underlying fundamental value to knowledge and education in art and it is this misconception of its value that sometimes “tosses the baby out with the bath water” (so to speak). I bring this up because there seems to be a fair amount of frustration arising from my fellow artists about the commentary or “process” that is expected in order to create something deemed worthy of a high grade or attention. It is this frustration that we all seem to share since the rules around art and abstraction are abstract within themselves, leaving a vast amount of space for subjectivity and personal opinion. So I have attempted to articulate these elusive “rules” for creativity with the hope it will help others to form their own understanding. To recap, the unspoken and shifting formula for creating great art involves: 1) acknowledging that “truth” is a matter of one’s perspective and shifts accordingly; 2) acknowledging the meaning that materials add to a work of art – for they are what “truly” make a piece; 3) deskilling becomes an art within itself, because knowledge and ability of the skill is required first before deskilling can be achieved successfully; 4) inspirations for creativity stem from the recesses of the mind, but a mind that has been filled with information and education—fueling the imagination and the ability to articulate, reconcile or rebuke/negate; and lastly 5) the ability to legitimize what it is that you are trying to create through the articulation of your own thought process. This is not necessarily a literal definition of your art, but the motivations behind it.Through this exercise you should be able to justify your originality and authority about your artistic ability. After all, since the rendering of high art is a journey into abstraction, it won’t have a clear baseline as to what has inspired it. A bizarre sense of justification will be desired by the public in order to gain positive recognition as an artist.

rhea paez Noir et Rouge (Video stills) Short video

jay cabalu interview JonBenét 36” x 40” Mixed media on paper

Rhea Paez: What inspired you to use this collage technique for your artwork? Jay Cabalu: I started doing collage work about a year ago, mainly as a new way to flex a different creative muscle, because I had become bored with my regular painting, drawing and print making skills, and I thought it would be an interesting challenge. RP: What’s an underlying theme between the three of these pieces, The Appropriation of Sasha Fierce, Revelation and JonBenét? Earlier you spoke of the media sensationalizing everyday events or is that just specific to the JonBenét piece?

Jay Cabalu

is a Fourth Year Fine Arts Major at Kwantlen Polytechnic University who is a prolific drawer and an avid painter, currently dabbling in 2D mixed media collage art. This past fall, he was featured in the 70th Anniversary Federation of Canadian Artist’s Show on Granville Island.

On a February afternoon, I got a chance to interview him long distance via Skype, as he is currently in Preston, UK as a part of the student exchange program at the University of Central Lancashire. We discussed his pieces, The Appropriation of Sasha Fierce, Revelation and JonBenét, which all make for an interesting critique of the media and popular culture.

JC: It is more specific to the JonBenét piece but I think if you were to think of the underlying theme between the Sasha Fierce, the JonBenét and the Revelation would be the way in which the media and popular culture, shape the way we see reality. You can see that in the Sasha Fierce piece, as the music video that it’s based on, “Video Phone” displays really gruesome subject matter such as war, gun violence and captivity. These aspects of war are sort of sugar coated, and turned into a fun, colourful, vibrant, music video by a major pop artist. You can see that underlying theme as well in the JonBenét piece because it’s about how a really personal and tragic event that happened to a family was turned into a circus by the media. It is all about the media sensationalizing stories. The Ramsey’s had a personal experience that they were going through publicized and

jay cabalu

Revelation 24” x 24” Mixed media collage

interview The Apopriation of Sasha Fierce 40” x 60” Mixed media collage

artists sampling and creating mashups of already existing songs and you can see it more and more with films, which cross different genre barriers. The whole idea of taking something that already exists and turning it into an entirely new entity happens often in popular culture and it is exactly what this collage process is, it’s taking something that is a product in itself and turning it into a distinct work.

had the whole world judge them for something that they didn’t do. That is kind of what these pieces are about sensationalizing of things that happen in the media. It’s relevant to popular culture because popular culture is about making everyone, as a complex cohesive culture, pay attention to whatever is sensational at the time. The parents were accused of killing their own daughter- which is horrible. Imagine being accused of that. They were exonerated ten years later but, who is going to remember that they were exonerated for that? Revelation is just kind of a comment on us as a society, and how our focus has turned to sort of frivolous matters as a result of media advertising and popular culture. This is why I use a lot of images from fashion advertisements, paired together with real life documentation of the Vancouver riots that happened after the Vancouver Canucks lost the Stanley Cup this last year. It goes to show you the sort of folly and misguided actions that can happen as a result of human flaw and also as a result of media frenzy. RP: Where do you see yourself taking

this type of artistic style? Do you see yourself using this for any future pieces? Is this underlying theme something you’ll continue to pursue throughout the rest of your studies at Kwantlen? JC: I never know for sure what the future will hold, but I definitely am interested in this new technique that I’ve sort of been developing, and it’s still exciting to me so I’ll keep doing it as long as it remains that way, and right now it is. I think I will continue with this theme because it’s something I‘m really passionate about. Just the idea of popular culture fascinates me. The whole idea of popular culture, which is understood by everyone around the world, that this is a global culture that you can relate to, no matter where you live –that in itself intrigues me. Also, I feel like there are so many different intricacies as to how this pop culture machine works, and manifests itself into other various subcultures. I find collage a very succinct way to talk about pop culture because I feel like right now pop culture reuses and recycles a lot of materials. You can see this with popular music with

