Overcoat Issue Two: Work

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Covers: 300gsm Maine Recycled Silk Body: 130gsm Maine Recycled Silk Typeset in Whitney Overcoat is an independent production publication. The articles appearing within this publication reflect the opinions of their respective authors and are not necessarily those of the publishers or editorial team.

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Editor: Alexandra Gibson Designer: Pete Saunders Illustrator: Sam Lyne Cover: Dr. Shane Liddelow — Fluorescent hair of the South American opossum as seen under UV light. This small marsupial native to Brazil has hair that naturally glows in the dark. hello@undercoat.net www.undercoat.net

contributors Dr. Gary Greenberg (University of Hawaii) Kate Holden (University of Melbourne) Caitlin Richardson (University of Tasmania) Myriam Robin (University of Adelaide/RMIT) Dr. Krystyna Saunders (University of Tasmania/University of Bern) Anna Leah Seltzer (University of California Santa Barbara)

illustrators Chris Edser (University of South Australia) Kelly Halpin (Art Center College of Design) Philippa Kruger (University of South Australia) Loretta Lizzio (GCIT Coomera Tafe) Alex Newton Max Thompson (Auckland University of Technology) Freya Tripp (Charles Darwin University)

additional images Ben Callahan (The College of Santa Fe) Darren James Tatiana Krasovski (University of California Los Angeles) Cecilia Kunstadter (University of Colorado) Ben Wheaton (University of Melbourne) Overcoat is an online publication that aims to share the highest standard of work being produced in creative and professional fields from different institutions globally. It is a platform designed to inspire and connect students and alumni within their own community and with like-minded people around the world. If you would like to contribute work to Overcoat, please send us an email.

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work/editor Since the release of our first issue, we’ve gone through a few changes.

As our Design Editor, Pete Saunders recently published on Undercoat, “The reason for the change is straightforward: due to our name, United Airlines threatened us with legal action due to the similarity of our titles.”

As Pete outlined, while we were initially horrified at the prospect of rebranding our publication, it gave us the opportunity to scrutinize our product and redefine our concept. Recently, we’ve been inspired by the story of Art Paul, Playboy’s Art Director. Pete had the pleasure of attending this year’s agIdeas design conference, where Paul spoke of how he had begun making a name for himself as a freelance illustrator, when Hugh Hefner turned up at his door with an idea for a project named “Stag Party”. As Paul divulged in a recent interview for The Saturday Age, he believed the name would limit their publication.

Much to their eventual advantage, another publication called Stag threatened Hefner with legal action due to the similarities in their names and Playboy was born.

Paul’s success due to his decision to follow his passion for creativity really resonates with us. From humble beginnings, Paul went from freelance illustrator to being credited with starting the Illustration Liberation Movement, working with a caliber of artists including Andy Warhol, Salvador Dali, and Tom Wesselman. This also illustrates one of the main motivators of this magazine: passions should transpire into professions. We want Overcoat Magazine to create exposure for the breadth of possibility to turn creativity into livelihood. Hence, the theme of this issue is “Work” and we’re excited to present to you the variation of what that means within creative fields. Dr Gary Greenberg from the University of Hawaii presents his work in photography with the images he takes of sand, some from the moon, through a microscope. Costume designer, Anna Selzer, talks us through the good and the bad of working on a blockbuster Hollywood film. Author Kate Holden gives an interview about the blurring line between life and work in the world of prostitution and writing memoirs, just to name a few.

The trajectory into a creative field is rarely as linear as Art Paul’s, as this issue clearly demonstrates. However, we hope to have inspired you to invest your time in mapping one out regardless and follow a passion, rather than a 9 to 5.

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Contents 09/ the business of journalism

myriam robin 13/ the far-gone south dr krystyna saunders 25/ a grain of sand dr gary greenberg 33/ a thin line kate holden 45/ the illustrators various 61/ at the table caitlin richardson 65/ ‘hollywood’ to the rest of us anna leah seltzer

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the business of journalism

Selling out for the corporates. myriam robin university of adelaide/rmit

Early mornings don’t agree with me, but this year, I’ve been trying to foster the friendship.

For you see, I’ve sold out. I’ve joined the ranks of the corporate world.

I get up at 7am every morning and reach an office in Melbourne’s central business district by 8am. As a business journalist, I try, like all journalists, to be impartial, fair, fearless and insightful. But let’s not get too idealistic. The truth is I provide a professional service: information, for people to whom staying informed is a professional necessity.

I’m lucky. I have a writing job that pays. One that lets me improve my understanding of the world, one that stretches my skills to breaking point. This wasn’t my first choice, but it’s one I’m increasingly happy with.

But I miss my mid-morning breakfasts and late-night writing sessions.

So I’ve written this for the dreamers among you. The ones who want to write about the arts, politics, philosophy or international relations.

The ones who’ve yet to join the daily grind. Corporate Australia is a strange place, so if any young writers out there are considering becoming purveyors of this world, you’re going to need some help.

Consider me your guide.

