american social ISSUE 0NE
A CREATIVE LIFESTYLE
PHOTO BY KHARA WOODS
MASTHEAD EDITOR
AMERICAN SOCIAL. It all started with a daydream, thinking about what I would be doing for the rest of my life. I realized I am surrounded by so much talent and creative people in my life that so many people know nothing about. That is something I wanted to change. And that’s the spark that started it all and American Social has begun. The heart of American Social is would essentially be how creativity transcends the individual. The heartbeat and the values would be about what is in a relationship with other creatives does for your creative brain as an individual. We build off of each other’s ideas, creating a much larger network of creative genius. And that’s the idea behind starting it. There is no competition is creativity. Everyone contributes. Its a commonplace of creatives, by creatives, for creatives. A commonplace all different creatives have a chance to showcase what they are doing. There is no limit in creativity and that is our goal to show that. We want people to see what others are doing and be inspired to do what they love. Everyone has their niche, you just have to find it.
MICHELLE SIMANCA EDITORS NOTE
Michelle Simanca
DESIGNER
Michelle Simanca
PHOTOS
Michelle Simanca, Chazlyn O’Bannon, Chris yang, Jordi Ganduxe, Pahala Basuki and Khara Woods
TA B L E O F C O N T E N T S 4
MUSIC
6
VISION
12
TRAVEL
16
PHOTOS
TIME TO Pursue ME FEATURING CHANTEL MUNSEY It all started with a voice memo. 743 voice memos. Singer/songwriter CHANTEL MUNSEY never expected anything to come out of a simple voice memo she recorded as she was aimlessly walking down the aisle in the supermarket one day. But as she decided it was time to stop pursuing things she felt were not benefiting and instead pursue the things she felt passionate about and that is when things started to change and opportunities began to open. Music has always been a common thread in Chantel’s life. As a young girl and growing up constantly being around church music and musical
theater, it revealed the love for the music she has always had but also gave her the talents to create her own. “I started writing songs as just melodies in my head, and in order to know and remember the melody, I started putting words to it. I would record it as a voice memo. In my phone and then later I would go back and fix words and make sense of them and my thoughts.” As she began to show them to her friends who showed their friends, things began to progress and transpire from that. Now a year later that voice memo is no longer just a voice memo but instead it is 3 EPs of her own which she plans to release later this May. Every artist has a process of the way they write music. When it comes to Chantel writing music, none of her songs are written after personal experiences or desires, she has but rather about a much bigger idea. “Every song that I write is about sex, breakups, falling in and out of love, unsuccessful love and ect. This is funny because this is not a direct representation of my life at all and these lyrics are not
about real people or real scenarios I have lived out. Rather my music is the sound of what is in my heart. Which is a deep empathic hurt for people who only experience carnal, physical, earthly unsuccessful love. They are either worship songs about a love that saves covers and overwhelms or they are about the opposite. A love that is carnal and uncertain.” It is no surprise to hear that one of her biggest musical inspirations is Kurt Cobain. Through her music and the way she carries and communicates herself there are definitely things they both share. She says “The character that he was and his love for people are what I find most inspiring”. She’s turning something that was always just a hobby into much more. And this is only the beginning for Chantel. She is driven, hard working and beyond passionate about she is doing. 2018 is her year as she already has planned to release of her own 3 EPs. STORY BY MICHELLE SIMANCA PHOTOS BY CHAZLYN O’BANNON
Vision Taking dreams from creative conversations to real life manifestations
What is vision? Vision is an idea of what you want something to be or look like. Vision is a future that you see past the here and now present day. But just because you imagine the greater future in your own headspace does not mean that it’s going to bring itself about. These ideas, these images, these solutions to the problems we see — when we have a revelation of these kinds of things in our minds, it’s not enough to just talk about them. These concepts have to hit the ground running, and someone has to be passionate about the why behind it all so that they can motivate and inspire others to bring or design the elements necessary for change or even original construction.
Casting vision is so much fun because you are able to dream about the future out loud in the now, and bask in all of the potential possibilities from a birds eye view, and then the most fun part of all is figuring out how you are going to bring it to life. A vision
people so these conversations in dreamland almost never run dry. The fun part is dreaming something so insanely huge and outside of my reach, and then breaking it down into baby steps and developing a plan that could actually take us to
seems so huge, and it is, because you’re having to pioneer something, meaning you are discovering and uncovering new information in order to move the vision forward. That’s a lot to think about, a lot to figure out. But it’s in the baby steps, and in the problem solving, and in the workable team of people you have who are equally passionate to bring something to life that will make the world as you know it a better place.
the place that SEEMS out of reach. The only reason it feels so out of reach is because it hasn’t been done before, so you really have to research and problem solve and think critically about how to attain the unknown. You have to develop strategies and ask any and every question you can think of. You have conversations with specialists in their field, people who will contribute to your frame of reference and grow your knowledge on various topics. Creative conversations with all kinds of different people lead to answers when a person with vision asks “how can this be done?”
