INDEPENDENT MAGAZINES

1. Why celebrate independent magazines?
Mike Koedinger: Independent magazines are at the heart of innovation in print media. Their unusual use of freedom of expression promotes excellence in writing, editorial design and visual arts. It’s where the future trends of print media are made.
Jeremy Leslie: Independent magazines are celebrations in their own right, celebrations of the passions and obsessions of their creators. They are creatively- rather than financially-led projects and at their best represent the desire to experiment and develop the magazine form in a way the mainstream is unable to risk.
Andrew Losowsky: An explosion of independent publishing has emerged in recent years. A result of advances in desktop publishing and printing technology, coupled with a fall in the costs of producing a magazine, have led to an unprecedented emergence of independent media all over the world. This emergence of media includes many magazines that are more original, imaginative and serving their audiences better than many mainstream titles. While many people predict the end of magazines, thousands of people around the world are proving otherwise.
Secondly, creating an independent magazine can be a very lonely pursuit. It’s about time that some of the leaders in the field were recognised, and that an event allowed the people behind these magazines to meet, share ideas and cross-pollinate some of their creativity.

2. What is the difference between an independent magazine and a mainstream magazine?
MK: Mainstream media are mostly 100% marketing products, aiming to produce the highest return for investors. Independent magazines are published and produced by the owners themselves. Their motivation is a passion for quality and the expression of their own voice.

3. Where do all these independent magazines come from? Are they a new phenomenon?
MK: Today independent magazines come from all over the world although mature media markets produce more independent publications than, say, African markets. Andy Warhol’s Interview certainly was amongst the pioneers in 1969, but it was only after the influence of British i-D, The Face and Blitz in the eighties, and the revolution of DTP in the early nineties, that the “independent magazine” became a phenomenon.
JL: They are an age-old phenomenon. They are how magazines first began, an experimental new form of media inspired by individual passion. They come from people’s desire to communicate, to have a voice. Many now develop from their creators online presence.
AL: Yes and no – although the desktop publishing phenomenon is a more recent one, the energy behind these magazines is the same as that which brought us fanzines and brings us blogs – a desire to put a distinct voice out there, to be imaginative and creative, and to find an audience. And they come from anywhere and everywhere that someone has a story they want to tell, through the medium of magazines.

4. Who makes independent magazines and why?
MK: Creatives with as many different backgrounds and motivations as there are different magazines. Designers publish magazines as a showcase for their work, mainstream editors and journalists publish independent magazines in search for self-expression, illustrators publish zines to find an audience… for a few it’s a way to get on the guestlists of exclusive cocktail parties, and finally some intend to make a profit from their venture and become fulltime magazine publishers. All good reasons, don’t you think?
JL: Anyone could make a magazine, but they tend to come from people with an element of media experience/engagement: designers, writers, photographers, artists. People who want to promote their passions for a particular subject. For the individuals concerned a magazine is often first made as a trial, an experiment. And they fall in love with the process.

5. Who reads independent magazines, and why?
MK: People looking for inspiration who know where to find it.
JL: To an extent it is a closed world of magazine lovers/collectors. The Colophon crowd – us! Most titles can never hope to reach beyond this small international group of city-based creative types. Magazines have always been ideal for recording and reflecting new creative trends and now the mainstream has become an extension of the PR business the independents provide that under the radar detail.
AL: The same people who consume any other media – that is, anybody who is interested in something in particular. Independent magazine themes range from the economy to fashion, art to saving the planet. Independent magazines often provide a different, original take on the same issues that affect everyone – love, life, money, death.

6. How do independent magazines make enough money to survive?
MK: Most often, they don’t.
JL: They rarely do. That’s the conundrum. Get successful and the pressure to maintain and grow that success can suffocate the original idea as you begin to rely on distributors and their advice. Its not an issue of selling out, its an issue of being directed down the mainstream path. Few have managed to make the balance between creative idea and success work. Unless they’re very lucky, they don’t make money.
AL: Many don’t. Others aren’t profitable, but continue anyway as a hobby. And still others do make money from advertising, sales, distribution, sideline projects – the same as any big media company.

MAGAZINE INDUSTRY

7. Are magazines only ink and paper?
MK: CMYK and RGB have become friends.
JL: In the truest sense, yes magazines can only be a physical item. The language of magazines can be transferred elsewhere but I haven’t yet seen a really successful transfer. I’m sure there is a way of applying the editorial and physical language of the magazine to a digital environment and am excited about some recent developments. But I don’t know if we’ll call them magazines.
AL: No – they’re an edited collection around a theme, appearing in a series of numbered editions. That could be online, downloaded, could be a poster, could be graffitied onto a wall.

8. How much longer do print magazines have left?
MK: Maybe not as long as the human race, but longer than most of us would expect.
JL: Magazines will always exist but the magazine industry as we know it may never be quite the same again. The massive broadening of niche markets over the past decade will contract. There will be fewer publishing companies as the simple quick buck – catch a trend, sell the ads, make a mag – proves no longer viable. But high end and small-run magazines will always exist.
AL: As a medium, I’d say an indefinite amount of time. However, in ten, twenty, fifty years’ time, there will be far fewer than there are now.