My days start with a meeting. This is the case in most newsrooms, but if you’re a business journalist, your meetings are more likely to be a roundup of the business stories you plan to follow up.

The good thing about business journalism is that the building blocks are provided for you. You don’t have to snoop around too hard for a serviceable story. The stock market’s reporting guidelines provide enough for you to go on.

Neither do you have to work too hard on finding people to interview.

For you see, business people often view journalists as providers of free publicity. Hell, they pay publicists to try and cajole you into writing about them.

Of course, if your story is at all controversial, or if you’re trying to get one of those very busy big-shot CEOs, you may have more trouble. In this case, you can fall back on the glittering world of consultants, disgruntled shareholders and academics to provide you with expert comment. Once you get that, then call the person you’re trying to write about to offer a ‘right of reply’. You’ll have more luck doing it in that order.

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Once you have your story, it’s time to sit down and write it up. Here, you would do well to invest in a business dictionary. Make sure you know all the jargon, but don’t use it in your piece. Interrogate the weasel words, translate the jargon and tighten up the long ambling phrases. You’re gonna be dealing with complex concepts, so don’t feel the need to quote extensively. There’ll be times when you’ll need to attribute but reword to keep the energy of your piece up.

Of course, some business people speak in perfectly catching soundbites. You’ll know them when you hear them.

But be careful. There’s not really much room for gutter journalism, or even just general sloppiness in business. That’s because the people you deal with today are very likely to be the same people you deal with tomorrow. As a business journalist, or indeed any reporter with a set round, you have to look upon everyone you meet as a potential contact.

This can be stressful, but it’s not a bad standard to hold oneself to.

When you’re in the office, the world of business journalism can look largely similar to a lot of other journalism. But everything’s different once you go to a conference.

I’ll be honest, these events have challenged me. I’m twenty-two and I look it. It’s terrifying being in a room with lots of fifty-year-old men and perfectly dressed thirty-year-olds. I’m not sure which I find more intimidating — the old hacks or the young guns.

Luckily, as a journalist I don’t have to be as well-dressed. They all know I wouldn’t be making much money anyway. A bit of effort doesn’t go astray though, neither does a handful of well-distributed business cards.

You’ll probably be provided with some business cards when you show up in your new clothes to any office job. You might think in an age where you can find someone’s entire resume just by knowing their name, business cards would be out-dated. They’re not. People give them out all the time. And it’s considered bad manners not to have any on you, so apologise when you leave them in a pile on your desk after taking photos of them on your mobile and posting them on Facebook with an “I haz grown up” status.

Also, when you’re at a conference, don’t worry if everyone seems to know each other. Business people are experts at casual conversation.

So just butt into a conversation circle and introduce yourself. No one will bat an eyelid.

Weird, I know.

it’s terrifying being in a room with lots of fifty-year-old men and perfectly dressed thirty-year-olds. i’m not sure which i find more intimidating — the old hacks or the young guns.

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the far-gone south

Exploring the bottom of lakes to help piece together the history of our ecosystems. dr krystyna saunders university of tasmania/university of bern

Got blown off my feet today — literally. There was nothing I could do about it. I was running effortlessly uphill with a heavy pack on my back. I started to move faster and faster up the hill without expending any extra energy.

As I reached the crest of the hill, I was picked up by the wind and thrown several metres forward. I could feel it starting to happen. It’s an amazing feeling being blown around and not being able to do anything about it.

Where am I and what am I doing here?

I am on Macquarie Island, which is a small (35km long, 5km wide) island at 53 degrees South in the Southern Ocean, approximately halfway between Tasmania and Antarctica. It is at the equivalent latitude of northern England or Canada, but it is a very different environment.

I am a palaeolimnologist, which means I study past lake environments — or as I often tell friends — I study the layers of sediment that accumulate on the bottom of lakes over time. Each layer represents a particular period of time and contains different biological, chemical and physical information, reflecting what the lake’s ecosystems, surrounding catchment and the climate would have been like at the time that layer was at the sediment surface. By collecting a tube of sediment from the bottom of the lake and analysing each layer, it is possible to piece together the different ecosystems and climates that were present in the past and see how they have developed into what we see today. There are many different ways to collect sediment cores, but the most common practice we use is to take two small rubber boats out into the centre (or deepest part) of a lake and tie them together to create a stable platform. The boats are held in position by ropes that are anchored to the shore. We lower the corer (which is basically a heavy weight with a plastic tube attached to the bottom of it) to the bottom of the lake and hammer or push the tube into the sediment. When the tube is full and/or we cannot hammer it in any further, we pull it back up and the sediment core is contained within the plastic tube. This is transported back to the lab where it is sectioned and analysed.

We know much less about what the past climates were like in the Southern Hemisphere, compared to the Northern Hemisphere.

This limits our understanding of global climate change and makes it even more challenging to accurately predict what is going to happen 14

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in the future. This is partly because much of the Southern Hemisphere is ocean, particularly between 40 and 60 째S. However, there are a few remote islands that have lakes and other landscape features that provide insights into past climates and ecosystems.

