Dear Readers, Omg we did it! It’s the first issue of SMASH Magazine and I’m freaking out like it’s a slumber party with Chrissie Teigen and I accidentally packed my sweatpants with the hole in the crotch. A lot of blood, sweat, and tears went into making this thing come to life and I couldn’t be more grateful to everyone who helped make SMASH happen. Special thanks to Kinsley Stocum for designing the gorgeous covers and working so hard to help me find the perfect fit. Thank you so much to all the contributors - it was a pleasure reading your work and looking at your submissions. Big thank you to Dakota Brown and the entire Publishing as Creative Practice class for being so rad and offering such great ideas and helpful support. XOXO to Casey Carsel for being such a patient teacher. When I was a kid I used to save every single magazine I could get my hands on (or steal from my mom) and carefully cut out pictures of every rock star, every outfit, every stylized letter and piece together my own collages to hang on my bedroom walls. I wanted SMASH to feel like a bedroom wall collage. Bright, beautiful, and a little bit messy. I truly hope you enjoy what I’ve put together. If you don’t, that’s cool too but just make sure to use nice stationary for your hate mail or I won’t even look at it honey. Consensual Hugs and Kisses,
KFancy
Table of Contents Cover by Kinsley Stocum Letter From The Editor...............................................................Page 1 Photography by Marqui Johnstone..........................................Page 2 Table of Contents.........................................................................Page 3 Photography by DeVaughn Taylor............................................Page 4 Illustration by Kinsley Stocum.................................................Page 5 Cover Girl Data Sheet.................................................................Page 6 Poems and Illustrations by Kaitlin Weed.................................Pages 7 - 10 Photography by Kaycie Surrell.................................................Page 11 In A World of My Own Making by Darjita Jain........................Page 12 Sestina for the DivaCup by Kaycie Surrell..............................Page 13 Advertisement for Ghost Eyes..................................................Page 14 Photography by DeVaughn Taylor............................................Page 15 - 16 Heroes by Bethany Ziskind Hankins........................................Page 17 Photography by Kaycie Surrell.................................................Page 18 Lili’s Planet by Kaycie Surrell...................................................Page 19 Photography by Kaycie Surrell.................................................Page 20 Jesus Snakes by Taylor Croteau...............................................Page 21 - 23 Advertisement for Ghost Eyes..................................................Page 24 Don’t Say My Name by Cat Strain............................................Page 25 - 26 Back Cover by Kinsley Stocum
Model: Molly Grotha
Model: Stephanie Mejias
In a world of my own making Darshita Jain there wouldn’t be a box. or man. or gods vicious enough to set a trap. eyes, looking under not for the stab wound - eyes peeking tenderly below the scar - eyes tired with pain ; what’s mine is yours; let’s heal together – eyes not green with lust of thirst and desire to burst a bubble of their own making - a world in violet and blue - transparent skin - transparent floating beings - bubbling to the brim of this urn, a world with ants and wasps and hummingbird songs – fairy wings not too tender to touch – not trapped in a golden box – not frozen for eternity in a snapshot – not waiting to take the incriminating shot of Pandora opening the box and remain damned for eternity - unable to resist beauty and open a can of worms – not this world, always a shade of grey, mixed with the red daze of being played - there was never grass. never shadow. never a tree bent over backwards to please the sun, never rose petals under the palm of my hand, never a woman too dumb to not wonder if it was a rigged game.
Sestina for the DivaCup Kaycie Surrell Her first period came in the morning and she felt her insides convulse and rage. Her mother found her next, scared and pink — brightest red on the clean, white towel. “What happens next,”, she whispered all soft and quiet so nobody would know. Mostly, the boy who could never know that she had changed overnight, this morning a woman with blood that dripped onto soft skin and new panties, all the rage and quick, her mother gave her a towel to clean up. Then a maxi-pad in pink plastic to tape inside her new pink underwear. “It’s this or that you know” she said, a tampon next to the towel like a dagger, too spooky for morning — threatening to return each month with rage promising her she’d never again be soft. Every month she wrapped herself in soft blankets, a heating pad on her bright pink skin doing its best but still a rage filled her. How could nobody know a better way than this? A sweet morning of relief before she threw in the towel? Then suddenly, as she sat on her bath towel a small, beautiful thing made of squishy soft rubber caught her attention from her morning magazine. It jumped out from the rest of the pink glossy pages. Did nobody know? How could she have been so blind? Hot rage filled her then. An ad — “Brand new, all the rage modern, reusable like a towel!” “Twelve hours of total comfort, you’ll know it’s the one for you! Our product is soft and comes in cool, clear purple or pink! Never have another stressful morning!” and now she knows that small rubber perfectly pink thing is meant to quell her rage. The DivaCup! So soft like the towel she sits on when she shoves it inside herself each morning.