RP: Currently, you’re in Preston, England, doing a student exchange program with the University of Central Lancashire. How do you like it over there and what do you think of their Fine Arts Program in comparison to our Fine Arts program? I know it’s a little early to say much, but thus far, what do you think? JC: You’re right. It is a little early to say as it is just week three of the semester, but so far it’s been really great and encouraging. I’m taking a self directed module, which they call classes, which is actually really exciting for me. My instructor suggested a project for me after seeing my work, which is to create illustrations for various films, which will then be submitted to a film magazine called Little White Lies for their cover illustration. It’s exciting for me because I’ve always been interested in illustration even before I was interested in pursuing a Fine Arts Degree, and I feel like the collage technique I’ve been doing as of late, is well suited for illustration. I’d like to see how my skills will adapt to the field of illustration, as it might be something I might be interested in pursuing in my future career. w

chelsea lawrick Media According to Enzenberger: a summary

“Constituents of a Theory of the Media,” Hans Magnus Enzenberger discusses what constitutes media and new media. He discusses the social concerns with new media and the way that it can affect anything from the individual person to a government body. Many of his ideas are still important in regards to practices of looking and art making today as new media extends further into the spheres of visual culture now than ever before. Enzenberger says that the media is inherently related to a capitalistic monopoly. Reasoning for this is best discussed with his example of both radio transmitters and television. A radio transmitter is an electronic device that is able to send a message to a receiver. Although, as Enzenberger mentions, the roles of both transmitter and receiver could be interchangeable with a few technical changes, when left as is (and it was) it is the opposite of a communicative device in the way that it provides no dialogue. It is related to the producer – consumer relationship, the ruling and the ruled, the bureaucratic monopoly and the masses. There is a power and a weakness in that relationship. The same can be said for television. As Lynn Hershman also discusses in her article “The Fantasy Beyond Control”, a television gives the viewer no opportunity to respond, only the choice to turn it off entirely. This whole idea is linked to the ideal of a monopoly that is able to control what is sent out, and thus the idea of the media at this time can almost be seen as a way to channel propaganda through this novelty.

Media is not fixed. Rather, it can be manipulated. This supports the above-mentioned notion of mild propaganda. A news report, for example, can be selectively edited and positioned in a certain way that could bend the truth entirely while making it seem documentary. As the Left — the socialists, the artists, the humanists— is suspicious of manipulation, and as was just discussed, media is subject to manipulation, the Left are therefore weary of media. According to the bourgeois, the higher levels of society and some governments, a problem with media is the ability for reproduction of information. If copy machines are available to everyone, secret information can be leaked to the masses.

The bourgeois notion of private library and restricted knowledge is eliminated as literature can be copied on mass levels and eventually digitized for the world to have access to. This use of media breaks down social structures profoundly: anyone can educate themselves, instead of having to be of higher social status. This also poses issues for copyright. Free speech becomes freer. Sometimes these mass publishing possibilities, as Enzenberger mentions, have even caused counter-industrialization for some countries (like the Soviet Union) as their governments fear leakage of information. Enzenberger discusses the “Achievement of Benjamin” where the notion of authorship is questioned through new media. Authorship had always been seen as this elitist position—the hand of the artist— but new media challenges that. Anyone can get a camera or a photocopier now and make what they will of them— manipulate other works, make things more facilitated by the media production process rather than creativity. To what means do we decide when the product is not art but product of pure machinery? This is an important question still today, if not more important, as digital cameras increase in quality and it seems as though anyone can take an adequate photo. There are several ways to illustrate some of the points of this article. One example of the frustrations with media as originally being one sided would be Vito Acconci’s Theme Song (1973). His engagement with new media as a way to reach out to the audience gives the frustrating limit to the viewer that they can not communicate back to him, no matter how badly they would like to. He tempts the viewer (or disturbs them, depending on who you are talking to) but there is no way to enter his space. In summary, Hans Magnus Enzenberger’s “Constituents of a Theory of the Media” covers a lot to do with the way media is perceived by different social groups - the Left, the bureaucrats and so on. He discusses the tensions people have with it and the way it affects the society it is in, as it is really present in every part of production. All the types of media he discusses form a whole – things feed off of each other and have created a type of communication (or miscommunication) of their own.

andres salaz

THERE IS NO PAST, AND NO FUTURE, ONLY THE ENDLESS, INSTANTANEOUS GRATIFICATION OF THE PRESENT. 35

debbie langtry

Words

Words Words

Thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nothing more intimate when shared, trustfully extended, anticipating reciprocation to engage a link for common ground.

Yet once spilled, never to be reconsumed, staining surfaces that canâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t pretend they were not touched. Affecting, infecting, imprinting impressions. Dangling in the air they can spike fear into ears hearing invitations unready to be answered. Wielding weapons carving comprehensions molding opinions while conjuring emotions with imagined tones that insinuate intentions. Requiring respect like a seasoning spice used sparingly requiring artful application to tastefully achieve palatable results. Only if accumulated into one conversation do their numbers inflict less harm. Contrarily, if they are spewed carelessly, then like a pandemic expectoration in duplication impressionable beliefs will occur. Who wants presumptions inherited over accidental spillage of spontaneously shared words?