My work takes me to some incredibly beautiful, remote, isolated locations. I feel very lucky to go to these places, which makes me even more motivated to try and understand them. Part of my motivation is also because I love spending time in these types of locations.

Every aspect of working in these locations is a mix of challenge and adventure, which starts as soon as we leave and does not end until we return. We access these islands by sea. The Southern Ocean is notoriously rough. I often wedge myself into my bunk with life jackets, blankets and whatever else I can find to stay stable. To get to Macquarie Island usually involves leaving from Hobart, Tasmania, and we either travel directly there, which takes four days, or go via Antarctica as part of the Australian Antarctic Program. This can take 10 days or longer and is an amazing voyage. After spending several days in large swells, a genuine feeling of excitement fills the ship as someone spots the first iceberg. Eventually we travel through thick sea ice and the pervading sound of the ship being pounded by the sea is replaced by cracking ice as it slowly moves forwards by breaking through it. When we arrive at our destination (usually an Antarctic Station) there is a changeover of personnel and re-supply of the Station. This takes a couple of days, after which we turn around, head back through the sea ice and icebergs, out into the Southern Ocean and make our way to Macquarie Island.

Arriving at Macquarie Island is a sensory overload, even if you have been there before. The mix of abundant wildlife and scenery together with the wet, windy and cold conditions is overwhelming. The wildlife is amazing, both in terms of type and sheer quantity. The coastline is filled with hundreds of seals and penguins, while albatrosses commonly soar through the air.

One of the biggest challenges working in the sub-Antarctic is the weather. The wind is often 100 km/hr or faster on Macquarie Island.

As a general rule of thumb, once the wind reaches in knots the same number as your body weight, you can no longer stand up. Often, we

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find ourselves walking at a 30 degree angle, leaning into the wind, trying to keep moving forwards. Surviving in these conditions means trying to keep relatively warm. Our standard gear for working on the lakes involves thermal top and bottoms, two layers of fleece on top, one or two on the bottom, a down vest, sometimes a down jacket if it is particularly cold, a balaclava, thick windproof hat, two pairs of gloves and a dry suit.

In the case of Campbell Island, one of the greatest challenges is the vegetation. It often takes over three hours to move just 500m, because the scrub is so dense. We also require a lot of equipment for working on the lakes, including two rubber boats, all of which weighs approximately 200kg and is generally carried by us on foot.

There is a sense of achievement that comes with successful fieldwork somewhere remote in these kinds of conditions. It can be isolating, working on a tiny spec of land in the middle of the Southern Ocean, knowing the only human life nearby is the 20 or so people at the main base a few kilometres away. However, it is because of this that many unique friendships and bonds form between people. It would be impossible to do this type of fieldwork without the continual effort, support and help of all involved.

The projects that we undertake have the same overall goal: to further develop our understanding of these ecosystems, environment and climate. Climates and ecosystems are constantly changing. They respond to many different factors, both natural and human-induced.

To be able to understand how they are changing, why and what the implications are for the future, it is important to understand what happened in the past and how we got to where we are today. It is this, together with the locations themselves and what it is like to work there, that has led me to these places and I am always looking forward to the next time I get to explore these wonderful, remote environments.

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a grain of sand

The beauty of nature through the lens of a high-powered microscope. dr gary greenberg university of hawaii

Scientist/artist/inventor, Gary Greenberg, uses his special 3D microscopes to create spectacular landscapes of worlds beyond our everyday perception. Initially a photographer and filmmaker, at the age of 33, he moved from Los Angeles to London to earn a Ph.D. in biomedical research from the University of London. Dr Greenberg was an Assistant Professor at the University of Southern California during the 1980’s. In 1990, he co-founded Edge-3D where he developed high-definition, three-dimensional light microscopes, for which he was issued eighteen US patents. Dr Greenberg is currently a faculty member at the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy in Maui, where he studies moon sand, collected during NASA’s Apollo missions.

Dr Greenberg’s mission is to reveal the secret beauty of the microscopic landscape that makes up our everyday world. Greenberg shows us that the miracles of nature are tangible, and they can be seen directly through the microscope. When we commune with nature, we become conscious of our connection with the universe.

Dr Greenberg focuses his microscopes on ordinary objects, such as grains of sand, flowers and food. These everyday objects take on a new reality when magnified hundreds of times, illuminating hidden secrets of nature. He shows us that ordinary objects are truly extraordinary when seen closely. Dr Greenberg’s images of sand makes us realise that as we walk along a beach we are strolling upon thousands of years of biological and geological history.

He has authored a number of fascinating books including: A Grain of Sand: Nature’s Secret Wonder, (2008); A Bug’s Eye View of Flowers, (2010); Florotica: Revealing the Sensuality of the Micro World, (2010); and, a children’s book, Mary’s Magic Microscope, (2011).

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a thin line

An interview with Kate Holden: a writer, who happened to take heroin and work in the sex industry for a while. kate holden university of melbourne

Kate Holden finds the terms “prostitute” and “heroin addict” harsh, but understands they are perfectly accurate. Even though today she’s a writer and a lecturer of non-fiction writing at RMIT University, those former terms still tend to find their way into descriptions of her; it is a way for society to neatly frame her into a convenient context.