9. How is the current financial crisis affecting magazines?
MK: Magazines that depended on advertising will have a difficult time, but many independent magazines are published as bi-annuals or quarterlies, and so might survive a 12-18 months crisis easier than, say, mainstream weeklies.
JL: Mainstream magazines are now suffering very badly as the advertising revenue dries up post credit crunch. Weaker titles are already struggling and the closures have begun. It is the perfect storm scenario: less ad revenue, fewer sales, internet usage soaring, paper prices rising, concerns about the environmental effect of production and recycling being unviable…
AL: Badly. Advertising is down, and as a result, many titles are closing or being put on ice. Others that were once profitable, or close to being so, aren’t any longer. Some say that this is only hurrying the inevitable move to digital; I don’t think we’ve seen the last big magazine launch yet, though.

COLOPHON

10. Who is Colophon aimed at?
MK: Creative people from around the world. Magazine professionals, students and of course magazine-loving readers.
JL: Creative people who enjoy/value the independent magazine.
AL: Everybody who is interested in creativity, imagination and an independent voice.

11. Choose five words to describe Colophon.
MK: Celebrating the independent magazine.
JL: Independent. Enthusiastic. Positive. Social. Sharing.
AL: Creative. Inspiring. Surprising. Networking. Magazines!

12. What did you learn from the first Colophon in 2007?
MK: Among many things, that for the duration of a weekend, the Colophon-crowd can party all night long and still attend about 10 hours of talks a day. Amazing.
JL: I learnt we are not alone – many other people love magazines too.
AL: That creativity breeds more creativity.

13. Why is Colophon different from other graphic design/print industry events?
MK: It’s the mix of the audience. Of course many designers attend the symposium, but you’ll also find publishers, editors, writers, photographers, illustrators, advertisers, professionals from cultural institutions, teachers, students and, last but not least, passionate readers.
JL: Its not a trade show. Exhibitors aren’t trying to sell you digital repro services. Colophon is to mainstream events what the magazines are to their mainstream – the alternative. The people behind it share a love of independent magazines and not a professional conference company. We started it because we wanted to attend it.
The event encompasses design but also covers content.
AL: Because it isn’t set in a giant anonymous hall, filled with paying stands. Because it doesn’t have sponsors leaping over each other to hand you the best freebie. Because it’s created by magazine makers, not professional exhibition organisers. Because it sets its attendees creative challenges. Because it’s all about the magazines. Because of the atmosphere and the people.

PERSONAL

14. What do you look for in a good magazine?
MK: I want it all, but first I want to be surprised. I expect very strong visuals, well-written good stories and interviews, as well as an individual, fresh concept. I like the use of carefully selected paper and of course I do appreciate high-end production, both in printing and binding.
JL: I want a magazine to surprise and engage me, to bridge the gap between familiarity and uniqueness.
AL: A unified purpose in design and content. Thoughtfulness, appreciation of the strengths and weaknesses of the medium. Something that makes me smile, something that shocks me, something that makes me think. Something that forces me to keep that issue in my cupboard, and not add it to the recycling pile. Imagination.

15. Do you have a large collection of magazines? If so, which are your favourites in your collection?
MK: I’ve loved and collected magazines since the eighties, but I’m not a huge collector. I guess I have about 3,000 magazines, including some eighties classics (i-D, The Face, Blitz, Interview, Details, Tempo, Wiener) and of course a large range of today’s best mags. Although I’m a visual person, in the end it’s the magazines that I read that I spend most time with and finally prefer – for example, the Paris-based “Magazine” from Angelo Cirimele and the German “brand eins”.
JL: I have a largish collection. Favourites include a piece of wood called Nice magazine, Econy, early issues of The Face, a copy of Brodovitch’s Portfolio magazine, early Grazia, Fantastic Man, Carls Cars, …
AL: Yes! My favourites vary depending on what’s on my mind at any one time… I love my old Nests and Flairs for their ambition, Portfolio for what it represents, Eros for what it was and what it did, and I have a tube filled with glorious IS/NOTs that will one day wallpaper my toilet.

16. Which current magazines do you enjoy?
JL: Kasino A4, OK Collections, Carl*s Cars, Wired, Fantastic Man, Monocle,
AL: All of the Colophon ten from this year and from 2007! Also, some editions of: Monocle, Wallpaper*, Creative Review, New Yorker, Portfolio, Foto8, UK Esquire, the Economist, Esopus, Fantastic Man, New York, Below the Fold, McSweeney’s, The Believer, Dumbofeather, Lemon, Russia!

17. In no more than 20 words, write what you think will be the future of magazines.
MK: Magazines will always be a source of pleasure and inspiration.
JL: Magazines will continue to be published but the focus will shift from quantity to quality.
AL: It will involve digital, print, ink, paper, hitherto uninvented devices and amazing creativity. Beyond that, I don’t want to know.

February 2009, © Colophon 2009 – International Magazine Symposium

Colophon 2009 Kick Off at Press Conference in Luxembourg with (from left to right): Mayor Paul Helminger, producer and curator Mike Koedinger, Casino Luxembourg Manager Jo Kox and Minister for Communications, Jean-Louis Schiltz. Missing on the picture: Jeremy Leslie (UK) and Andrew Losowsky (USA), the two co-curators.