Words Words

connor doyle

Broken In In homes where windows were our doors, we learned to raise ourselves on the promise of escape; it was for the late-night bars & after parties & for leaning into the punches of our enemies & patriarchs; we stayed out long past dark & lied about who we had been with to mothers & lovers who replaced them. So, after we renounced our old escape routes & entrusted youth to our kids, is it surprising that a set of keys & a cellphone can remind us of our fathersâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; houses?

claire matthews

III The inside of your thigh: a beach along Oregonâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s coast. Everything meets here. When thereâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s nowhere left to go, you turn, unravel your fronds, whispers from the sea to remind me of home. The merry-go-round, you dared me to lick a bar, laughed when I burnt my tongue. You read to me while you thought I was sleeping, about a girl who emerged from the sea and married a prince. Meghan, I picture you on the grass in my backyard, dandelion in hand, ready to smudge away my freckles with yellow.

claire matthews

V It took two months for the plates to rattle, then finish. After the worst of tremors, 40,000 young salmon leapt through turbine blades of Lewis Riverâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s hydroelectric dam. No one spread ashes that day, week. Ceramic jars littered mantles, little monuments. Ferns were among the first to be reborn, the craterâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s mouth bandaged green. The year my father left, we kept the house, sold the furniture. Bought a round kitchen table so no side was empty.

ROZ

interview

Most art students… …feel they have a freedom to create what they like with much to gain from the final product, such as a good grade, something for their portfolio, or praise from instructors. However there are some who feel they have everything to lose by creating art, such as artist and student Roz. Roz, whose name is a nom de guerre, has remained anonymous in this interview for her protection. Uncensored (2011) and Crying Shame (2011) are two examples of Roz’s work that have stimulated a conversation about the sexuality of Muslim women and rituals in the Persian culture. Our interview begins with an overview of the themes in her work…

Rhea Paez: Looking at your pieces and

your artist statement, they reference Persian culture and Muslim women within that culture. Would you like to elaborate on it? ROZ: Basically I try to question some

of the religious and cultural rituals that not only Muslims do, but most Persians as well. I know the culture because I grew up in Iran. It’s basically things [within my culture] that I question, and things I want to know more about—these rituals regarding stoning, women wearing veils and all of these limitations women have—just because of their gender. It’s all very interesting for me to explore. RP:

Your piece Crying Shame is about stoning. Please tell me more about it.

Yes. I actually did two pieces about stoning. The other one is a drawing I did. The reason I chose to make these pieces about stoning is because this event does not only happen in Iran, although it is illegal in most countries, it is still happening in smaller cities. It’s just really sad that the people who participate in these rituals are really close family members of the victim, and they’re extremely religious. There’s this book about all these people who were stoned, based on true events; most of them being women, sometimes even children who were raped, or people being accused of being with someone else.The family members of these people cannot handle the shame that this family member might bring to them because of what they’re being accused of, so the family decides to stone this relative to death. I did some research on it and I found out that even though it is illegal in Iran to stone someone it still happens. There was this judge in Tehran who was voted the best judge of the year, a very fair judge, and he signed the papers to get a couple stoned, even though it was illegal. He tried to keep it secret, but it was written in the court system that he passed it. It’s interesting because it was passed during the Ahmadinejad Regime, which does not support stoning. I would have expected this with Ahmadinejad’s background and religious beliefs, but it’s just interesting that even though it’s illegal it’s still happening and no one can really stop it. It’s not just happening in Iran: it’s happening in African countries, it’s

happening in other Muslim and Arabic countries. But it really needs to be addressed. Even though there are so many people against it, and are trying so hard to do something about it, they haven’t been able to stop it. It’s killing with torture. I don’t understand why people need to torture another person for adultery since these people are forced into arranged marriages. RP:

Even though it’s illegal do you think that stoning is still happening today because it was a really common tradition before?

Well it still is common today, yet it’s sort of hidden.

RP:

Do you think that stoning has something to do with the mob mentality? Remember the performance piece by Marina Abromavich, Rhythm 0, where the inflicting of pleasure or pain with random objects didn’t start until one person from the audience picked up an object and then eventually the rest of the audience responded to the other objects with aggression towards her, albeit the first audience participant was cautious with their first action.

Yes, it’s exactly like that. I think everyone has the potential to be violent against another human being, you just have to be in that situation. The really disturbing thing about these rituals is that the husbands, the fathers and the children of the victim, are the ones who start throwing stones at their own daughters or their own mother. How can you possibly hurt your own mother, your own daughter or your own wife by throwing stones at their

ROZ

head? It’s extremely cruel, and no one needs to die that way. RP:

You were saying you didn’t want your last name published in this magazine because of the content in your art. Why is that?

Even though my work isn’t political, the subtle hints of these issues in my work can be problematic for me because I go back to Iran twice a year to visit my family and they have many spies around. I know a friend of mine just got shot and killed in Texas because she was one of the leaders of a Green movement there, and they shot her for that. They shot her by her house, so these spies are everywhere. Just because you’re not in Iran you’re safe—that’s not the case. You can never be safe from them. They have people everywhere, and they will find you if they need to. The other problem that I have about publishing my name is that my last name is a very uncommon last name, and my dad is well known in Iran, so I’m not only scared for my own life, but I’m mostly scared for my parents because they live in Iran and anything can happen to them.