Kate sprung to notoriety in 2005 when she wrote In My Skin, a refreshingly honest, and in some ways, shocking memoir of her alarmingly easy fall from Melbourne University graduate into drug-use, and consequently, prostitution.

In 2010 she published her second book, The Romantics which details her readjustment into society as she travels to Italy with romantic ideals and an intention of finding a reformed currency for relationships.

Today, Kate is happily coupled and living in Melbourne. It’s a bizarre experience talking to a complete stranger you feel you know so well, due to her published work. She speaks in a delicate, pointedly articulate fashion; the musical intonation of her voice is one of a storyteller — it quietens at the end of sentences as if she is reading a children’s book.

There is nothing “harsh” about her, until she says “fuck” or “vagina”, two words that sound totally out of place among others I admit left me searching for a dictionary. Here, she talks about the blurring line between her life and her work in the world of prostitution and writing memoirs, and are they all that different?

When you were first introduced to heroin, what do you think it was you found so attractive?

I’d always been aware of the mystic around heroin. It was very much an element in the

lives of people that I had admired, like Billie Holiday and Kurt Cobain and in the 90s when I was getting into it, the people taking it were very artistic and imaginative. There’s a real legendary status around those people who were very gifted, but used. The majority of people that get addicted to heroin, over all other drugs, are people who are very much dreamers.

I was also really attracted to my boyfriend who was an artist, so I felt like that was part of the deal. Being involved in arty crowds [laughs].

And I suppose I started thinking that heroin was something that would take me somewhere new.

I saw it as a test of my courage and my maturity.

The people I started using with were just a little bit younger than I was and weirdly enough that didn’t make me think they were immature, it made me think, they’re more mature than I am.

So if they could do it, why couldn’t I? And I think when you’re young, you often feel like life is a series of tests of your courage — can you move out of home, can you go overseas for the first time, can you learn to drive a car — they’re all part of the deal of growing up. I didn’t have the courage to learn how to drive [laughs], but I did have the nerve to try heroin.

I’d just finished my honours degree and instead of feeling like a grownup with a firm idea of where I was going in the world with the qualifications to take me there, I was 24-yrs-old and I had an arts degree in classics and literature, which wasn’t going to take me anywhere [laughs].

If somebody had told you, when you started using, the course your life would take for the next 15 years, what do you think your response would have been?

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[Laughs] I would have been fairly astonished!

If anyone had said in 10 years I would be someone who wrote publicly and often about my sex-life, that would have astonished me, because I couldn’t even say “vagina”. It’s not that I was prudish, I was just shy.

Often you are introduced in some derivative of “Kate Holden, former heroin-addicted prostitute”. How does that make you feel?

Well, it’s perfectly true. That’s exactly what I am and I’m not ashamed to be identified as that, but they’re rather harsh, brutal words.

I think the time will come when I actually ask that people don’t use that description of me, not because I’m resiling from those attributes, but just because I am a lot more than that and even at the time that I was a sex worker, I never identified myself primarily as a sex worker or a heroin addict, because that’s only something that you do, it’s not who you are. And I’m a writer. When I was at university, I always thought I’d be introduced as “Kate Holden, our new librarian” [laughs].

You have had two main professions, prostitution and writing. Both have resulted in an intense exposure of your personal life. Where does the boundary exist for you between work and life?

I guess I’m a bit of an over-sharer, because I am unnerved by certain subjects like sex, and I think the best way to handle my discomfort is to actually just ride right through it. I know if I’m embarrassed by it, other people are as well and it’s probably better we all just get over that embarrassment. I was so fascinated when I was developing sexually. I would talk about it with my friends and say, “you’ll never guess what I did last night!” and it was almost as if it wasn’t

happening to me; there was something very scientific about it. I brought that into my sex work persona: I knew that my clients were very nervous and that my job was to make them feel better, and one of the ways I could do that was to be very matter of fact about everything, including myself. I would say, “I’m a perfectly normal girl and I’m going home after this to do the dishes”, [laughs]. I think sometimes the connection you can make with another human being is based on a recognition of similarities.

That’s what I tried to do when I began writing my memoirs, because I didn’t want to feel like I was an outsider. I wanted to feel like I was a really normal person who had this experience and since publishing In My Skin I’ve had hundreds of letters from people saying, “your story is my story”. It’s a really powerful thing licensing people to talk about their experiences by putting your hand up first. But, I hope that as I become older, I’m becoming slightly more discreet [laughs]. Not boring, just maybe a bit more discreet.

What personal cost has that come at?

You’ll have to ask my shrink [laughs]. I guess I’ve made myself into an outsider again., in the sense that, if I go out in public or I meet people who’ve read my books they know lots more about me than I know about them and, because of the subject matter of my books, people probably have quite a sexualised image of me and I’m not a particularly sexual person.

I don’t dress very sexually, I’m really frumpy.

I mean, the positives are huge, but I’m aware that I’ve kind of categorised my own privacy, to make a commodity, to be really blunt about it. And in a way, it’s not that different to being a sex worker [laughs].

