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Amelia’s Magazine | The Love of It Indoor Picnic

Photograph courtesy of Ctrl.Alt.Shift.

Ctrl.Alt.Shift is a seriously cool experimental youth initiative dedicated to politicising a new generation of activists for social justice and global change. Last time I heard of them, link they were organising a comic book themed talk at the ICA Comica festival. Using creativity, price photography, film, stories, illustrations and music, it aims to give a voice to the silent majority- meaning you and I, dear artistic and socially motivated Amelia’s readers! On January 7th, experimental youth movement Ctrl.Alt.Shift will become the first charity to venture onto newsagent mainstream shelves with the release of its own bi-annual magazine – Ctrl.Alt.Shift: The Corruption Issue.

All photographs Adrian Nettleship

It’s hot stuff! Spanning 84 pages, the launch of Ctrl.Alt.Shift: The Corruption Issue will focus on corruption as both a key cause of poverty and the barrier to overcoming it, and represents an ongoing attempt by the organization to bring a marginalized social and political agenda back into mainstream rhetoric. Including a satirical fashion shoot inspired by Guantanamo Bay, and drawing on comment and work from contemporary artists such as V V Brown and Sarah Maple, the magazine taps into popular culture to provoke debate and counter apathy amongst its audience of 18 – 25 year olds.

Highlights of the issue include the artist Sarah Maple; described by The Independent on Sunday as ‘the heir to Tracy Emin‘s throne’, Maple unveils a bespoke piece of work influenced by corruption and sex. Richard Shoyemi looks at how Asda’s new Asian range will inspire a generation of fashionistas for the Culture club section of the magazine. There is an interview with Tim Westwood as the Radio 1 DJ talks marrying music, activism, and why he wouldn’t take Pimp My Ride to Palestine. Freelance journalist and Middle East expert Ben White is the author of Israeli Apartheid: A Beginner’s Guide. White breaks down the language of corruption for the magazine. There is also Riz Ahmed; fresh from appearing alongside Jude Dench in the movie Rage, the actor and MC finds time to give his take on the effects of corruption. Ctrl.Alt.Shift’s Face the Music unearths the sounds which are making it big in Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria and beyond. There will be a goody two shoes feature on how Brazilian shoe company Melissa and designer Vivienne Westwood have met in ethical style heaven. And there is ‘Murder he wrote’, an investigative feature into honor killing in India.

We love the fact that the magazine puts what it preaches into action. It’s well known that magazines add to the pollution issue we all now face; printed on completely uncoated paper using vegetable ink, the magazine is completely biodegradable and has a cover price of £3.95. It is available from most WHSmith stores, as well as www.ctrlaltshift.co.uk/magazine

Katrin Owusu, Head of Youth Marketing and Innovations at Ctrl.Alt.Shift and Chantelle Fiddy, Editor of Ctrl.Alt.Shift Magazine tell Amelia’s art editor Valerie Pezeron about their exciting new venture.

Valerie Pezeron: It’s a very brave act of faith to launch a magazine at a time when the industry is experiencing economic problems. Why should people buy your magazine?

Katrin Owusu: Ctrl.Alt.Shift: The Corruption Issue is inclusive, broad and at times controversial; with content ranging from a fashion-shoot inspired by Guantanemo Bay, to Sarah Maple creating art inspired by sex and corruption, to the music which is making the charts in Afghanistan. We hope the magazine will reach out to people who wouldn’t traditionally be interested in politics or current affairs, and encourage those people out of their comfort zones and into action.

VP: I love Ctrl.Alt.Shift and you guys are really setting the bar really high!

Chantelle Fiddy: It’s a real accomplishment to have produced a magazine that takes on board third sector objectives yet sits happily alongside consumer titles. Having had the freedom to explore new ways to package stories on global and social injustice, from Tim Westwood talking about activism to looking at the work of ethical shoe company Melissa and highlighting trends from around the world, we’ve resulted in something of a first (for the charity sector).

VP: So the new year is commencing with a bang?

CF: It’s the icing on the cake for what’s been an amazing eighteen months for Ctrl.Alt.Shift!

Run to the shops now, there aren’ t that many original magazines with a conscience out there…besides Amelia, of course!
Photograph courtesy of Ctrl.Alt.Shift.