RP:

What is it that you want to get out of creating artwork involving these themes since it poses a risk to you and your family? Should someone recognize that it is you who is doing this work?

I think there are not enough Persian artists talking about these issues. Art is not a very popular subject and usually people who pursue the Fine Arts paint landscapes and art that is beautiful to look at, not art that is political or is about social issues. I just want to create awareness

interview about these themes. I know that there is awareness about these issues within the culture, but I want to open up this awareness to everyone, and not just for Persian people. Even the Persian people who grew up here are not really aware and educated about these things that have happened. RP:

Going forward, do you think you’ll continue to create art about this subject matter or do you think you’ll explore other things?

I think I’m going to explore different issues but I’m really interested in pushing myself in trying to capture these very cultural rituals that are questioned by western society …and also to try to make art that doesn’t just criticize these rituals but to create a conversation around it. For Roz’s complete artist statement on her work, please visit us on the web at www.pulpmag.ca

Previous page: Uncensored, (2011) 23”x36”, Digital Photography. Muslim women are only allowed to be sexually active when married. They have no rights to abortion since it is illegal, and safe sex is usually not practiced, even though condoms are very accessible. In addition, in most cities women have to have their husband’s permission to be on birth control pills. This piece questions the ethics of these rules. Below: Crying Shame, (2011) 12”x4”, Ink on Paper. The Qur’an forbids sexual intercourse outside of marriage. The punishment for adultery is stoning to death. It is a form of execution by torture still being practiced in Iran today. These rituals are performed by the close family members of the individuals committing adultery. I wanted this work to be decorative and pleasing to the eye but also comment on the issues that are embedded in the Iranian culture.

josh elford Double-Dog Dare His undershirt sticks to his skin. Luckily for Adam, his Team BC windbreaker hides sweat stains. The sun leaks through the trees and ribbons of the sun are displayed on everyone in the campground. Adam and his younger brother, Nolan, enter the cooler pastures of the Cultus Lake Grocery Store. “You have the money Mom gave us right?” Nolan asks. “For sure.” “Do we have enough for an ice cream cone each?” Nolan inquires. “Probably only for me,” says Adam. “But they’re 4 bucks each and she gave you ten!” “Nah, she only gave me five.” Tears start to well in Nolan’s eyes. He had no way of knowing that their mom gave Adam ten dollars. She said she would, but she mentioned that he had already had one yesterday before begrudgingly handing his brother the bill. “Want to play Virtua Fighter 4?” Adam asks his brother. Nolan stares at his shoes and shakes his head. “You can watch me then.” The arcade to the left of the entrance occupies half of the little store. Behind are various cold drinks like milk and individual sodas. They don’t sell the 2L of Cokes anymore. The clerk said that they had never sold 2L sizes of anything, but he could swear that he bought a couple two years ago when he was twelve. The other half of the store holds a few pails of the greatest ice cream Adam has eaten in his life.

Adam hands Nolan a quarter. He accepts it with wide eyes, then wipes his face on his sleeve. “I thought she only gave you five dollars,” Nolan says while rubbing his eyes. “I lied.” Nolan grabs the bottom of his brother’s windbreaker and hugs him. Adam laughs and guides his brother away quickly. “Please don’t. You get boogery when you cry. You’re making a mess on my jacket!” He uses more force in his brother’s removal than he intends. Nolan clutches his shoulder and takes a step away. Adam grabs a few napkins from the front counter and cleans up a bit. He deposits the napkins into the receptacle by the front door. A couple girls walk into the store and head straight for the ice cream pails behind the display glass. Adam stares at the brunette on the left. She is the same age as Adam and the girl beside her is the same age as Nolan. The brunette girl glances at Adam staring at her. She adjusts her glasses and quickly focuses her attention on the choice of ice cream in front of her. Adam smiles a little bit. She is wearing a white tank top with little pink shorts and she also has a yellow glow stick she wears as a wristband. “I hope she gets the bubblegum,” Adam whispers to himself, and the very young boy standing in line with his mother looks curiously at him. “May I have a scoop of the bubblegum please?” the girl with the glow stick asks. Nolan viciously jabs at the joystick with a look of complete seriousness in his eyes.

josh elford

“Sweet,” Adam says softly. “You already used your quarter?” Adam asks. The game screen is flashing Please Insert Coins while two fighters are braving a tough pixelated battle. “I’m sorry, Nolan. I didn’t mean to push you.You know how much I love my jacket.”

“Well, you’re a lot bigger than my son was when he played. He could hit for power too, but he was in really good shape. He could steal a lot of bases.”

Nolan continues to jab at the joystick. His face is turning a deep scarlet.

“I could probably steal a lot of bases too,” he says. “I’m a lot faster than I look.”

“Okay, I’ll play the quarter game with you later at the lake. I’ll let you search for it the first ten times.”

“You may have to lay off the ice cream then. It isn’t exactly good for an athlete.”