Colophon is an international biennial which brings together in Luxembourg, during the weekend of March 13 to 15, 2009, a public from around the world to celebrate excellence and innovation in the independent magazine industry.
With a circuit of fifteen exhibitions spread across Luxembourg City and approximately forty hours of conferences, creative roundtables, presentations and workshops, Colophon reaches out to a number of different audiences. The symposium attracts an international crowd hailing from the four corners of the earth. For this second edition, the organisers are planning to transform the entire city for the duration of this one weekend in March. In addition to the symposium, which addresses both professionals and students, the Luxembourg general public and that of the Greater Region will be able to visit the many exhibitions, participate in the daytime workshops intended for children and attend the nightly festivities.
Initiated in 2005 by Mike Koedinger, Jeremy Leslie and Andrew Losowsky— three media professionals—, Colophon was born within the framework of “Luxembourg and the Greater Region, European Capital of Culture 2007” and in collaboration with Casino Luxembourg – Forum d’art contemporain. Its success was instant with visitors coming from 25 different countries.
Political support
“For the City of Luxembourg, its trades people and its cultural players, Colophon 2009 is set to have an important economic impact, because it will be beneficial for consumption, especially if you consider the 2,000 nights of hotel bookings which it will generate,” says Paul Helminger, Mayor of the capital and ‘patron’ to the symposium. “But beyond this economic impact, it is also the positive impact on our brand image and the promotion of the City of Luxembourg throughout the whole world which is of interest to us.” And promotion there certainly will be, because if the event’s main purpose is to celebrate the independent magazine, the magazines return the favour  with gusto with more than one hundred of them offering up an advertising campaign diffused throughout 35 countries of the world at a value of approximately 450,000 €. To this effort can be added the related reports in the international press, newspapers, blogs and digital magazine sites on the Internet.
“It’s an event that perfectly articulates Luxembourg’s ambition to continue developing its role as a centre of excellence for the associated activities of the media and ICT. Colophon is a fresh illustration of the dynamism of the sector and helps to position Luxembourg on a new and promising axis,” declares Jean-Louis Schiltz, Minister for Communications and ‘patron’, within the Government, of the symposium.
“The independent magazine is at the centre of innovation in the written press”, explains Mike Koedinger, initiator and one of the curators. “It is a place of freedom and excellence in creation; where media professionals can express themselves without constraints. It is here that they create for themselves the trends of the international market.”
Exhibition Circuit
As far as the exhibitions go, a veritable circuit is proposed which winds its way through the capital. First stop is the Luxembourg Casino – Forum of contemporary art, to pick up the Colophon programme (10 € including its map of the city and valid entry to all the venues) and to see the first major exhibition “WE MAKE MAGAZINES” which allows you to discover 110 independent magazines, from 30 countries, in interviews, in pictures, and of course, to flip through.
Next, ten cultural venues – from gallery beaumontpublic to the Chapel of the Abbey Neumünster Cultural Arts Centre while passing by the Musée d’Histoire de la Ville de Luxembourg or the kiosk of the AICA — will host the exhibitions for “TEN GUEST MAGAZINES”. From Berlin, Hong Kong, Los Angeles, Paris and even from Mexico, these magazines, originating in ten different countries, will appropriate these Luxembourg cultural venues over the period of one weekend. Here one will find, among other things, Sang Bleu (subcultures and tattoos), Good (a magazine “for people who give a damn”), Kasino A4 (melancholic magazine), Volume (architectural project) or BabyBabyBaby (contemporary cultures).
Direction Mudam for “BEYOND KIOSK – MODES OF MULTIPLICATION” where Christoph Keller assembles 500 selected publications originating from his archives of 6,500 artists’ books, magazines, videos and catalogues. This itinerant and evolutionary show presents “the most relevant independent editions of contemporary art” and has been shown in twenty institutions since 2001. For its passage in Luxembourg, the installation of the publications is entrusted to Italian designer Martino Gamper.
Next, drop in at Extrabold to see the installation of Australian magazine SNEAKER FREAKER before going to the Carré Rotondes for the two “Luxembourg” exhibitions. DESIGN BACKSTAGE where the Design Luxembourg association is showing samples of work from a score of its members to demonstrate the importance of design beyond its aesthetic aspect. “Good design solves problems and adds value to products and services,” underlines president Guido Wolf. And to finish, tribute to CAFÉ CRÈME, the first international magazine published in Luxembourg. “During our ten years of existence, from 1986 to 1995, we displayed the work of approximately 150 contemporary photographers,” explains Paul di Felice and Pierre Stiwer, the founders of Café Crème.
All the exhibitions will be open throughout the weekend, but they can also be visited during the NIGHT OF THE MAGAZINE Friday March 13 when all the locations will welcome visitors until 10 PM, after which the party continues at the Carré Rotondes.
The symposium
A hyper intensive programme encompassing forty hours of presentations and discussions spread out over the three days of the symposium in two distinct spaces at the Luxembourg Casino – Forum of contemporary art.
And just like any real magazine, the symposium will be informative and diverting at the same time. Thus, it will propose many formats: panel discussions, lectures, on stage interviews-dialogues, Pecha Kucha presentations (presenting an idea in 20 images, each one has the screen for no more, and no less, than 20 seconds) or markets for photography portfolios and graphic illustration that bring together a hundred creatives.
And how, with all these magazine lovers united in one place, could they not want to launch the creation of a new magazine together? The three curators take up the challenge and invite the public to collaborate and carry out, together, a 100 page magazine over the course of the three days. To facilitate this, a “newspaper office – graphic studio” workshop will be installed at the Casino Luxembourg and, through periodic multiple briefings, the missions will be given out to interested parties. At the symposium closing, during a ceremony with the participation of Minister Jean-Louis Schiltz, the digital version of the magazine will be shown on the big screen at the Philharmonie.
To prolong the pleasure, a film cycle dedicated to media is on the programme at the Municipal Cinematheque during the month of March, and a kiosk of magazines of the world will be installed at the Luxembourg Casino in collaboration with Fellner Art Books.
In spite of the fact that the financing is not yet entirely in place, Mike Koedinger remains optimistic a few weeks before the event: “We have succeeded in gaining the confidence of the Government, of the City of Luxembourg, and of many cultural institutions and private cultural players as well as private partners. We have succeeded in getting all its actors to collaborate in making Luxembourg the place of excellence to accommodate this international event. And today we ask that Colophon be perennialised to become ‘Colophon – International Independent Magazine Biennial’ in Luxembourg.”
Colophon 2009 – International Magazine Symposium from March 13 to 15, 2009 in Luxembourg City across fifteen venues. Programme detailed and updated regularly, information and inscriptions here

