Vhcle Issue 13

vhcle

ISSUE 13 FALL 2013 / VHCLE MAGAZINE

masthead

MASTHEAD / CONTRIBUTORS

Charlie Lee / Founding Director

Editorial Cassie Lee / Founding Editor

Jamie Thunder / Books Editor, Sub-Editor

Desig ne rs Raoul Ortega / Visual Director

Thomas Adcock / Visual Designer thomas@vhcle.com

CONTR IBUTOR S Tim Sunderman, Marc Ingber, Jamie Thunder, Emma Davies, Myles Lawrence-Briggs, Julie Craig, Elise Wehle, Gianmarco Magnani Cover: Gianmarco Magnani, Print 001A Vhcle Books: Illustration by Thomas Adcock Vhcle Woman: Photo on (p32) by Raoul Ortega, Photo (p34) provided by Julie Craig -- Vhcle Magazine Tel: USA +1 415.364.8568 contact@vhcle.com

Facebook: Vhcle Mag Twitter: @vhcle -- Published by Charlie Lee: Vhcle Magazine, www.vhcle.com All content copyright 2013. All rights reserved.

Without limiting rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced without the prior written permission from both the copyright owner and the publisher of this magazine. Vhcle Magazine is not responsible for the return or loss of, or for any damage or injury to, any unsolicited manuscripts or artwork.

/ Illustration by Thomas Adcock

Short Stories

-- By Jamie Thunder

/ Vhcle Books, Issue 13, pp20-23

In the swel tering hea t that accompanies the British summer – it’s reached over 30C at times! – I’ve found myself reading a lot of short stories.

This could be because the drowsiness induced by the sun lends itself to shorter stories that require less attention. Or because I’d just finished several longer novels and needed something more immediate to relieve my reading fatigue.

But either way, it got me wondering: why don’t we read more short stories?

assumptions developed over the previous 30 pages, makes them feel taken for a mug. Or else they are too well-wrapped, too selfconsciously self-contained, a cloying cupcake in a bow-tied box.

This doesn’t, however, answer our question – after all, plenty of terrible novels are published and eagerly bought. So is the problem with us? After all, when was the last time you read a short story?

In the early 21st century the short story is not dead, but it lives a secretive life. It’s hidden away in the Books sections of magazines and newspapers, only occasionally surfacing in a full collection. Short stories act now as a calling card, like the flimsy shampoo samples found pasted on the glossy pages of magazines. “Look,” they cry, “If you like this, you’ll love my new novel!”

The form deserves better than this, to be a wingman for the real moneymakers. But until we value short stories enough to pay for them – whether in collections or as individual downloads – that will be their lot.

Maybe this comes down to book-lovers being an ornery lot, with short stories becoming collateral damage in the war against the

attention-deficit generation. And it’s hard to deny that there’s something almost pugilistically satisfying about finishing all 550 pages of Crime and Punishment, a feeling of achievement. Yet few readers are still holding out against Kindles on sentimental, nostalgic grounds, and it would be a shame if it was simply stubbornness that took us away from the delights that a short story can provide.

Reading a short story brings a different enjoyment than a novel. In a short story you can hold the entire structure of the story in your hand, and appreciate the craft that’s gone into it sentence by sentence without exhausting yourself. Then there’s the privately momentous point when you spot the story’s title glinting from the page; in the enclosed space it’s like finding a tiny piece of treasure.

There are still short story ‘specialists’ writing today: the likes of Lorrie Moore, Alice Munro, and more recently Wells Tower all write moving, funny, complete short stories that don’t feel constrained by their shorter word counts. So next time you find yourself at a loss for what to read next, try some short stories, and remember: it’s not how many words you use; it’s what you do with them that counts.

1984

George Orwell

-- Reviewed by Emma Davies

/ Vhcle Books, Issue 13, pp24-27

The image from 1984 that lingers longest in the memory is not the ambiguous terror of Room 101. It’s not the all-seeing, all-knowing pdeuso-mythical figure of Big Brother. It’s not even the prospect of a world in which even thought is controlled. No, it’s the ending: a solitary man, sat in the corner of a disreputable cafe, soaked in substandard gin and broken into submissive obedience. That people are fallible and resistance against the regime proves futile is a theme that runs throughout much of Orwell’s work – but it’s here it finds perhaps its most haunting expression.