The scarlet leaves his face and he smiles. They both insert the quarters and the battle begins. A dim red sun replaces the vivid orange hue of midday. The many hours spent at the arcade have brought a refreshing late afternoon breeze. Two children with wide-spread grins sprint past them holding newly bought roasting sticks from the store. The smells of burning campfires and various flame-cooked meats fill Adam’s nose. “Why do you always get the bubblegum ice cream?” Nolan asks. “It’s unbeatable.” The answer suffices. A woman walks towards Adam and notices the BC logo on the left side of his chest. She smiles and approaches him. “Did you get that jacket from baseball too?” “I did.” “That’s wonderful!” she exclaims in a loud, rather unnecessary high-pitched squeal. “My son has a jacket like that from when he played baseball ten years ago. Oh, you must be a power hitter.”

“How did you know?” Adam answers, slightly taken aback.

Adam scowls. The lady recognizes that she may have not been as encouraging and wise as she intends to be, so she quickly adds, “But you’re on vacation so you should enjoy yourself!” She escapes through the door and into the store. Adam looks at his reflection in the window and adjusts his jacket for optimum comfort. “Did you know that lady? She wasn’t very nice,” Nolan asks. Adam shakes his head. Nolan’s attention is quickly grabbed by the playground behind the store. It is much bigger than the average school playground. There are two swing sets, one is multi-colored and the other is silver. The silver swing set is a lot smoother, but most of the kids use the colored one instead. There are three different types of monkey bars: the basic upright one you have to climb across, the upright-curved yellow one which would look like a giant banana to a bird, and the dome monkey bars where many kids like to hang upside down. “Are we going on the playground?” Nolan asks.

josh elford

Adam can’t even shake his head. The glow stick girl, who shares the same immaculate taste in ice cream, is sitting on top of the dome monkey bars with her younger sister who looks like a miniature version of her, and a couple of other girls who are in deep conversation. The glow stick girl’s laugh fills the playground with enchanting music. Adam relaxes his shoulders and feels weightless. He feels euphoric, like he can see music notes. Nolan shoots him a baffled look. She looks at Adam and giggles. His stomach feels like someone reached in and grabbed a fistful of his innards. His ears burn and change to a shade of crimson. He might be coming down with some sort of sickness. The glow stick girl taps a friend’s shoulder and Adam is still looking at her. Now all the girls on the dome-shaped monkey bars are looking at Adam. They whisper amongst themselves. The music of laughter fades away and is replaced with a horrific cacophony of giggles. The friends nudge the brunette off of the domeshaped monkey bars and her cheeks become red. She looks back at her friends and seems reluctant. The girls are still looking at Adam, who is trying to look away, but can’t. The friends point at him and urge the glow stick girl his way. She giggles and buries her face in her hands. She is coming his way. The wood smells better. Lingering aches and pains disappear from his body. He doesn’t even notice the sweat under his jacket. She stops in front of him, drags her feet slowly on the gravel. She puts both arms behind her back, says, “Umm, ‘lo,” in a mouse-like voice,

but there is a quiet confidence, which Adam finds encouraging. “H-hey,” he manages to say with tremendous effort. Her smile erases all the worry from Adam’s body. He wonders if glow stick girl has a pretty name like Lavender. He wonders if he’ll ever see her again. What if she doesn’t live close? What if she lives in Calgary and he can only see her once a month? What if she lives in Victoria and he would have to wake up at 4 every morning and hop on a ferry to see her? He could become a travelling merchant where his daily routes take him. “I’m sorry about this,” she says in a quiet voice, no longer confident. She walks to his side. She reaches her hand back and slaps his ass with surprising force. The sound echoes in Adam’s ears and he’s sure the whole campground can hear it. The sound of laughter and meat sizzling on the fire is replaced with the enormity of this sound. She joins her friends and they each laugh with unrelenting ferocity. The littlest of the girls laughs so hard she collapses to the ground *** “You suck at hiding quarters,” Nolan says as he emerges from the lake, holding his hand high above his head as he paddles his feet to stay afloat. “I can throw it farther then.” He winds up and throws the quarter with all of the strength that his arm possesses. Nolan reacts like a dog fetching a ball and water splashes from his feet. The search begins.

josh elford

Adam sees an older boy with canary yellow shorts, holding a large, sharp rock and a boy, about two years younger, with red shorts fishing for minnows with a small net. The yellow shorts boy is Nolan’s age, the red shorts is two years younger, and they share the net equally with no arguments. One of the boys notices Adam and hands him the net. Adam obliges and leans over the edge of the dock and dips the net slowly, gently into the lake. With the fluent movement of his wrist, he deposits two minnows into the bucket the two boys had. They were the first that they caught. “My turn!” says the red shorts boy. “Nice catch,” the other boy says. “Why are you wearing a shirt?” he says to Adam. “So I don’t get burnt,” Adam replies. “My older brother wears a shirt swimming too,” the young boy says. “He wears it because he thinks he’s fat.” “My sister wears a shirt when she goes swimming too,” he continues. “She said it’s so guys don’t look at her boobs.” Nolan leaves the boys with the minnows, slowly makes his way back to the edge of the dock. He gives Adam the quarter. “I still get to look again, right? You promised me yesterday!” Adam nods. As he starts his wind-up to throw the quarter, he notices a boat approaching the dock. Boats have their own dock to load at, so he doesn’t know why this boat is so close. He notices a family on the boat. The father is driving, holding a beer,