At Colophon 2009, ten exhibitions will be dispatched all over the City of Luxembourg showing ten of the best and astonishing international magazines in then air now.

AICA Luxembourg

» Kasino A4 (Finland)

Place de Bruxelles, Kiosk
Opening hours : Fri., Sat. and Sun. from 10.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m. Outdoor exhibition.

Beaumontpublic + königbloc

» Volume (Netherlands)

21A, av. Gaston Diderich
Opening hours : Fri. from 12.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.
Sat .14th from 12.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. and Sun. from 2.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m.

Centre Culturel de Rencontre Abbaye de Neumünster

» La Más Bella (Spain)

28, rue Münster
Opening hours : Fri. from 11.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.
Sat. and Sun. from 11.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m.

Cinémathèque Municipale de la Ville de Luxembourg

» IdN (China)

17, place du Théâtre

Opening hours : Fri.– Sat. from 6.00 p.m. – 10.00 p.m.
Sun. from 12.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.
+ Special Media Movies Cycle Opening Mon. 9th March at 6.00 p.m.

Fondation de l’Architecture et de l’Ingénierie

» GOOD (USA)

1, rue de l’Aciérie
Opening hours : Fri. from 10.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.

Sat .14th from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. and Sun. from 2.00 p.m. to 5.00 p.m.

Galerie Nordine Zidoun

» Sang Bleu (Switzerland)

101, rue Adolphe Fischer
Opening hours : Fri. from 10.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.
Sat. from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. And Sun. from 2.00 p.m. to 5.00 p.m.

Konschthaus beim Engel

» Nuke (France)

1, rue de la Loge
Opening hours : Fri. from 10.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m. (close between 12.00 and 13.00)
Sat. 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m.(close between 12.00 and 13.00), Sun. 2.00 p.m. to 5.00 pm.

Galerie d’art Lucien Schweitzer

» Karen (UK)

24 Av., Monterey
Opening hours : Fri. from 10.00 a.m. to 10.00 p.m.

Sat. 14th from 10.00 a.m. to 6.00 pm. and Sun. 15th from 2.00 pm. to 5.00 p.m.

Musée d’Histoire de la Ville de Luxembourg, « Annexe »

» BabyBabyBaby (Mexico)

14, rue du Saint-Esprit

Opening hours : Fri. 10.00 a.m. – 10.00 p.m.

Sat. and Sun. from 10.00 a.m. – 6.00 p.m.

Nosbaum & Reding Art Contemporain

» Liebling (Germany)

4, rue Wiltheim

Opening hours : Fri. from 12.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m.

Sat .14th from 12.00 a.m. to 6.00 p.m. and Sun. from 2.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m.

Zona de Obras is a working team specialized in developing musical and cultural activities. It has an extensive team of collaborators in the main cities of Ibero-America and Europe. It is one of the most prestigious graphic design firms in Spain in subjects related to music and Latin American culture.

Colophon is delighted to welcome Zona de Obras as a media partner of the event in 2009!

More info about Zona de Obras, click here

DROME magazine is a prestigious, alternative and cosmopolitan Italian quarterly that deals with the contemporary world of art and culture, taking on a different theme in every issue.

More about Drome here

More info about Apartamento

Co-Founder Sahil Merchant was delighted to accept the award. “It is very encouraging to receive recognition for ignoring common wisdom and breaking all the accepted rules within an industry” he said. Unlike the newsagent channel, which Merchant goes out of his way to distance himself from, Mag Nation is constantly increasing its magazine range and also actively encourages customers to browse. In fact, the Mag Nation stores have signs saying “everything at Mag Nation can be touched, felt and browsed… except for our staff”.

Mag Nation has developed a cult following in Melbourne. Known for its range of over 4,000 mainstream as well as traditionally ‘hard to find’ niche magazines, its flagship store in Elizabeth St expanded to a new store in Greville St, Prahran early in 2008.

In the last two years, approximately 2 million people have walked through Mag Nation’s doors. “These customers have other choices, and we are therefore humbled that they continue to choose a small business like us over larger brand alternatives” says Merchant.