…if you’d asked me before i was a sex worker, i probably would have said that i think it is inherently degrading. it’s a whole lot of men shoving their penis’ into women against their inclination and then paying them as if that makes it ok.

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How do you deal with criticism or feedback?

In a sense, people critiquing your work are critiquing your life. Is that how it feels?

Yeah, it does [laughs]. Which is weird, because it’s usually people who’ve never met me. I often think they’ve misread my books or they haven’t read them at all. The first one, I mostly got really good press, but every now and then someone on a blog would say, “what a spoilt, slutty, middle-class bitch… what a brat. She went off slumming-it and then she came out of it really rich and went off to Italy.” I mean, my family was never rich and people weirdly assumed that I went to private schools. I certainly wasn’t famously rich and went off to be a princess in Italy — I went to Italy to have a nervous breakdown! And I never thought, “Oh I’ve had enough, I might get out of drugs.” I often think people have got frames that they want to shove me into, so I got framed as the nice, middle-class girl who went to the underworld and came out again. I can see that’s a really available narrative, but that’s exactly what I was trying to write against.

It’s quite hurtful when people say really vicious things about you personally. I think the idea that people who put themselves out there in public are then up for slating in every direction is completely unfair. You don’t sign a contract.

There’s no one point where you walk through a door and say, “ok, I’m now public property and I’ve decided to sign away all my rights.” When I wrote my book I thought about 10 people would read it.

asked me before I was a sex worker, I probably would have said that I think it is inherently degrading. It’s a whole lot of men shoving their penis’ into women against their inclination and then paying them as if that makes it ok. Not to say that’s wrong, but I think the problem with that attitude is it’s very general. The reality of a woman like myself, in a first world country with legal protection, is so much more specific.

I actually didn’t feel exploited in general.

I went everywhere from the streets to a really good brothel, so there were certainly points in between that I would have held to the first attitude I had [laughs], but overall by the time I finished, I thought that that attitude was wrong. I’m now much more on the side of pro-sex work feminist activists. A lot of sex workers are incredibly brave, strong women, who do an incredibly challenging and difficult job and rather than making them victims, I think that makes them real heroes.

I believe legal protection, in tandem with social acceptance, is really important. I’m incredibly frustrated by the hypocrisy that goes on around dialogues of sex work. It’s still a subject that makes people very uneasy. People want to think of sex workers as “other”, whereas it’s actually completely surrounding us and it’s “our” people, “our” community that does it and uses it. To constantly focus on the women themselves who work in the industry is very unhelpful and an almost anti-feminist thing to do.

What was your interpretation of sex workers before and after you were one yourself?

It’s hard, because it’s one of those real divides.

What does sex work really offer people who have only known and believe in long-term relationships, other than fear?

I was brought up as a feminist. I studied feminist studies at university and if you’d

That’s the thing though, men who have been married for a long time, who have a stable,

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conventional, socially ratified relationship, are interestingly the men that go to brothels. And their wives are the women most fascinated by my story. I think they are threatened, but equally drawn to it.

Did you feel any responsibility knowing you were having sex with someone else’s husband or did you not see that as part of your job?

I think at the time, I definitely did think it wasn’t part of my job. Obviously I did think, “this man is married to someone else and she doesn’t know that he’s here,” but I really didn’t think it was my problem. I was a bit like a mechanic who doesn’t ask too many questions about a car — I just fixed the car [laughs]. I was also very aware that my clients had rights to their privacy. It really wasn’t up to me to ask them about their marriage, unless they wanted to talk and some of them did.

To be honest, I absolutely, sincerely think that if my husband went off and had sex with someone else I would rather it was with a sex worker. Sex workers are generally some of the most sexually healthy and discreet people in the community. I’m not naïve and I know that men do like to have sex with lots of people — for men, it’s often very difficult to be monogamous, for whatever reason that is. I just think it’s healthier that there are sexually available, discreet and safe services.

So I would feel for a wife, but I think the sex worker is not causing the infidelity.

In In My Skin you write about co-worker Heidi, a lesbian that claimed not being attracted to men made her job easier, because she could “enjoy men’s company without becoming emotionally engaged”. Was this a challenge for you?

Yeah, but it wasn’t a challenge, it was a privilege. I probably took the risk of becoming more emotionally engaged than some of my colleagues, because I was very lonely and I really appreciated that human contact as much as my clients did. I had a boyfriend, but we had a very difficult relationship and I was really isolated from my friends and family — I didn’t have time to see anyone, I worked so hard. So I really cherished the chance to have emotional relationships with my clients, probably a little bit too much. There was one client who told me he wasn’t going to come and see me anymore.

I don’t think I was being creepy to him, he was just being careful. But I really liked him and he could tell that and that wasn’t what he was there for. I’ve still got a teddy-bear that he gave me as a farewell gift. In fact it’s right next to me.

It’s the saddest bear in the world [laughs].