laughing. The mother shoots nervous glances at her husband. The son is leaning over the back of the boat at the daughter, who is on the innertube attached to the back. The girl in the tube adjusts her position and her brown hair flows in the wind. Adam leaps into the lake. He narrowly misses his brother. The water is cold. It pierces his skin and freezes his insides. He opens his eyes. His sight blurs. He sees his brother’s legs kicking close by. He lets out the air in his lungs, produces bubbles that tickle his nose. He sinks to the bottom of the shallow lake, where his feet land gently. He smiles. Maybe this water is magic water. He thinks about how much fun he is having with his brother and how happy Nolan is that he gets to search for a quarter. He thinks about how enjoyable it was to catch the minnows and throw the quarter. He thinks of baseball and the many wonders that it brings him. He thinks of the admiration his classmates give him in gym class when they see him play. His lungs tighten, but he feels okay. He emerges from the lake with the smile still firmly on his face. “That wasn’t the girl from yesterday,” Nolan says. “On the boat, that wasn’t her.” “I know.” Adam says. “I thought it might have been, but it’s okay. Want another throw?” Nolan nods. He swims to the ladder and climbs up onto the dock. The two boys are still fishing minnows with the two lonely ones still circling the inside of the water-filled bucket. He faces the lake and flips the coin in the air and catches it. He winds up and throws it hard, thinking that his arm has never felt better.

lee beavington

Hraunfossar

when mantles plumed magma and fire governed the ground pillow lava piled like burnt pancakes encased in crusty carapaces now the volcanic detritus lays frozen hiding sun-laden rock trolls borne from a molten mother upon Iceland’s raging offspring its bubble babies now fossilized a ravine plunges its path carving through liquid layers of life cemented by Gaia’s postpartum cooling maiden waterfalls grace the bank with their flowing flower dresses white riparian ribs joining the central spine a thousand tributaries emerge from tender tunnels to merge with the mother affluent Hvítá glows with maternal pride a crystal crevice of lotic bliss as though the sky has flooded this river upon which rapid clouds crest like writhing spirits stone seals bob beneath her current dark and still while their world rushes by they stand in holy waters from virgin springs statues stubborn yet helpless against the grind of time’s teeth today the lava flow falls feed fields that once bore fire letting seeds bear roots and stems until Gaia’s womb contracts again

lee beavington

Amoeba nuclear heart in a cellular cloud oozing palmate of pseudopodia tactile eyes offer radial perception sticky branches with cytoplasmic fingers membraned sea engulfs sandbars digesting pelagic prey in its microscopic ocean liquid predator like sap over a fly an incoming tide devouring each pebble in turn

debbie langtry & chelsea lawrick Elusive Freedom (detail) 6.5” H x 18” L x 10” W Hydrostone sculpture

“Two-faced” head is one of four sculptures as a set. These sculptures are representative of how an individual might want to deny or remove an aspect of themselves, but one can never escape a familial bond, social expectation or inherited trait. For more of Debbie’s work, visit her website at debbielangtry.blogspot.com

debbie langtry • sculptor

chelsea lawrick • painter This is a preliminary sketch painting for a larger painting of the same subject. It is a part of a series of oil paintings that deal with notions of trophies, collecting, and human nature. For a full artist statement and to view the rest of the series, visit Chelsea’s website at www.chelsealawrick.com

Look What Father Brought Home (sketch) 24” x 30” Oil on canvas

wei heng liu

Desire (video still) Video

Chelsea Lawrick: When did you start working with themes concerning beauty and product consumerism? What drove you to become passionate about these themes? Wei Heng Liu: I started in 2010 in Ana Gomes’ performance art class. I was inspired by Marina Abramović’s work, Art Must Be Beautiful. In the video, she combs her hair and simultaneously repeats, “Art must be beautiful.” So, I did a similar performance, yet I recorded myself putting lotion on my face and changed Marina’s phrase to “Women must be beautiful.” The work reflected my desire to look beautiful; at the same time, I wondered what beautiful is to women. From this work, I began to create more works about beauty, desire and consumerism. CL: There is a definite difference in style between the rendering of images in Cosmetics and Unlimited Beauty. What was it like creating Unlimited Beauty? Did you know what words you were going to write before you wrote them or was it a intuitive process?

Tools 46” X 48” Oil on canvas

interview WL: Creating Unlimited Beauty was fun because writing with lipstick made me feel cool and powerful about being a woman. However, the strong smell and the stickiness of the lipsticks disgusted me. Yes, I had looked into words on cosmetics labels and fashion magazines before I wrote them. When I was making the work, I had a note with me to remind myself what to write on the canvas.   CL: In your performance video I see references to plastic surgery and an underlying violence from the use of the fabric face mask. What are your thoughts on the way women are pressured by the media and popular culture to go to these sorts of extremes in the name of ‘beauty’? WL: I think most women have a love-hate relationship with beauty. I admire women, who have the courage and strong motivation to do any kinds of body modifications. However, I think we should define our own beauty rather than forcing ourselves to fit in with the standards that the media and popular culture create. w

“the strong smell and the stickiness of the lipsticks disgusted me.”