Asked why he thought Mag Nation was able to take out the Best Young Business Award over other nominees from many different industries, Merchant pointed to a willingness to experiment as driving their innovation. “Take our website as a case in point” he said, “Online magazine subscriptions are considered to be the enemy by most magazine retailers. Yet we have built a massive website offering both local and international magazine subscriptions, and have done so in a way that for the first time ever, allows customers to have an enjoyable experience as well as a pragmatic transaction. No other physical retailer has attempted to cannibalise themselves in this way”.

The Mag Nation website (www.magnation.com) features a city made of magazines that users can navigate through, as well as a tongue in cheek ‘magdentifier’ that takes users through an increasingly silly set of questions to recommend magazines based on their personality profile. Merchant feels that the website played a large part in their award win last night.

The title of Best New Business in Melbourne fits Mag Nation well. It seems that everyone other than the magazine industry grey hairs agree.

More info: www.magnation.com

Hotels are now online and best rates offered to all Colophon 2009 Flash Passers! Have a look to our Travel tips page and book your room now. Suites, single rooms, doubles and twins are available in different types of hotels. Fill a registrar forms or book by email/phone. All you have to say is “I am coming to Colophon 2009″!

Don’t get lost, find also a multitude of tips about how to come in Luxembourg, where is Luxembourg on the map (?!), addresses of the main locations, opening hours, phone numbers of taxis etc.

Help yourself and take our new Colophon’s 2009 banner for your blog at:

buzzparadise

Thanks to Vanksen for that!

More info about Vanksen

More info about Distill.

Website: www.distilldigital.com

It was total psychic horror: death, decay, dissolution, cold empty black malevolent lonely voided space. It was the worst thing I have ever confronted . . . I understood on an intuitive level why people kill themselves. If I had to go for any length of time with that feeling, I’d surely kill myself.” (‘Infinite Jest’, 1996).

Brrrrrr! this is what’s waiting for you in Lodown 63!

More info at www.lodownmagazine.com

Luis Mendo shows the new issue of POP is in a split run of no less than 6 different covers. With beautiful typography. See them in all glory here on Luis Mendo’s blog: http://bladblog.nl/

do you read me?! opening on the 30th of September – finally good Magazines have found their place in Berlin.

At do you read me?! you will find a curated assortment of contemporary Magazines and Reading. The shelves – specifically designed for the shop by Greige/Buero fuer Design – are constantly in flux, being filled with the latest issues from “A Prior” to “Interview” to “Zoo Magazine”.

Providing consultation, research and creating individual assortments for clients do you read me?! stands out as the specialised shop for magazines. Amongst famous galleries and better cuisine – the shop in Auguststrasse 28 offers a comprehensive range of art, culture, fashion, photography, design, architecture, literature, music, theater, society, politics and business titles.

Alongside relevant magazines to stay up-to-date with, like “Brand Eins”, “Du,” “Lettre”, “Monopol”, and “Vogue,” you will find unique Magazines like “Achtung”, “Another Magazine”, “Baseline”, “Foam” and “Nico”.

do you read me?! is no Newsstand – the classic glossies are only available by order! Make a shopping list, get the latest magazine news, or get your very own magazine box containing your orders and recommendations – for everybody that appreciates beautiful, intelligently written and well made magazines, do you read me?! in Auguststrasse 28, Berlin-Mitte, is the perfect place.
Do read more magazines!

do you read me?! GbR
Magazine und Lektüre der Gegenwart
Mark Kiessling, Jessica Reitz
Auguststraße 28
10117 Berlin-Mitte

Tel. +49-30-695 49 695
Fax +49-30-695 49 696

info@doyoureadme.de
www.doyoureadme.de

Newsletter: news@doyoureadme.de

Short Biographies:

Mark Kiessling
Having studied design at the Cologne Model (KISD) and founded Greige/Büro für Design eight years ago in Berlin. He is working as a successful Art Director and Designer for well-known fashion and cultural clients.
Together with his partner Rupert Kopp, he designed the Interior of do you read me?!, with the support of Uwe Andrés, designsfiction.

Jessica Reitz
Is a professional bookseller and bachelor of communications working for Dussmann das Kulturkaufhaus for several years as head of marketing.

Statement:
“We provide a subjective selection of beautiful, sapiently written, well crafted magazines in the scope of art, culture, fashion, photography, design, architecture, literature, music, theatre, society, politics and business. We look forward to compiling, together with our clients, the most beautiful, most interesting and most innovative magazines available from around the globe.”

A lot of designers regard the practice of infographics as dull and boring — but this is almost certainly because they’ve never tried it. The 10 we spoke to, and whose work we’ve used to illustrate this feature, love what they do and believe it offers as big a challenge and as great a satisfaction as any other kind of design.

IdN have also published the new book “Pens are my Friends” dedicated to Jon Burgerman’s works.

For the first time ever Jon Burgerman’s commercial, personal and collaborative works are collected together in one lavish publication. Included amongst the many projects are toys, clothing, exhibitions, murals, customizations, sketchbooks and a sick bag.

Accompanying the hundreds of pages of brain melting doodles, drawings, characters and colours are essays by the Pictoplasma team and editor of Modart Magazine, insights into Jon’s working process and, of course, photos of salads.