What happens in a brothel room is quite amazing — you have two people who feel safe, who have no clothes on, with have fake names and there are no windows. That room has the potential to become a chamber for such intimacy. I thought that was an incredible phenomenon and I was really lucky to access it.

Why do you think brothels focused on serving a female cliental aren’t nearly as popular?

Yeah, why indeed! I haven’t really looked into it much, but the last I heard it was very expensive for women to access sexual services.

I think Judith Lucy did a show where she talked about how she’d booked a male prostitute and she paid $600 for two hours! That’s more than a man would pay.

I also got the idea that her service was mostly about talking and massage and then half an

that room has the potential to become a chamber for such intimacy. i thought that was an incredible phenomenon and i was really lucky to access it.

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hour of sex at the end. I suppose the idea is that women like intimacy and foreplay and an emotional connection, and sex is their secondary concern, which may or may not be true. I guess it comes down to the fact that men simply couldn’t do that many jobs in one night. They just couldn’t catch up, so they have to charge more I suppose.

The Romantics follows the journey you took of shifting your mindset from selling sex back to love-making. Do you think you accomplished that?

Yeah, that’s very much how I see the narrative of the book. That’s why I wanted to write it, because I think it’s a move a lot of women make — that transition between love-making and just fucking. There are times women have casual sex and times they’re deeply in love.

All of those negotiations between who has the power and who are you when you’re doing either? Are you stronger when you’re just fucking or when you’re vulnerable and making love? Those are all the questions that really interested me.

It’s also a story about men and just how frightened they are. I say frightened as opposed to what complete pricks they are [laughs]. I would rather think it’s because they’re nervous. I mean all of the characters in the book are romantics, each one of us desperately wants to have a loving and romantic time and each one of us is so frightened that we’ll fuck it up, for whatever reason. Everyone is trying.

A lot the issues you encounter are not unlike the issues many people encounter in their own relationships, it’s just that you’ve taken it to the extreme.

[Laughs] That’s right! It’s not just, “yes I’ve had lots of boyfriends,” it’s “I’ve had thousands!”

Have your family read your books?

Yeah they have! My mum read both, but she forgot that it was about me, because she was so enthralled [laughs]. Both of them read The Romantic. I told them they didn’t have to, especially my dad, but he insisted. I told him I could give him a copy with all the sexy bits taken out, but he wanted to read it all and they both didn’t really blink an eye. They were very cool about it. I mean, it’s a horror really!

You don’t want your parents hearing about you having sex!

You’re lecturing non-fiction to first years at RMIT. How do your students respond to your past?

Well, I have no teacher training at all, but I’m not sure it exists for when a male student in my class says, “I’m going to read your book.” I say things like, “don’t feel you have to”. There’s no protocol for that! I just go on the fact that they all seem to be fine about it. Quite a lot of my students read my book last year and they all said they really liked it and didn’t seem to think much that they knew all about their teacher having sex. I think it’s weirder for me than it is for them. It’s good, because it means I can teach them about memoirs and they know that I know what I’m talking about.

Photography: Darren James.

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the illustrators

Spectating on the development of characters by those who bring them to life.

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chris edser Whether it’s for illustration or art-pieces, the most important part of the process is generating an idea. Sketching, planning and research are all crucial. For this project, I was looking to adapt one of my illustrated characters into a woodcarving. Trying to re-create the hair texture in three-dimensions was the biggest challenge, but first I had to roughly carve-out a fairly lumpy shape, to turn a drawing into a sculpture with a degree of anatomy. The woodcarving was finished with beaded eyes and a clear varnish to bring out the texture.

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kelly halpin I absolutely love drawing. I believe creating art is a way to filter your imagination through to the outside world and you never really know what to expect! It’s very exciting! Most of my subject matter includes bones, trees, hearts and strange creatures. I love displaying nature in a twisted or surreal way. I generally use micro pens, ink wash, and Prismacolour marker, but on rare occasions I’ll paint with acrylic or watercolors. The piece I’ve included was done with black and white pens and Prismacolour marker on cardboard.

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philippa kruger My illustrative strengths lie in combining detailed pen and ink line drawings with digital collage. This design process allows me to incorporate an array of fabrics and textures into my work, resulting in the perception of handmade illustration and design. This process allows me to work in simple, logical steps, in order to successfully complete each illustration.

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loretta lizzio I first pencil the image onto the wood. I tape off and cut around the area I wish to spray paint. I have the most fun with this part!

Peeling back the tape reveals a nice, clean-cut white image. I then draw with pencil over the top. This is hard on wood and I have to sharpen my pencil with almost every stroke; the wood grinds the lead away in seconds. The process is time consuming and it’s much harder to get detail when the wood is rough or coarse. I then seal the drawing and wood with a clear, usually matt finish spray. Complete!

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alex newton My drawing is self-taught. I’ve learnt techniques and styles from my idols, like Olivia de Berardinis, David Downton, George Barbier, Jean-Gabriel Domergue and Erte.

I start with an idea — a dress, a drape or a pose — which I scribble onto my hand-pad, then sketch with a pencil. The picture takes on a Ganesh-like quality, as I decide where an arm will sit or what kind of hat should be worn. I outline the sketch in 0.05mm fine liner pen and rub out the pencil.

