Forth Magazine » Issue 7

Forth Magazine Issue #7

Jessi — Sun, 18 Apr 2010 22:57:32 +0000

Forth Issue #7

Click to view our NEW e-magazine!

Editor’s Note:

One year in publication… Unbelievable! I’m continually amazed how life progresses, how time seems to “fly,” how people and ideas converge, develop, and flourish together into collective lives of their own. This being the anniversary edition of FORTH—still the only publication in Los Angeles to unite art, literature, and journalism—we thought it appropriate to present the edition as our official “State of the Union” address—an exploration of converging art forms, industries, and of course people.

And who better to help bring this theme to life than one of our city’s former political leaders turned celebrated photographer: Gil Garcetti. I was thrilled to have the privilege of meeting and interviewing Gil about the union of his two seemingly distinct passions—law and photography. As our former D.A., Gil knows what it’s like to live in the public eye, practicing a passion that affected the lives of many. Interestingly, his current work as a photographer tends to give voices to those who otherwise would not be heard; his lens often serves to in fact be the public eye. In discussing the two outlets, one finds that Gil is ultimately passionate about serving his community; and with photography, his has become a global community. Once a quiet artist, now an international artisan, Gil continues to live a life of truth, service, and creativity—an exemplary world citizen of creative unification.

We’ve also had the immense pleasure in bringing together some award-winning—albeit very diverse—writers and artists in this issue. Internationally published poet Will Alexander and nationally recognized spoken word champion Boris “Bluz” Rogers might never be found on the same stage together, but their words shine forth here in these pages, both as reflections of a changing world. Cutting edge artists like Suzanne Erickson and graphic novelist Jimenez Lai exhibit here adjacent to investigative journalism by Matt Schrader, congregating art and politics. We’ve also begun to exhibit San Francisco-based art and poetry, merging the often vast creative border between Northern and Southern California. And an article on artist and organizer Alexey Steele reveals the genius of a man who has brought renowned classical musicians together with artists in a spectacular ongoing series called Classical Underground.

Additionally, our fantastic Collective of FORTH writers have taken on the theme of union to its brilliant extent. Julia Ingalls and Sofiya Goldshteyn address the states of the publishing and art industries respectively, while Marco Mannone and Sophie Kipner similarly write their A/B subjective accounts of the same hilarious and insightful experience—the search for union, as it were, in the bigger, better, faster human-connecting world of speed-dating. But this magazine is not just a production of talented artists and writers; rather, it is a hybrid conception of many superbly gifted individuals, like our Creative Directors Sally Foster and Jessi Chow, and Managing Editor Jason Hall, along with our great events and marketing teams, all of whom I’d like to personally recognize on the anniversary of our publication.

FORTH, like all things born of a collective mind, has indeed become an entity of its own. After one year in print, the young brand is growing, and our vision includes something altogether more than simply words and pictures on paper. We see this as a merging not only of creative people and industries, but a movement of sorts in the direction of collective consciousness, spanning geography, technology, and generation. FORTH is to be a word or symbol synonymous with art, literature, journalism, and truth for the young and old alike, for hard-copy readers and digital viewers, for Angelinos and all other cities wherein brilliant and inspired people converge to create an artistic melting pot and want only to live lives in which they remain true to themselves and sincerely engaged in the pursuit of passion.

We trust once again that you’ll press on with us, through another strange and compelling year, as we aspire to our mission: To bring together community through art, literature, and truth. And we hope to remind you that a life of passion is truly possible after all. Thank you as always for reading. Press on. Go Forth. And Enjoy!

Jeremy Shawn Pollack
Publisher & Editor-in-Chief

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Featured Artist

Interview with Gil Garcetti by Jeremy Pollack

Gallery of Photography by Gil Garcetti

Literature

Poetry

“American Pie” by Bluz

The Nexus of Phantoms by Will Alexander

Transition Period by Keely Hyslop

Journalism

The Dirt on L.A.’s Parking Ticket Moneymaker by Matt Schrader

Alexey Steele’s Classical Underground: A Giant Experienceby Sofiya Goldshteyn

Will Alexander on “A Nexus of Phantoms” by Sophie Kipner

Suzanne Erickson: “F$#% the Flock” by Sofiya Goldshteyn

State of the Union – A Closer Look at Two Creative Industries (Part One) by Julia Ingalls

State of the Union – A Closer Look at Two Creative Industries (Part Two) by Sofiya Goldshteyn