More info at : www.idnworld.com

Founder of Test Pilot Collective, a type and design studio, he also worked at a number of design studios-DNA Studio, American Eagle Outfitters, IDEO, Bigwords.com, Design Guys, and Duffy.

Rares and less rares books have been collected over the past 12 years. They range from graphic design, architecture, art, typography, illustration, skateboarding, graffiti, etc.

His collection included also an amazing selection of magazine’s premiere issues. A pleasure for the eyes..

More info: www.joekral.org
http://www.flickr.com/photos/joekral/

Contact Joe: info@joekral.org

Fall issue is available now, including “wonderful goodies from amazing profiles”, fall fashion regarding the cooling weather, coverages about Creativity Now Conferences held past Summer in New York and Stockholm and contents of selected panel discussions if you missed it. Rita Ackermann is on cover recovered by colors. Indefinable, almost. Featuring Louise Bourgeois retrospective at the Guggeheim, French Conceptual artist Sophie Calle in an exclusive interview with artist Jill Magid. Special menswear preview and a very hot promise which will vaporize this issue lava. Let’s see…

Tokion’s website: www.tokion.com

Cabinet magazine has open a new place for exhibitions and events in Brooklyn! The programme will starts in mid-October and will include exhibitions, screenings, talks, dinners, symposia, performances, workshops, boating expeditions, and more. The door is located at the 300 Nevins St, Brooklyn, but keep it secret!

More information at www.cabinetmagazine.org

Photo: Grant Willing

This is a magazine – Episode 25: Activities in time and space

Intra-dimensional episode with: aids-3d, Center for Tactical Magic, Damon Zucconi, Francesco Spampinato, Grant Willing, Harm van den Dorpel, Loshadka, Nikola Tosic, Oliver Laric, Shane Hope , Yoshi Sodeoka.

With site-specific performative installations – Happening 20 September 2008 8pm

8.00pm Francesco Spampinato x Sbudellatron “Unbounded”
8.30pm My Cat is an Alien “Beyond yr shadow – I am / I am not (here?)”

Careof DOCVA
Fabbrica del Vapore
via Procaccini 4, 20154 Milano
+39 02 3315800
careof@careof.org
www.careof.org
www.docva.org

The episode continues from 19 September – 11 October 2008, Tuesday to Saturday 3.00 – 7.00pm

http://www.thisisamagazine.com
http://www.thisisnotamagazine.com

DEVORA RAN® presents it’s second issue debating and discussing porn, eroticism and art.

DEVORA RAN® is a magazine about the sex culture, founded by two women who are sick of a traditional and repetitive vision of pornography. DEVORA RAN® is the unedited showroom of the sexual revolution that society is experiencing; a real alternative to the current sex industry’s conventionalism.

DEVORA RAN® is directed at women and men, which makes it the first sex magazine aimed at a mixed audience. The strength of DEVORA RAN® lies in the fact it is the alternative everyone has been waiting for. It makes its debut in the market, without any competition, ready to satisfy consumers who are culture loving and unrepressed in their sexuality.

DEVORA RAN® is not a porn magazine. It includes much more than penetration, fellatio and big cocks. It doesn’t only depict posing models, but explores real people’s sexual attitudes and culture.

DEVORA RAN® is a showcase for its collaborators’ work: portraying sex through photography, cinema, music, literature, philosophy, painting, illustration, design, etc.
DEVORA RAN® fuses pornography and art, organizing events and publishing the work of the best artists.

DEVORA RAN® is edited in Spanish and English and publishes every two months the most recent contents online. Eventually, luxury editions will be printed.

More info: www.devoraran.com

mono.kultur is a central platform for a potentially larger network of activities within different areas of culture, with the mono in the name not only standing for the mono-themed approach within the magazine, but also as a reminder to adhere to a certain attitude and philosophy within everything that mono.kultur do.

First proper external collaboration on a new fashion label under the moniker of mono.gramm will be showed this week during London Fashion Week at the temporary showroom in the East End.

Private View on 16.09.2008 from 18h – 22h or at any other time during the opening times specified below.

Showroom 14.09.2008?–?26.09.2008, 12h?–?19h.
yfbs, 207 Whitecross Street, London EC1Y 8QP, UK, www.yfbs.co.uk

The Drome Revolution Tour 2008

Focussing on the many magnificent European cities, and on some across the Atlantic too, DROME celebrates its current glorious trilogy – liberté (DROME 12), égalité (DROME 13), fraternité (DROME 14) helping to constantly liven up and support exhibitions, celebrations, awards and parties, from September to December 2008.