Then I colour and decorate.

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max thompson My process is not too dissimilar to any other illustrator — it starts with an idea. The idea turns to thumbnails and sketches, slowly forming into a concept. The concept gets tidied up; references are gathered and implemented.

Painting commences, whereupon I normally have a minor breakdown and start again.

I finish up the painting by adding all the fancy sparkles and swishes. Usually, I look back a few days later with fresh eyes and redo half of it.

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freya tripp The work isn’t really about anything in a narrative or illustrative sense. I use oil paint to create illusions. Using grotesque distortion and carnivalesque juxtaposition, I create work based on my dreams about the world and the potential for the artistic practice to engage with complicated issues therein. I omit certain elements or include something incongruous in an attempt to incite questions in the viewer; a question mark seems intrinsically more interesting than a full stop.

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at the table

Dinner: described using an oft-forgotten art form. caitlin richardson university of tasmania

Kitchen tables are simple objects and yet they often provide the setting for intense private experiences. In Sestina and Skin I’ve used poetry to create two kitchen table encounters. There’s something about poetry that lends itself to this kind of exploration. At their most spare and fleeting, poems capture a single moment or an image, a furtive glimpse through a window. Through this concentrated focus, poetry has helped me to appreciate the drama in ordinary everyday life.

I’ve always imagined that for real poets, writing poetry is an effortless activity. For me, it’s hard work. I remember struggling for nights and days over a poem for a writing class. When I finally read it to the class, it took less than thirty seconds. All the words I’d carefully arranged — gone in a few breaths. But when I’d finished and others began sharing their work, a powerful sense of connection grew in the group. No one said much, but there was an understanding between us. Poems are only small bundles of words, but they carry so much energy, devotion and feeling with them. That’s what makes them precious.

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sestina The mother always lays the table

set deep in her hollow face, wide round eyes

with thick white serviettes, just in case. A plate

like a baby’s eyes, and it breaks her heart to see carrots

placed beside each crisp triangle, baby carrots

become fear served up on a plate,

bright against the china. ‘Nice carrots’ the mother

the fear that grows and eats her daughter,

says, but no answer comes. Only eyes

leaving shadows beneath her cheekbones, the table

rolling at her from across the table, the daughter

still, life waiting elsewhere. The mother

is communicating at least. The daughter

shakes and remembers her own mother

sits upright in her chair, the table

who carried them through storms long ago, but her eyes

misses her hands reaching for seconds. Now her eyes

are tired of charades around the table,

cast down at the neat assembly on her plate,

the dizzying rounds ‘they’re just fucking carrots’

arms tucked at her sides. The mother

she says, too tired to care. The daughter

eats too fast again, shovelling carrots

doesn’t look up, her hands flinch but the plate

like she’s eating for two, as if hoping digested carrots

remains untouched, the plate

still made their way through a cord to her daughter,

growing cold, steam fading. The mother

to fill the hole in both of them. But the mother

knows they’re fading, wonders where her daughter

remembers she is sitting across the table

gained these sunken eyes

now, eighteen years spread between them, plates

that see poison in a plate of carrots,

carry food and a choice. Her daughter’s eyes

and set this nightly vigil around the table.

And with plates in front, the mother and daughter sit with weary eyes and the baby carrots resting on the table.

Two matching plates salt and pepper shakers, fish straight from the oven, paired with Pinot Noir ‘for sweet velvet tones’

skin

Symmetry in the propped-up conversation, his eyes waiting after question marks dissolve.

Homemade hommus, jokes prepared earlier, words filling gaps, fuzzy insulation.

Feeling her way in this strange new terrain: this bright table-cloth with the folds still ingrained.

Her elbow bumps a glass heart still— wine bleeds from its lip.

Look what you’ve done His voice, torn on a fish bone a raw red voice, the old voice— spills, stains.

It all dries up in the cool silence.

There’s more food in the oven, a salad with dressing but dinner is done, it’s all— undone.

A piece of sequinned fish skin lies glittering on her plate.

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‘hollywood’ to the rest of us

The dirty world of costume design on some of the world’s biggest movies. anna leah seltzer university of california santa barbara

People like to call my industry, “the industry” or “the business”. I’m sure it’s rooted somewhere in the annals of American colloquialism, but I’m embarrassed by it all the same. In fact, I find more often than not, I don’t want to talk about my job at all. It’s not all the Non-disclosure agreements I sign, the hush-hush attitudes of my superiors, or the paranoia of the studios I worry about so much as people’s perceptions of “the industry”; Hollywood is a weird place. When my friends refer to my job as being “in Hollywood” my skin crawls. Right now I’m working on the Sony Pictures lot (formerly MGM), which is located in Culver City, damn it! In fact, I’ve never worked in Hollywood Proper. Where I grew up in Los Angeles, Hollywood is a neighbourhood. To the rest of the world, it is synonymous with American cinema and filmmaking.

The glittering tendrils of “Hollywood” reach so far, that I can’t show up at a family function or mingle at a party without somebody inevitably asking something incredibly silly, like which star have I met lately.