Unlimited Beauty 36” x 48” Lipstick on canvas

Cosmetics 48” x 36” Oil on panel

daryl markiewicz

Biological Biomorphics Variable dimensions Plaster

of making art has taught The process me to accept and embrace the surprises and accidents in my life and in my work with positivity and creativity. I usually start out with an overall plan for a project and during the process of creating, the piece changes and evolves based on things I see happening in the materials. This process of experimentation and observation of materials is what dictates the direction of my project. Though I start with a concept and an end goal, it is the ideas that have yet to take shape, which truly excite me. Over Glass • Performance • 270 minutes

By living in the moment and accepting these anomalies, I see my artistic process evolving in a very similar way to that of my discovery of art. With my latest project of body casting [Biological Biomorphics], all three moulds failed. Noticing the ability of the casting material, alginate, to move and flex, it led me to experiment with the moulds and the unique shapes they could create. I began to work with the “failed” molds and the resulting pieces are now, in my opinion, my strongest pieces to date - confirming my belief that life, and its experiences, are links in the chain reaction of the universe. If the mould had not “failed”, I never would have ended up creating the biological/ biomorphic forms, and I never would have found the direction in which I am working in now.

darylmarkiewicz.posterous.com

marlow gunterman

Our Poem Together we’ll blossom fly into the night sky always next to one another raving until sunrise so we can come home to every ounce of drunken happiness We’ll sing, we’ll chirp our scandalous tunes we’ll raise our glasses tongue the provocative juice because baby, mornings are nothing without you High on you like crystal methamphetamine in our fits of passion just how we’re meant to be our lips to part only to meet again To you my love, “We”

taryn pearcey

Predator As the bird hangs from the catâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s jaws beneath the cherry tree in my backyard, a chirp escapes its mouth, a flute with a flat note. The thwap-thwap-thwap of flight is the only movement in an otherwise still tableau. Galaxies wait beneath the catâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s eyes: twin pieces of amber. I want to dive inside one, leap off the cracked back deck into a world where the sky is the orange of sunrise, casts the same glow over every face, and illuminates all the dark corners. My sister cries out, sends the cat darting through blossoms. The bird left behind is a mount in the grass. I wait for the thwap-thwap in silence, as my eyes ignite.

taryn pearcey

How to Dress for Gym Class Stand in the corner of the locker room. Become another lump left over by the paint on the cement wall. Observe. What do the other girls have that you don’t? Their skin is free of blemishes, while your shoulder is stained by the green bruise from that Italian girl with the fake eyelashes who rammed you into the wall during no-contact floor hockey. Remove your clothes from your bag while the rest of the room buzzes in chatter, adorned in short-shorts and yoga pants. Your shorts are pink, two sizes too big, on sale at Zellers. Your mother might insist you are thin but her words are blanks compared to thighs like condensating milk jugs.Your shirt is stained with ketchup, and baggy to keep your cleavage to yourself, to give them a smaller target. Turn your back to the crowd and dress in silence. Seek comfort in the cement. It’s easier not to flinch when you can’t see the firing squad.

taryn pearcey

My Mother Tells Me My mother tells me how to chop celery for stuffing. Small pieces. Careful, watch your fingers. The late morning light shimmies in through the kitchen window over the sink.

My mother tells me how to dice onions without crying. Sit them in the freezer for a few minutes. Don’t touch your eyes. She drops the Kleenex box by the cutting board anyway, but turns, and lets me begin alone.

She tells me I wasted no time when I was born. The nurse hardly made it across the room. I was seconds from bungee jumping onto the waxed floor, my first breath almost my last. She tells me my father hated his job only once. Photographed the death of a SIDS baby, my age. He came home, watched me sleep beneath clouds and hot air balloons adrift on the wall over my head, in a crib littered with forgotten cheerios. She tells me my oldest sister was disappointed when I wasn’t born a boy. I hung out with the boys in elementary school, anyway. Pushed them off the slide, threw juggling cubes at the ones I liked. She tells me not to use orange condoms, because that’s how she got me. It is the first time she admits a mistake.

tpearcethewritingfreak.tumblr.com

Christopher Snell Self Discovery Plaster and found objects

A Day Through My Eyes

tara hallquist

of my son was something that may not have The birth been planned, but I think having him is what saved me, and it is also what drives me every day to be a better person. With that being said, the changes that have occurred have had some effects on me. I went from being able to sleep all day, being able to get up and go wherever and whenever I wanted and being able to leave the house a complete mess if I wanted to. Now, my days are filled with caring for my son, cleaning up after him, making sure heâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s fed on time and has all his meals, to folding laundry and ironing. Cooking, cleaning and cartoons are a big part of my day. These photos represent the rituals that I do on a daily basis, but also try to convey the state of mind that Iâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;m in and the constant need to keep going. I wanted to show the emotional state that I am in as well as show the viewer how I am still figuring out who I am and how to deal with the new life that I chose. These photographs I hope give just a little peek into my daily routine and the happy chaos that surrounds me.