The DROME revolution tour 2008
Bestiario: festival di sperimentazione artistica – rome, 23/26.09.08? the inspired by drome night: 24.09.08?ex mattatoio di testaccio ?web: www.festivalbestiario.org ? ?tina b. 2008 the prague contemporary art festival – prague, 25.09/15.10.08 ?various locations ?web: www.tina-b.eu

Vienna design week – vienna, 02/12.10.08 ?various locations ?web: www.viennadesignweek.at
Pecha kucha night – trieste, 04.10.08 ?mercato ortofrutticolo?web: www.pecha-kucha.org
Artverona 2008 – verona, 16/20.10.08 ?exhibition grounds of verona?web: www.artverona.it
Zoo art fair 2008 – london, 17/20.10.08?royal academy of arts?web: www.zooartfair.com
Illustrative 2008 – zurich, 17/26.10.08 ?drome magazine young illustrators award 2008 ?zürich messehallen?web: www.illustrative.de
Show off 2008 – paris, 22/26.10.08 ?espace pierre cardin ?web: www.showoffparis.com
Art forum berlin 13 – berlin, 31.10/03.11.08?messegelände berlin ?web: www.art-forum-berlin.de
Artissima 15 – turin, 07/09.11.08 ?lingotto fiere ?web: www.artissima.it
Art basel miami beach 2008 – miami, 04/07.12.08 ?miami beach convention center?web: www.artbaselmiamibeach.com

info: drome@dromemagazine.com web: www.dromemagazine.com

More information:
Exhibition L’art en Europe, Domaine Pommery à Reims, 5 place du Général Gouraud 51100 Reims, Tel : +33 03.26.61.62.63, www.pommery.com
Ends 31st December 2008. Catalogue published at the occasion, print: August 2008.

by Rick Poynor, the contributing editor of PRINT.

For a medium that is regularly pronounced to be living on borrowed time, the magazine seems to be in a surprisingly perky state of health. If you took the industry’s temperature by scanning the racks in Borders, you might find it hard to credit that there is any problem at all. London branches of the store, like their American counterparts, are awash with titles catering to every conceivable interest and taste. In reality, though, while there are more titles on sale than ever, the total number of sales in the U.S.—366 million copies a year—has remained the same since 1990, so the trend for many publications is downward.

Nevertheless, as the title of a recent book put it, We Love Magazines—the “we” in this case being design people. The book accompanied the Colophon2007 symposium in Luxembourg, an event about independent magazines co-curated by Jeremy Leslie, a British magazine-design supremo at the custom publishing house John Brown. Leslie is also author of magCulture, a survey of contemporary magazines that later became a popular blog. In January, he was at it again, co-organizing a conference with the title “Magazines Are Dead: Long Live the Magazine!” (Maybe there is no revival; maybe it’s just Leslie’s tireless promotional activities that make it seem as if there must be one going on.)

I used to be an obsessive follower of what was happening in magazines, but it’s an expensive and space-consuming habit, and I eventually slowed down. I always took it for granted that the best magazines offered a combination of great writing and great visual appeal, with design as an expression of the content. Lately, the trend has been more and more toward magazines that you look at rather than read in any concerted way, and Leslie’s first magazine survey, Issues, actually began with the declaration, “I don’t read magazines.” Someone else wrote those words, but they set the tone for the whole book. For a writer, the sentiment is a complete turnoff. Apart from art and design titles, the magazines I tend to buy these days are publications devoted to commentary about books, music, film, and politics. While it’s important that they are designed for comfortable reading, they will never be featured in roundups of the latest trendy design.

So I decided to conduct a survey. My method was simple. I went to Borders and bought every youthful, creative, free-spirited, independent British magazine that caught my eye. Many of these titles occupy or extend the style-magazine territory defined by The Face (now defunct), i-D (founded in 1980 and still soldiering on), and later by Dazed & Confused and Sleazenation. Sleazenation is now also departed, and was the last title of this kind I read regularly because I liked its sharp, historical awareness of pop culture and its critical, questioning view of the corporate pressures on contemporary youth culture. In no particular order, here are the titles I took home: Flux, Blag, Fused Magazine, Product, Garageland, Wonderland, Wound, Sublime, Karen, Amelia’s Magazine, Let Them Eat Cake, Nude, Bad Idea, Meat Magazine, and Little White Lies. Most of these titles have arrived on the stands since 2000, and some are just a few issues old, although it turned out that Blag—founded by art student twins and financed these days entirely by sponsored advertorials—has been around in one form or another since 1992.

What I was hoping to find were magazines that convey a sense of necessity. They need to exist because they have something to say that no other publication expresses with the same urgency, excitement, inventiveness, completeness, or precision. They come from a deep sense of commitment, they are propelled by genuine passion, and they offer information and insights that simply aren’t available with the same vividness anywhere else. They express their moment because they participate in it, yet they also stand a little apart from it, showing self-awareness and a capacity for reflection that isn’t possible for absolute insiders. Above all, they define their own agenda.

Design is a significant factor, though it cannot be the sole criterion or even the first consideration. For a magazine to gel, it needs an editorial vision. That vision may come from a designer, if the designer is also the founder, publisher, editor, or an especially potent force in the magazine’s creation, and it may well involve visual ideas and visual expression, but there has to be subject matter—content—before there can be expression. If the content is compelling, the magazine can hold together and engage the reader—note reader—even if the design doesn’t break new ground.

Good examples of this are Nude, which offers “music, graphics, and hip lit”; Bad Idea, devoted to “modern storytelling”; and Little White Lies, a film magazine. All of these journal-like publications, with attractively small pages, have visual strengths—Little White Lies’ illustrated covers, each based on a film image, are particularly effective—but their reason for being is to explore cultural, literary, and cinematic subject matter that their editors and writers know and care about. Although Meat Magazine and Garageland, both five issues old (as is Bad Idea), have yet to show the same coherence, they put a notable emphasis on writing; it would be perverse to buy any of these titles merely to flip the pages. All of them get by, at least for now, with little, if any, advertising.