Ctrl.Alt.Shift is a seriously cool experimental youth initiative dedicated to politicising a new generation of activists for social justice and global change. Last time I heard of them, medications they were organising a comic book themed talk at the ICA Comica festival. Using creativity, try photography, film, stories, illustrations and music, it aims to give a voice to the silent majority- meaning you and I, dear artistic and socially motivated Amelia’s readers! On January 7th, experimental youth movement Ctrl.Alt.Shift will become the first charity to venture onto newsagent mainstream shelves with the release of its own bi-annual magazine – Ctrl.Alt.Shift: The Corruption Issue.

Photograph by Luke Miley

All other photographs by Adrian Nettleship

Valerie Pezeron: It’s a very brave act of faith to launch a magazine at a time when the industry is experiencing economic problems. Why should people buy your magazine?

VP: I love Ctrl.Alt.Shift and you guys are really setting the bar really high!

VP: So the new year is commencing with a bang?

CF: It’s the icing on the cake for what’s been an amazing eighteen months for Ctrl.Alt.Shift!

Run to the shops now, there aren’ t that many original magazines with a conscience out there…besides Amelia, of course!
All photographs courtesy of Amy Hughes

Hiding in the loo from the conductor; tearing your hair out at awkward crossword clues; playing I-Spy; attempting to mop up spilt coffee with a balled-up bus ticket – there are a multitude of ways to pass the time on a mammoth journey, erectile not all of them particularly productive. For Joanna Tinsley, story though, gazing out of the windows of trains as they zig-zagged across Japan on a visit to her brother last September ignited an initiative that last weekend saw hundreds of Bristolians pack their picnics and head out into the snow.

“The Love of It started, as all good ideas do, with a list,” Jo recalls. “I wrote down a list of everything I loved doing: road trips, wild swimming, picnics, telling stories, playing Scrabble, night-walking and star gazing, climbing hills and camping, spending time with friends. It dawned on me that there wasn’t one single place that brought all these things together – so I decided to make one!”

And so began The Love of It, which Jo describes as “the source of all knowledge on good, wholesome fun.” Jo and her blossoming team of international editors seek out, promote and organise community-based events and activities of the frolicsome (and usually free) variety, from rickshaw road trips to Scrabble tournaments to – for the especially thick of skin – outdoor Boxing Day dips. After just its first fortnight, The Love of It had even had a hand in forging the Bristol chapter of the Cardboard Tube Fighting League.

“I started thinking about the all the movements that have gathered momentum recently – the slow movement, downsizing, growing your own food, green living, freeconomy, the resurgence of crafts and pervasive gaming, wild swimming and cool camping,” says Jo of her motivation for kicking off The Love of It, “and I began to think that what underpins many of these movements is the idea that doing something creative, just for fun, makes you happier. It’s the idea that spending time with the people you love, joining a community, sharing skills, making things and playing out is not only part of a more eco-friendly way to live but is a surefire way to feeling good. Or, on a more casual level, that every now and then doing something random, creative and just for the love of it can help you chill out after a busy week.”

The south west’s big chill was thawed on Sunday at Bristol’s Biggest Indoor Picnic, the event that marked the official launch of The Love of It and invited the people of Bristol to bring their hammocks, board games and cucumber sandwiches in from the cold. Jo called on the likes of Lucy and Lucy of positive psychology art workshop organisation Light Box ; the monster-making flair of Stuffed Nonsense; Cloth magazine; and long-time collaborator and Bath’s Magic Lantern film club founder Kerry to bring their skills and enthusiasm to the Indoor Picnic. The result was an afternoon of treasure hunts, International Homemade Hobnob Day nibbles , fabric fight-offs, mass Twister contests and bubble-blowing competitions. And this is only the beginning…

“Project 2010 is a series of 52 challenges to help you live for the love of it,” says Jo. “We plan to include such fun projects as having a monster swap (making a quirky little critter and sending them on adventures around the world) and pimping a board game (human Monopoly anyone?). Oodles of fun!

“Our main aim is to make 2010 the year you live for the love of it. We’d like to help people focus on all the little things that make us feel happy (building dens, skimming stones, conker fights) and spend less time worrying about the big things that keep us awake at night.”