Strangers in the Night: Speed-Dating in L.A. (Part One) by Sophie Kipner

Strangers in the Night: Speed-Dating in L.A. (Part Two) by Marco Mannone

Art
Mixed Media

Mixed Media and Paint by Suzanne Erickson

Illustrations

Colored Pencil by Will Alexander

Excerpts from Bureau Spectacular, a graphic novel by Jimenez Lai

Sculpture

Art by Liz Maher

Will Alexander on “A Nexus of Phantoms” by Sophie Kipner

cscheung — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 09:12:54 +0000

Read “The Nexus of Phantoms by Will Alexander”

Reading Will Alexander’s poetry is like walking into a Jackson Pollock painting: you get lost in a maelstrom of colors, lulled by beautifully constructed metaphors, and unexpectedly shaken by the jarring sounds of each hard-handed stroke. Through Alexander’s work, words fill three-dimensional forms and talk back to you with distinct colors, voices and angles. An autodidact born and raised in South Central L.A., Alexander’s early work didn’t fit into conventional, academically defined structures. After years of carving out his own niche, Alexander is now internationally recognized as a leading literary figure. A poet, essayist, novelist and visual artist, his accomplishments include the Whiting Fellowship for Poetry in 2001 and a California Arts Council Fellowship in 2002, and he was named by The International Biographical Centre in Cambridge as the Outstanding Scholar of the 20th Century. Alexander’s most recent collection of poetry, The Sri Lankan Loxodrome, is a surreal adventure embedded with a lexicon all its own and laced with seemingly disconnected words applied to the page like that of smattered paint.

Staying true to non-linear storytelling, “A Nexus of Phantoms” was initially inspired by the color of lorikeets but is most simply the result of what he deems as his ability to hear poetically. I sat perplexed by this poem’s many metaphors an hour before our meeting, trying to find the thematic tie-ins to the title poem. Instead, I only found a nexus of my own. I thought that with some explanation on his part, I would be able to put this poem into context, neatly boxed and ribbon-tied. How very wrong I was, and I think that’s exactly the point.

Alexander’s poetry is a fluid landscape of words wherein meanings are changed by the context in which they are read. He tells me he hears words in a certain way, as if he were a living, breathing vessel through which words move from source to paper. He scribbles words down as they come to him, hence the pen and paper he always keeps handy in his coat pocket. With the exception of having to make a few minor grammatical adjustments, Alexander’s published poems are basically the same as their first drafts. Why? “Because that’s how they came to me. They came in that order, and that’s how they were intended to be read,” he explains. “I let the words sit until they speak back to me. They tell me what I need to know.”

The idea of words swirling and lingering on the page is just another example of his ability to enchant with imagery, which transports the listener into the cosmos. “I am not a literary person and this genre is nonlinear in that sense. The power is in terms of the hearing. The ability to hear poetically,” he tells me. “William Blake mentioned that as well: to actually hear language at another level as if it had been alchemically brewed. It could be a common word, an arcane word, but the level is soaked by a certain kind of poetic energy, another level that escapes a measurement and can no longer be maintained quantitatively. Reality has a tremendous range; you just have to look at nature. Look at the lorikeets.” This skewed sense of reality is the root of the issue, according to Alexander, because life isn’t linear. His poems come to him in fragments and his poetry reflects that natural pattern. “This is the problem that we are in,” he asserts. “These old ideas and boundaries are starting to break down.”

Gallery of Photography by Gil Garcetti

Jessi — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 07:54:23 +0000

Read and Listen to the Interview

Excerpts from Bureau Spectacular, a graphic novel by Jimenez Lai

Jessi — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 01:43:44 +0000

Graphic novels aren’t just the province of superheroes and neurotic shut-ins. Forth is proud to feature an example of the new direction of this form, via an excerpt from Jimenez Lai’s Bureau Spectacular. In the author’s words, the work is an attempt “to better understand the spatial implications of the two-dimensional fiction.” Check out these pages for an illustration of a very literate theme: the struggle of man to transcend his environment for something he can’t tangibly describe, but which he intuitively knows is better.

Mixed Media and Paint by Suzanne Erickson

cscheung — Fri, 15 Jan 2010 23:22:56 +0000

Title: “My bed” size: queen size mattress;
medium: paint, yarn with needlework on bed mattress 2009

Title: “Fissure 1″
size: 60 x 50,
medium: oil on canvas. 2009

Title: “Finally”
size: 28 x 44
medium: plaster 2009

Title: “Fuck the Flock”
Size: 31 x 50
medium: plaster and paint. 2009

Forth Magazine » Issue 7

Forth Magazine Issue #7

Forth Issue #7

Click to view our NEW e-magazine!

Editor’s Note:

Table of Contents

Will Alexander on “A Nexus of Phantoms” by Sophie Kipner

Gallery of Photography by Gil Garcetti

Excerpts from Bureau Spectacular, a graphic novel by Jimenez Lai

Mixed Media and Paint by Suzanne Erickson