Thought Police; he caves under pressure and betrays his lover; he ends up ironed into submission by an oppressive, tyrannical state that wields absolute power simply for its own sake.

There is no glory in this tale. Orwell’s unheroic hero is unceremoniously crushed, and you’re left in no doubt as to how a similar scenario would play out with any other protagonist. No happy ending; instead a defeated man, a bottle of clove gin, and a sense of grim inevitability. And Big Brother, always watching.

VHCLE WOMAN Julie craig

B / ÉTOILE ISABEL MARANT / Ankara Collarless Jacket

I have been obsessively looking at this jacket for weeks now. While it is insanely out of my price range, I lust after it. So fluffy and big!

A shop near my house has a bunch of these La Rochere glassware. Simple and understated, with their iconic bee on them all. An awesome old French style.

F / BEST MADE COMPANY / Seamless & Steadfas t Enamel Steel Pla tes

These plates are the best of all worlds for me. They remind me of camping, have that nautical essence, are enamel and are completely unique. Plus the shop they are from has the most amazing things. I want them all.

G

E / JUST FEMALE / Temp Jacke t in Gre y Mela nge

I love a big coat. You can wear a boring outfit, but when you throw on a great coat, you instantly look great. This one looks like a huge cocoon of wool.

G / ONE TEASPOON / CRY TO UGH SLOUCH PANT

The essential pants for me. Slouchy, comfy but still look so cool. One Teaspoon clothes always have that ‘beach girl in the city’ look.

to develop a project based on my own ideas. When I was at university I thought design projects would be, for example, developing a graphic campaign for the Rolling Stones. But after many years working in the field I realized that things were different. I understood that maybe a project for the Rolling Stones would never be possible. It was 2009, a hard time in Europe and the agency I worked for had to close, and so I had to focus my attention on the next step.

I have been very influenced, since I was a child, by all manga and comics that came from Japan during the ‘80s, so I always had a lot of ideas about designs like those mentioned

– combining texts, logotypes and icons based on a black inked illustration style. After many conversations with my wife about all these ideas without a place or a client I decided to work on a personal project about illustration, entitled 100 Prints (www.silencetv.com). I started this project in 2010 and I think it will be finished around 2016. The project is basically composed by 100 Prints, divided into 25 series, composed by 4 Prints. During late 2010, after many prints, I decided to try something in the music field, creating a series for a rock band. So I made those prints and because I didn’t want to use any existing band, I chose a fictitious name and called it Sixty Watts (www.sixty-watts.com).

At that moment it was just a series about music, nothing else beyond that. A few weeks later after posting that series, I read on a French blog some comments about my work and those specific prints. The blog comments said something like “ … these are some posters for a rock band called Sixty Watts, but don’t try to search their music because they don’t exist ... “ When I read those words I got an interesting idea. I remembered when I was a child and the affect it caused when I saw album covers of bands from the ‘70s and ‘80s in record stores. Then I remembered the project that never came for the Rolling Stones, and then I thought: If I have all these ideas for a rock band and don’t have the band to work with, then I will invent my own rock band. And because it doesn’t exist it would be the only rock band that has everything except music. At the very beginning and several times during the process, I thought ‘how ridiculous is this idea?’ But then I thought about it as “different” and I’m sure that moment was very important for me and kept me going on. So I studied and worked for a year on this project. I bought various things about music from the US, Europe and Japan. I started studying all the products that I bought and also read about history, discography and curiosities from different bands. All that gave me more ideas

than the ones I had and more possibilities for design. When I looked at that album cover, and without listening to the music, my imagination started creating a complete story. And that if I want, it could be endless.

What is your creating process like? I start almost all ideas on paper, taking a lot of references from books, magazines and also the internet. I first start thinking on a concept and then I start making sketches for the entire composition, combining icons, fonts, logotypes, headers and all those elements around a main character. I try to keep a square format. I always start each work using just black ink and I try to finish it that way. Sometimes it works and sometimes it needs an accent, so then I’ll try adding a simple color scheme to the composition. I love to draw with pencil and ink, but right now my work is mostly digital, so I’m focused on vector illustration using a laptop and also a Wacom.

Favorite drink? Cold water.

/13

Issue 14 coming 12/2013 www.vhcle.com