Written by Amy Hughes on Monday January 18th, 2010 12:40 pm

Categories ,activities, ,art, ,bristol, ,camping, ,Cloth magazine, ,community-based events, ,craft, ,film club, ,Indoor Picnic, ,Light Box, ,Magic Lantern, ,outdoor, ,positive psychology art workshop organisation, ,The Love of It

Amelia’s Magazine | Pencil Chit Chat with Jess Wilson and Liv Bargman

For the December 2009 launch of Amelia’s Anthology of Illustration, treat Amelia invited the participating artists to draw on the walls of Concrete Hermit. During a day of creative scribbling, two of the participants: Liv Bargman and Jess Wilson noticed and appreciated each other’s hand drawn typography. Jess approached Liv with the idea of Pencil Chit Chat and the rest as they say is history! After 8 months of conversing via email Jess and Liv be will chatting through their pencils across the walls of the Front Room in Cambridge between the 16th and 20th of August 2010.

What were your first memories of each other?

Liv: It was at the drawing on the walls day at Concrete Hermit back in December. But I don’t think we had an extensive chat at all. We were getting into the scribble zones. I was really impressed with Jess’ wall, it looked so bold and vibrant

Jess: I remember Liv commented on my good use of type and I watched her slowly throughout the day and thought “wow”…

Explain Pencil Chit Chat please…

Jess: I had the idea for a while and was just waiting for the right person to come along. I thought Liv’s type was different enough in style to mine but still had hand rendered qualities which helps fuse the project together.

Liv: It was Jess’ idea. I was bowled over and really excited by her email asking me to take part and be the other shoe to walk along a meandering little journey into scribbledom.

How do your conversations start? Do you pick a word or a phrase at random and are there any rules with how you each have to respond to the previous illustration?

Liv: It all started with a ‘hello’ and we got to know one one another from there. Talking gibber jabber and making sense along the way.

Where do you see Pencil Chit Chat developing?

Liv: Into print and to keep going. The whole idea of the Chit Chat is personal work but not self-indulgent. Maybe other illustrators could do the same. It’s like the Slow food movement, pigeon post, back to the old writing desk days of yore.

Jess: Really I see it as a creative outlet where I can experiment and discover. I get many projects where people want a illustration which looks like a previous one. This is a chance for me to explore new techniques and avenues. Where do I see Pencil Chit Chat developing…….where it wants to really. Possibly I’d like a better website, but it would have to be idiot proof for Liv and I! We were thinking we’d like to publish the first year’s illustrations in a book by Christmas.

Liv: Make a wee book, possibly in time for Crimbletime. Make up more words and infiltrate them into society. I’d like to see it passed onto others designers. Illustrators possibly sometimes feel like doodle hermits cooped up in their sheds or ships.

How did you become involved in Front Room?

Liv: This was also through Jess. As you can tell she is the brainchild of the operation- and an extremely prolific and hardworking dude she is.

Jess: I came across there website whilst browsing on the internet. I got in touch! Originally I was going to do a solo exhibition. But I thought it be funnier and better with Liv.

How will the exhibition unfold? Will you take over the gallery walls again as at Concrete Hermit?

Jess: Pretty much! There are going to be two different conversations unfolding, so we are both working all the time like “busy bees”…

Liv: We will have two starting points i.e. two conversations will be underway, and we will swap over when one has finished their reply. It will be different I’m sure.

How will you start the conversation during the exhibition?

Liv: I think it will be good to bring in talking points like newspapers and books to add some weight to it, I want to steer it away from being anything like a self-indulgent display. This is because I think the idea of chit chat could be used by other designers, swapping ideas. That postage idea is a great one.

We will have a structure with two conversations/two starting points and we will swap over with a reply.

Do you send Pencil Chit Chat by post or by email and if by post – how was this decision made?

Liv: We do it by email, but it would be nice to carry on part of it by post- that’s actually a really good idea! I really believe in the slow food movement as a holistic view of how we should do everything in life. Whether it be setting up businesses, in the music industry (going back to the DIY approach), growing food or how we travel about. In reference to this, I really enjoyed Will Self’s radio 4 programme a few months back about Psychogeography.