Ghost Eyes t-shirt and accessories. Photography by Bethany Puterbaugh. Model: Peyton Stewart. Website: ghosteyes.net
“My brand Ghost Eyes is sustainably handmade striving to empower all bodies. All items jewelry, accessories and apparel are handmade myself here in Chicago.� - Natalie Standiferd
Provocateur: pruh-vok-uh-tur; one who provokes trouble, dissension, or the like; one who provokes. “Being an artist is one thing, it's not hard to create something visually appealing. But to provoke an emotion, a feeling, a thought...that's a whole other high. My portraits celebrate beauty in the vulnerable, the somber, and the lustful. Feel like you're seeing something you shouldn't? Good.� - DeVaughn Taylor
Model: Molly Grotha
Heroes Bethany Ziskind Hankins So, you say you want a hero. Girl, you’d best start trying to be your own, cause rock stars were never made waiting for white knights to take them home. And the words look pretty on the page, girl, but they won’t shake nobody’s soul, waiting in a spiral bound cage for some melody to come make them whole. And action figures may be fun, babe— but they won’t save nobody’s life. You best keep that cape in the toy box, and not try to use that to fly. Cause you can love, love, love all you like, but lovin’ love ain't gonna change your story. It’s time to play the protagonist, girl. Don’t give sidekicks the Hero’s glory. So, you say you want a hero, Girl. You’d best start trying to be your own, cause you’re the greatest story never written, and the pen is in your hand alone.
Model: Danelle Porter
Lili’s Planet Kaycie Surrell Lili K is a Cancer with a Pisces moon and a Scorpio rising, a quality to which she attributes her moody songs and writing style matched by her seemingly unshakable confidence and effervescent personality. She looks at you like someone who’s been through it all before because she has. Lili was discovered by Tidal in 2015 before they were acquired by Jay-Z and before they were known as the streaming service that claimed exclusive rights to highly sought after albums like Beyonce’s “Lemonade” and Kanye’s “Life of Pablo.” Lili, now in complete control of the direction her music takes her, is interested in using her voice and her connections to say something meaningful. She spent too long getting pushed in a direction that didn’t feel genuine. It’s a familiar trajectory. Singer gets discovered. Singer gets flown around the world. Singer makes an album. Singer gets slowly pushed to the back-burner in favor of easily categorized and genre-specific musicians who are a bit easier to sell to record executives and the general public. “When I did the 2015 album roll-out I had a team, a PR manager, a stylist and it kind of turned into everybody else’s thing and not my thing,” Lili said. “I felt like I was being pushed in a million different directions and I felt really depressed. The whole thing.” So she fired everyone. At 23 Lil K was the face of Tidal — as in hers was the first you’d see when you visited their website. She was being flown to Los Angeles and New York and taking meetings with Jay-Z. She even headlined the Made in America Music Festival that year. But it was too much. The work was there. She had the spotlight. But she still never signed to a major label and has no plans to. “I started stripping everything down and starting over because I didn’t want music to be something I hated. But there’s anxiety in that too. Have I been gone too long? Is it too late? Does anybody care anymore?” Lili
said. “But I’ve come to a point in my self-love journey where I feel confident enough to get back to why I did music in the first place so even though we’ve re-cut a long of songs and reworked a lot of things I think the album is better for it.” Fast forward to this year. “Planet of Flowers” is done but Lili admits she’s scared to release it. The album is her baby and without any team, it’s up to her to face the anxiety associated with releasing something so personal. POF is the album where she opens up about mental illness, abusive relationships, self doubt, systematic oppression, and how to cope. Without the proper funding and distribution, the stress and pressure of finding the right way to release an album can be overwhelming. “I decided that I needed to create something for FUN; I needed to create music just for the sake of creating music,” Lili said. “I landed on the idea of making an EP full of collaborations with my friends; that EP ended up being called “Songs With Friends.” It's a five-song EP that features collaborations with music friends of mine from my two hometowns; Milwaukee and Chicago.” The EP (out May 10) features fellow artists and close friends: The O'My's, Klassik, B-Free, Evan Lane, and Air Credits. The songs are produced by Lili and the featured artists, respectively. “The point of making this EP was to get back to creating for the love of creating. Also, it serves as a re-introduction before I come out swinging with ‘Planet of Flowers.’” Follow for more: @lilikjazz
“My sophomore album Planet of Flowers was finished about two years ago, but I wasn't ready to put it out. Mentally, emotionally, professionally, personally... I had to figure my shit out. I had to take a step back from the industry and fall in love with myself as a human, because I was unhappy.”