Fashion-led titles play by different rules, so here we have no choice but to flip. The 11th issue of Wonderland is clotted with ads from Marc Jacobs, Calvin Klein, Gucci, and DKNY, followed by pages of tedious, narcissistic fashion shoots. The design has a kind of informal monumentality that quickly becomes repetitive. Yet whenever I was on the verge of tossing Wonderland aside, an intriguing article would pop up about shop-window dummies, the continuing relevance of cut-and-paste collage-making, or the found photo artworks of Canadian artist Steven Shearer.

The second issue of the bizarrely titled and even fatter Wound—the name comes from a line in a Robert Frost poem—shows greater signs of wanting to have it both ways by serving the commercial fashion system while coming on like a fire-breathing, free-thinking radical. “There’s an underground renaissance around the corner,” says a designer. “There’s a lot of us out there ready for change.” If they threw out the interminable fashion spreads and kept the well-researched features about androgyny (the issue’s theme), synth punk, and the use of color in architecture, it would make an engagingly eccentric arts mag—it already reads like it’s been hijacked by art-school lecturers. As it stands, Wound goes to a lot of editorial trouble for something that’s bound to be treated as a flipbook. Let Them Eat Cake, the best-designed title in my informal survey, is much lighter on its feet, making this fresh-faced fashion newcomer one to watch, although it has a long way to go to match the editorial confidence and panache of The Face or i-D, which were always worth reading in their heyday.

Most of these magazines are small-scale, intimate ventures in which the presence and personality of the people who make them is evident. Amelia’s Magazine, a lavish, ultra-feminine, relentlessly patterned and curlicued production—reading it feels a bit like being smothered in a pile of floral cushions—is the creation of publisher–editor–art director Amelia Gregory, a one-woman, home-publishing powerhouse. Issue eight is as thick as Vogue: This one may go far. By contrast, Karen is an agreeably petite, restrained, and almost poetic meditation on everyday life and ordinary experience in words and pictures, put together by someone who may be called Karen. It’s about as close to a personal blog as a magazine could be.

Leslie argues that the future of magazines (such as it is) lies in becoming even more magazine-like and supplying distinctive, design-led experiences that you can’t get from the web: unusual paper stock, page formats, special extras, freebies. These British independent magazines, which usually depend on a symbiotic relationship with a website, certainly cater to an enduring need for tactile, smell-the-ink, hold-it-in-your-hands “thing-ness.” While none of these titles could yet be called a classic, several of them—Bad Idea, Little White Lies, Karen—do convey a sense of real necessity. They also confirm that the urge to publish a magazine, even now in the age of immediate online dissemination, comes from seeing thoughts and opinions given the tangibility and satisfying permanence of ink on paper. Adventurous ideas have always required words for their fullest expression. Magazines will surely wither without good writing.

More information about PRINT: http://www.printmag.com/design_articles/observer_not_dead_yet/tabid/360/Default.aspx

From 032c Bulletin March 2008. Save the Date: Saturday, 5th of April 2008
Next to the German Foreign Ministry in Berlin-Mitte, 032c will open its new MUSEUM STORE designed by KONSTANTIN GRCIC with an exhibition and party on Saturday, the 5th of April 2008.
Invitation to follow.
LEAD MAGAZINE OF THE YEAR

032c caused a mild media sensation in Hamburg last week by winning unexpected the prestigious German media award LEAD MAGAZINE OF THE YEAR against AD (Condé Nast) and STERN (Gruner & Jahr). BILD Zeitung says: “Ein globales Magazin!” Thank you.

www.leadacademy.de

NEW YORK TIMES T MAGAZINE ON 032c
There has been a lot of coverage of the new design aesthetic of 032c Magazine, but hopefully the final word on the new ugly phenomenon has now been said in the current issue of T: The New York Times
Style Magazine.

www.nytimes.com/indexes/2008/03/09/style/t/index.html#pageName=09Rawsthorn

Kasino A4 Magazine is ranked as one of the top 10 independent style magazines by the editor of Style Press Angelo Cirimele on WGSN.com.

Cirimele writes the following about Kasino A4:

“Finland, the other homeland of graphic design” could be a fine slogan for the independent-collective-published Kasino A4, which knows how to combine limited means – black and white – with graphic effect – glossy and monochrome cover.

Subjects are rich and angles surprising, written in quality English language. Fashion gets the spontaneous treatment; atmosphere can in turn be natural and peaceful, or violent and urban. With six issues published so far, Kasino A4 leaves no one indifferent.

Kasino A4 Magazine Issue #7, The Family Issue, is published April 20th, 2008. In connection with the family-theme Kasino A4 has an online campaign, which gives readers a chance to join the Kasino-family by pre-ordering the upcoming issue for 10 euros. In return the new family member will receive a personalised copy of The Family Issue delivered home.

More about the campaign and the magazine:
http://www.wearekasino.com/

Pekka Toivonen, Art Director
pekka@wearekasino.com +358 50 583 4415

Jonathan Mander, Editor
jm@wearekasino.com +358 40 747 5006

“More magazines than you’ve ever seen”.

News from our friend Ravi Pathare: The fifth store in the Mag Nation stable opened successfully in Melbourne a couple of weeks and is going great guns. Have a look: http://www.magNation.com