It inspired me to write/draw a bit of the Pencil Chit Chat on it, as it explains this is a way to travel about and take in more as we walk and ponder about. Being cooped up in a metal tube hurtling about the skies to t’other side of the planet in 5 minutes isn’t exactly au naturelle.

What is it that interests you about type, particularly hand rendered typography?

Liv: It’s really cathartic to draw letters and take your time over something that people do everyday, scribbling a note on a napkin or by the side of a crossword. It’s pure communication and you can be witty or stupid. I like illustrations that educate you too. I was always pouring over my encyclopaedia when I was a younger.

Jess I like the expression and extra meaning you can give to a word when it’s hand rendered type. I have always done it so really it’s just natural.

What is your relationship between text and the illustration or is there no separation between the two?

Liv: Definitely the educational slant and informing an audience directly. I’d be more than happy to make versions in different languages, as that is a downside to hand rendered type if one doesn’t understand English. Maybe I should go and research in Japan..

I feel letterforms make my work look better! It’s an extra graphic detail, but it also has substance.

Jess: I see it as all part of my work. Sometimes the type can give extra meaning to the illustration.

How did you develop as an illustrator?

Jess: I always really enjoyed drawing and being creative and it just seemed a natural progression for me. I like working to a brief also which is something illustrators seem to do often.

Liv: I decided it was the path for me when I realized it was inbetween fine art and graphic design. I didn’t want to do either of those. Illustration is for the people (as is Comic Sans- that’s a font for the people, but that’s another story) as it bridges gaps between understanding and informing one of a text or an idea, rather than alienating and putting something on a pedestal.

Why is Comic Sans the font for the people?

Liv: Aha! This made me chuckle a lot! I’m an inverted snob I suppose and it’s a symbol of anti style and there’s a font snobbery surrounding it. Plus teachers have to use it on school reports- it’s compulsory apparently. To me, it’s comforting and reassuring and I quite like it- as is the same for a group of my fellow Falmouth uni illustration pals. We are Comic Sans Fans. See The G2 a few weeks back – awesome article about it (I think this is just an edited version).

My sister’s a graphic designer so I like to mock her too.

Favourite Illustrators?

Jess: Recently Cristina Guitian is doing brilliant stuff, and Adam Hayes. I really like the big shows that Le Gun put on. I saw their one at Pick Me Up and I thought it was ace.

Liv: Old cookery books- the kitsch photography is joyous. Ren and Stimpy and other fifties-esque cartoons. Dirty edges and bits you get out of photocopiers, collaging Victorian style, Blists Hill museum, music pumping into my earlugs- plenty of textures and bleeps. Books books and more books. The music video ‘The Tain’.

What is a lightbox and how does this work?

Liv: I hope this isn’t some new software everyone is in on. It’s a tracing cube with a switch and electricity, powered by a lemon battery used on the old spice ships to help sailors navigate in the lower decks. I think the Lumiere brothers invented it.

Jess: It’s a errrrrrrrr..(this is hard). Right!

It’s a box which you can draw on to copy the images underneath. So I draw all my roughs first, to get the alignments and proportions and then trace the images in color.

Finally… what are your thoughts on the alternative sustainable technologies illustrated for Amelia’s Anthology?

Jess: Kite ship – Why isn’t it being used!

Liv: The sea serpent, The Anaconda – what a beast. It stays tethered to the seabed and gathers the power of the waves in its rubber body. A fantastical piece of engineering I want to see in our high seas.

If you are in or near Cambridge on August 20th (why not take the trip from London, it’s not that far…) make time for the private view of Pencil Chit Chat at Front Room Gallery: 6.00 – 11.30pm..

Written by Sally Mumby-Croft on Friday August 6th, 2010 1:57 pm

Categories ,Amelia’s Anthology of Illustration, ,Amelia’s Magazine, ,Anaconda, ,Comic Sans, ,Concrete Hermit, ,Front Room Gallery, ,Jess Wilson, ,Kite Ship, ,Le Gun, ,Light Box, ,Liv Bargman, ,Pen Pals, ,Pencil Chit Chat, ,Pick Me Up, ,Sustainable Design

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