Hasta La Ideas

It’s really cold outside today and now it is snowing. The malls have their Christmas decorations up. Next week is American Thanksgiving. So I guess all signs point to Christmas! So in preparations for gift-giving season, I’ve uploaded a special item to the shop: an UPPERCASE Christmas Gift Pack + Subscription. This includes all available back issues (#7-#11) plus a subscription mailed to the USA or Canada for $150 (you save $20). I have VERY LIMITED QUANTITIES and once these are gone, that’s it for issue #7; it will be sold out. (Issue #7 is only available as part of this pack. You might try the workroom for single copies of #7.) Please order your Gift Pack here.

I am always interested to know how the magazine inspires people. When Mustaali Raj, an avid subscriber and regular visitor to my studio, mentioned that issue #9’s exploration on how food inspires creativity led to a photo project with The Western Muslim, I was curious to see more.

“Of all the meals eaten during Ramadan, the Suhur (the pre-fajr morning meal) is the most diverse amongst Muslims all over the world. We thought to ourselves, wouldn’t it be interesting to see what others are eating? And we did just that. The Western Muslim is presenting “The Art of Suhur”, a photo album on our facebook page showcasing suhur meals.”

Mustaali has sent in submissions for almost every open call! We published his matchbox labels, but alas didn’t have enough room to include his pet portrait in the current issue. So behold, Cuddles, the pet cockatiel:

Thanks, Mustaali!

Making things requires making a mess. In issue 10, we celebrated the creative mess in all its shredded, snipped, smeared and scattered glory by asking our readers to submit photos of their creative workspace. Here are some outtakes—we couldn’t fit everything into the magazine!

My name is Jessica and I’m the maker behind Miniature Rhino. I loved this “Mess is More!” call for submissions theme. As a maker, blogger, and blog reader I often feel like what we leave out our messes and mistakes. They are far more interesting than the perfect pictures we paint. I call these pictures my craft vanitas, and hope that you enjoy them!

One of the best things about Renegade Fairs is that we get to meet our many contributors. In San Francisco, Brynn Metheney came by to say hi. Brynn’s conceptual creatures are featured in the current issue #10 with an article written by Glen. Brynn’s The Morae River project involved creating an entire world and its inhabitants; we chose to include her work for its imaginative quality and that it worked with two of our themes of this issues—animals as creative inspiration and visual story-telling. Read more about Brynn and the article on her blog. Thank you Brynn and Glen for a great article.

Please see the flickr set to preview pages from issue #10!

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