“I finally decided I needed a change, and I went out to LA for a few months. I started doing vocal production and songwriting for other artists, I spent a lot of time by myself, and I began to fall back in love with myself and my craft.”
Makeup by Marqui Johnstone
Ghost Eyes Accessories. Photography by Bethany Puterbaugh. Model: Peyton Stewart
Don’t Say My Name Cat Strain My first name is Catherine, but my family calls me Alex. I was conceived in a dorm room in North Carolina, and popped out nine months later. My parents didn’t know what sex I was going to be, so Alex seemed like a safe choice — Alexander or Alexandra. All of my Christmas ornaments, cross stitched bible verses, and cards are all made out to that name. Alex isn’t a childhood nickname, it is my name. It wasn’t until elementary school that I had to reckon with its significance. I was quite the social butterfly as a child. I was invited to a lot of birthday parties. I would arrive, stoked, gift at the ready and holding my mom’s hand. The birthday boy’s parents would greet us and go, “Oh, Alex is a girl.” I wasn’t just their buddy anymore, I was their girlfriend. From second grade onward I was shunned by the girls for being too masculine, and shunned by the boys because my mere presence got them in trouble with the adults. As a rough-and-tumble kid I demanded that I only wear “soft pants.” Much easier to climb trees that way. I would run with the boys and play tag, or pirates. Much more fun than sitting on a decommissioned tire to gossip or talk about marriage, yuck. During recess we would all race to the playground, the last one there was It. I remember sitting on the bridge with my legs draped on either side of the bars, just chillin’. A teacher came up and told me to close my legs. I was seven. I had to be categorized, my friendships with these boys only made sense if we were dabbling in some patriarchal flirtation with adulthood. My parents had three children in five years. They were a fresh 25 when my younger sister was born. You could say that dressing their children up was low-priority after getting food on the table. My family has a lot of fond memories of grocery store runs in which my brother would be in Superman PJs and a cape with yellow rain boots, while I wore sensible princess dress-up heels. We weren’t crying, and we were dressed and ready to go, so why make a
big deal out of it? But my name, my clothing, my parents — it all become innocently complicit in how I was treated by my community. As I grew and moved through the education system, it became apparent that I could not escape, “Alex.” During attendance on the first day of my junior year English class, Mrs. Parish called out, “Catherine?” Before I could open my mouth, a peer jumped in a said, “She goes by, ‘Alex’.” Alright, then. The teacher pauses and replies, “Oh, that’s not on the sheet.” “Yeah, it’s my middle name. Catherine is f—.” “Everyone calls her ‘Alex’!” says the helpful classmate. So that settled it. My first taste of freedom was at theater camp. No middle name on that attendance sheet. I made the penultimate decision to slim “Catherine,” down to “Cat.” My friends don’t call me Alex. They understand that it’s reserved for people who’ve lived through my pre-Cat history. You have to earn nicknames, so it makes sense that you would have to earn the right to call me by mine. Additionally, It’s difficult to get to me to respond to “Alex” — unless I’m at home. I’ve elegantly partitioned it off from the rest of my life. It’s allowed me to compartmentalize my past. Alex is here, Cat is there. Even better, I don’t have to explain Cat. It’s a part of my first name. The ease of identification I’ve only just begun to experience is the norm for everyone else. I eat, sleep, and wake with both ears to the ground. I worry that I’ll be called out for my name(s). Cat seems made up, and Alex isn’t on my license. It’s been difficult to feel ownership over either of them. I’m reluctantly disturbed when I hear either one come out of the wrong mouth. In mixed company I respond to neither, until someone inevitably yells, “Catherine!” A sure way to get my attention, due to its long-ingrained use on behalf of my mother when I hadn’t completed a chore, or was caught terrorizing a sibling. Either way, hearing my name — any name — isn’t natural. So, it’s Cat, for now. “Catherine,” when I’m in trouble.