For me personally, I love dreaming out loud. I love having creative conversations with my friends about creating and designing and making things. And I’m surrounded by creative
STORY BY MICHELLE SIMANCA
PHOTOS BY CHAZLYN O’BANNON
Travel & creativity STORY BY MICHELLE SIMANCA
One of the most amazing things that we can experience is having the opportunity to travel. It opens our eyes to things we’ve never seen before new people, new food a new way of life. It reveals something about us that we may have never even noticed, the urge to never stop discovering for being happy exactly where you are. When it comes to creativity and traveling, It ignites the creative spark within us even when we think we may have lost it. As Nicolas Cole wrote, “CREATIVITY IS A FICKLE FRIEND.
PHOTO BY CHUTTERSNAP
ONE DAY, SHE’S MADLY IN LOVE WITH YOU. THE NEXT, SHE CAN BE STANDOFFISH AND SHY, OR FRUSTRATED WITH YOU ALL TOGETHER. IT’S THE REASON SO MANY ARTISTS AND CREATIVE COMPLAIN OF THINGS LIKE “WRITER’S BLOCK.” THOSE ARE THE DAYS CREATIVITY WON’T RETURN YOUR CALLS, AND IF SHE DOES, REFUSES TO CRACK A SMILE.”
Everyone has their moments, days, and even months Where creativity can be an all time low or perhaps something we think we lost. And it’s just something that we have to pay more attention to. I’ll we need is inspiration. And this is why traveling is great for creativity. Sometimes all we need is to go outside, Get away and experience new things. Traveling stimulates our brain in ways our day to day life does not. We experience new things and new surroundings that helps us identify who we are as a person and as a creative.
Traveling for creative is essential because the culture is different everywhere. So what is trendy or fashionable or common well known in one place could be completely different or offensive in another place. Creativity is what brings us together so we need to have a common language. So it is essential to travel and become familiar with other costumes and culture. Let yourself step outside of your comfort zone and the word that you know and step into someone else’s and a paradigm shift to bring you a immense creativity. And inspire you in a different way than you have been before.
CAMBODIA
PHOTO BY JORDI GANDUXE
INDONESIA
PHOTO BY PAHALA BASUKI
JAPAN
PHOTO BY CHRIS YANG
a chat with photographer chazlyn o'bannon
WHERE DID YOU GROW UP? I grew up in a small town outside of Seattle, Washington. My family loved taking photos, they loved capturing memories. we have a ton of pictures in our house, a ton of when we were kids and growing up. We also have a lot of videos and home videos. Their love of capturing moments and capturing memories definitely influenced and made me love it too. WHEN DID YOU FIRST REALIZE YOU WERE INTERESTED IN PHOTOGRAPHY? I think I started taking photography in art form my freshman year of college. My friend Nelson but I came back from a missions trip and he noticed that I had a good natural eye. So since then I just began to develop it and ever since then I love taking photos. WHO ARE SOME OF YOUR FAVORITE PHOTOGRAPHERS? Joe Greer is a given. My favorite photographer is also a painter and a graphic designer, Alexander Rodchenko. His work was really big in the 1920s-1930s. He’s sort of revolutionized the idea of photography. WHERE DO YOU FIND INSPIRATION? Anywhere. It could be from a poem I read or something I saw driving, or even somebody’s shoes. It could be from what
someone says, I think inspiration could be found anywhere. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE SUBJECT TO SHOOT? I love shooting people. I love shooting people out doing whatever. Not specifically portraits, but street photography and travel. WHEN DID YOU FIRST PICK UP A CAMERA? The first camera I picked up was my freshman year, and it was actually a film
camera. So I did not do digital for about 5 months or so, I always did film. As I read everywhere that learning on film helps you develop your eye because you only have 32 shots. You only have 32 chances to make whatever you are looking at to come to life. So I think the film definitely helped me develop my eye. IS THERE ONE THING YOU WISH YOU WOULD HAVE KNOWN WHEN YOU FIRST STARTED TAKING PHOTOGRAPHS? I wish I knew that one day someone is going to offer to pay you. And to probably figure out how much your art is worth. Also to know that not everyone is going to find what you find beautiful, beautiful. Some people are just not going to get it and that’s okay.
WHAT HAS BEEN YOUR FAVORITE SHOOT UP UNTIL NOW? I think I would say I have 3 top favorite shoots. One that I really loved is one I did at Florida Polytechnic. Its a pretty common place for people to take photos, but I just loved how they turned out. That is the first time I looked at my photos and thought, wow these are actually really good. My second favorite shoot was would be the one I shot with my roommate. It was different because we styled the whole shoot and that was the first shoot that I did that I got to control the situation. And my third one is any of trips ever been on and my travel photography. Those are the photos that I look back at the most. There is so many stories and memories behind them WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE PART ABOUT THE CREATIVE PROCESS OF PHOTOGRAPHY? There is so much that goes into the planning, execution the finished process and the sharing the work. I feel like I love the process as a whole. Theres ups and downs of each side of the process. There’s ups and downs to planning a shoot. It could go your way great or totally could not. Same with the finished process and sharing your work. I don’t think I could pick a favorite part because I just fell in love with the whole process. STORY BY MICHELLE SIMANCA PHOTOS BY CHAZLYN O’BANNON
american social