All of them, ok? I work in the fucking Costume department, let’s talk about something more stimulating!

I find the establishment of the character far more interesting than the person playing them. To establish a character, they need a look.

The look, from head to toes, is the costume. Costumes are arguably the most important part of filmmaking, but every department believes their department is quite obviously the most important, so I’ll just make a brief case for what I know best. When a new person walks into the room, most people make an instant assessment of them. Without having to say a word, the observer quickly sums up the observed based on their physical appearance. When we get up in the morning, we get dressed (or we don’t) — that right there says something about our character. We all have deeply personal reasons for wearing what it is we are wearing, each and every day, all within the confines of our time and place in the universe. When a costume designer is charged with dressing his or her actors, they are not simply throwing the right colours on. The costumer must research and consider any number of factors, including age, sex, race, species, time period, social and economic status, mental health, season, city, country, planet, etc. There is a lot going on to ensure the audience will make that split second character judgment the costumer is intending.

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I haven’t been working in costumes for very long. I studied film and television analysis in school and focused on documentary and journalism. Once graduated, I tried my hand in more than a few production jobs. I was hoping to work my way into the production office, when I was offered a position as an assistant to the costume department on Marvel’s Thor. It was working under designer Alexandra Byrne that I discovered how drawn I was to costumes and how deeply involved the process is. We built Asgard and their demi-gods from the ground up. We dressed contemporary, military, superhero and period Norse. Thor was a huge learning experience, covering nearly every facet of costuming and I came out with an education.

Since then, I’ve been tapped to work as an assistant on other blockbuster films, as well as to design short films and commercials.

Most recently I completed a short film, titled Abigail and the Pearl Thieves, produced by RedCube Pictures. When I design, I start with a script, a character description and a large cup of coffee. On Abigail and the Pearl Thieves we had a fantasy world and a turn of the century period world; we had a story within a story to create. I created mood boards with references for clothing, colour, texture and accessories and used them as a visual reference to walk our director, Colin Borden, through my ideas and questions. Next I rallied my good friend and talented artist, Tatiana Krasovksi, to draw up some amazing illustrations to define our characters and create a blueprint for the costumes my co-designer, Adam Sabodish and I would be making. Two years and quite a few amazing donors later, we had the means to create Abigail and the Pearl Thieves. Adam spent a few weeks scouring the city for the right pieces.

We spent close to 20 hours hand working pearls onto the costumes.

When we arrived on set and got everyone dressed, even we were impressed at what we had accomplished. That’s always the best part.

All too often people mistake real costuming for “dressing people”.

We all wear clothes, so of course everybody has an opinion, and because they don’t know enough camera and lighting jargon to hassle the Director of Photography, they’ll go ahead and let me know, even if their opinions are terrible. I think that’s why some of us get so offended when people call us “wardrobe”. A “wardrobe” is something that holds your clothes for you; a “costume” is something that quite literally defines a character on screen.

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Sometimes it feels as though costumers are second-class citizens in comparison to other departments. Some of the most talented stitchers, tailors, and seamstresses in the world work in our business.

Their years of expertise create, not just beautiful pieces, but costumes made to be used and abused over the course of 4–5 months of shooting. They mainly come from small countries our producers have never been to, speak with heavy accents, and don’t quite get the same respect someone sitting at a computer in, say, the Art Department might. On films like the multi-million dollar, sci-fi action films I’ve been working on lately, quite literally, their blood, sweat and tears go into the construction of the pieces. On a made-to-order film, there are thousands of yards of fabric to be dyed, painted, aged, and printed; we get dirty in costumes. There is armour to be sculpted, moulded out of foams and rubbers and laboriously painted, to look like the real thing.

We have dirt under our fingernails, circles under our eyes, and have been known to disappear socially for months at a time. This applies to set costumers especially, who show up three hours before general call to get everyone dressed, and go home an hour after wrap, once they’ve hung everything up and sent out the dry cleaning. We smell like any number of toxic chemicals, paints, glues, burnt coffee or the sharp metallic bouquet of clothing hangers. Glamorous, isn’t it?

It should be no surprise there aren’t many old-aged costumers. I’d like to see some statistics on the cancer rate of the local 705 International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employers members.

It’s difficult work, as any job on a film is. A lot of us might come off as bitter, but nobody is forcing us to show up everyday. I’d say there is a three-part equation for why we do it: love of the craft, decent pay, and the chance to participate in something that is longstanding. Movies are tangible works; good movies are watched over and over again. They are studied, copied, translated, reproduced, re-mastered and redistributed in 3D ten years later. I believe it is human nature to want to be a part of something big — kind of like the Egyptian pyramids or a great symphony — but with more explosions, aliens and sex.

Photography: Ben Callahan Illustrations: Tatiana Krasovski

i think that’s why some of us get so offended when people call us “wardrobe”. a “wardrobe” is something that holds your clothes for you; a “costume” is something that quite literally defines a character on screen.

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thank you for reading. www.undercoat.net

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dream

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