Digital photography Series of 4

tara hallquist

cody lecoy Chelsea Lawrick: What do you think your art is about as a whole? Cody P. Lecoy: When I think of art in my life, it has really turned around my basis of thinking on a momentous scale. To create art is to consciously examine one’s thoughts that form beliefs and therefore the actions that follow. In this respect, I appreciate art for it has bridged dualistic thinking between mental and physical creation. Art as a regular practice in my life has brought balance. In the early stages, art starts with the concept. Inspirations arise from ideas of interest, inquiry into unknown territory of the mind that wants to be explored and felt for oneself, this experiential learning is key, I feel, in art making. Once the concept gains weight then it must be tested physically- the body is put into motion to construct this mental construction, the driving force behind the hands at work is the mental vision of the art in the mind’s eye. This goal of accomplishment fuels determination. A steady pulsating force pulls an individual closer to completing a work, finding a link between what is held in the mind and what is being made in front of the eyes. This approach can be applied in all arenas of life- having the awareness to create experience is quite transformative. Thematic elements of my work revolve around mind and body interconnectedness. CL: I know you used to work mostly in oil paints, and moved to acrylics. What medium do you like more and why? CPL: I much prefer painting with acrylics because it is well suited to my style of application. I like to work with layering images, building up from thin coats to a opaque finish. Also with thin coats transparency can be achieved, elements that I like to portray work well with this effect, such as shifting, transformative and transitioning

Survival Caught in a Glance 3’ x 3’ Acrylic on canvas

images, or images in motion. It is also less toxic, and I can work out of a home setting, without so much ventilation. CL: Tell us a bit about your recent award. What is it called, how did you apply for it, and what does it involve? CPL: I recently received an award through the YVR Art Foundation Scholarship program last spring. Over the course of one year, I will be working on a series of ten paintings for the Vancouver International Airport. Out of the ten, I will choose one that will be on display for the duration of one year. The application called for portfolio samples, a project proposal, budget plan along with reference letters. For this award, it called for applicants to be of First Nations ancestry, under 25 years old, along with producing art

that celebrates the art of the Northwest Coast. I fully appreciate the efforts of the foundation. The goal of the YVR Art Foundation is to break the stigma of Northwest coast art on display as artifacts- as objects that speak [only] to a history of the past. By showcasing emerging artists, voice is given [and shows] that the style is still very much alive and evolving. CL: What is it like receiving mentorship from a renowned artist like Lawrence Paul Yuxweluptin? CPL: Receiving mentorship from Lawrence has been extremely rewarding. He has been aroundpainting for so long that he can provide me with tips and tricks that would have taken me hours to finally figure out for

interview

Staring into the Sun 3’ x 4’ Acrylic on canvas

myself. These have been simple tips such as having variety with brush sizes, keeping palette colours fresh, using impasto techniques, allowing colours to mix on the canvas and tips about improving form line technique and composition. Although the discipline of Northwest coast form line is rigid, he advised me not to restrict myself in what I wish to portray, saying that

“everything is up for grabs” - there just has to be an accountability for what is produced. CL: What are you looking forward to most in the upcoming year? CPL: This year I am most excited for the upcoming May submission date. I am more than half way through the series

of ten paintings and the progress has been steady. Elements from each of the paintings will be incorporated in the final piece, and a more cohesive conceptual understanding of the art has been continually been elaborated upon rather than just producing work as technical studiesw

10” x 17” Collage on paper

vivianpencz.wordpress.com

vivian pencz • 1977

editorial Managing Editor [Claire Matthews]

Publishing Editor [Debbie Langtry]

Arts Editor [Chelsea Lawrick]

Feedback:

info@pulpmag.ca

Submissions:

submissions@pulpmag.ca Claire Matthews is a fourth-year History Major, Creative Writing Minor student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University and the Vice President of the Kwantlen Creative Writing Guild. Her genres of choice are poetry and fiction, though she dabbles in creative non-fiction on the occasion

Debbie Langtry is a fourthyear BFA student. She likes to explore the dynamics around culturally patterned behaviours, consumerism and environmental concerns. Most of her artwork is three-dimensional. Mixed media and experimentation are a huge part of her creative process.

Chelsea Lawrick is a fourth-year BFA student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University and the Co-Chair of the Kwantlen Fine Arts Collective. She has exhibited work in Surrey, Vancouver, Toronto, Australia and the UK, amongst others. She most commonly employs the mediums of painting and print making to create her work.

Assoc. Literary Editor [Connor Doyle]

Web Editor [Weronika Slowinski]

Assoc. Publishing Editor [Andres Salaz]

Assoc. Arts Editor [Rhea Paez]

Connor Doyle is a third year Creative Writing and English student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University. He is the President of the Creative Writing Guild. At the moment, he is engaged in a number of creative projects both in and outside of the school, including short fiction, poetry and slam/spoken word.

Weronika Slowinski is a third-year English Major student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University and is active member of the Kwantlen Creative Writing Guild. She explores fiction and poetry, but is not limited to literary endeavors. She enjoys graphic design, drawing, and paper crafts.

Andres Salaz is a fourth-year BFA student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University, and the Chair of the Kwantlen Fine Arts Collective, the Surreyalists. He is a painter influenced by the contrasts of the mysticism of primitive beliefs found in isolated towns around Mexico and the immediacy and superficiality of modern cities.

Rhea Paez is a fourth-year BFA student at Kwantlen Polytechnic University who aspires to be a practicing artist after finishing her degree. She creates art as a way to articulate the things that sometimes cannot be communicated through language. She believes that everyone from all walks of life is able to appreciate art.