Suspira - Between dread and desire.
First job after university: wproject - Social Media.
She emailed a speaker she heard at university, and offered to help out.
The job was not paid, however, it helped her gain experience and contacts. She would get paid for 3 days but work 5 days a week.
Afterwards, she decided if she was going to work for free, she might as well work for herself.
She always wanted to do publishing, so she though what was her unique viewpoint/ what she was most knowledgeable about, and how she could merge that with publishing.
Suspira - The Monster Issue
- Monsters and Classic horror (1930s - 1950s)
She spent around 6 months finalising the concept. She says it was like peeling an onion, where her ideas constantly developed and morphed. It took a lot of research, and her goal was to showcase the horror genre from the perspective of a publication.
Biggest professional challenge to date?
How to pay my bills without selling my soul.
How important is it to have show a women's perspective in todays society?
It's very important. And not just women, but for any minority. It's necessary to provide a platform where they all can express themselves. With Suspira, we are able to bring to attention a lot of underrated films, books and etc.
The design of Suspira - The Monster Issue:
Extracting classic elements, and putting a contemporary spin on it.
It took a while to find the right balance between horror and contemporary design.
A lot of what happens is intuition, an idea/ a feeling that drives me. And from that she starts to build a case, and research for the publication.
The publication also touches on mental problems, and puts a face/ a character to those problems and fears. It explores many different issues in this way, all surrounding the idea of fear/monsters.
Did you always see Suspira as print, what about digital?
It being physical/print is part of the experience. There's textures and finishes that create the experience. And in a digital way, this would work differently and would require more of a shift. IT is something that can happen but right now, print is the way we encapsulate everything.
With the issues being themed, how do you balance the theme of each issue subject, and still keep them cohesive?
One of the ways we do this is sticking with the same typeface, the same paper. And by doing this we were able to be more flexible with the other elements such as colour and layout.
Suspira - The Fetish Issue
- Horror, Exploitation and Erotica (1960s - 1970s)
The second issue was not planned, it simply snowballed from the previous issue. I wanted this issue to be quite sexy, erotic and ridiculous, but at the same time make all this graphic horror into something quite beautiful and aesthetically pleasing.
We do not have ads, so everything we use to publicise the magazine is social media. Especially Instagram. We also submitted for the Stacks awards, and even if we didn't win, it gave us a little bit of publicity. There are other ways to publicise than paid advertisements.
What is the future of Suspira?
This is our test run, and its sold out, so there's definitely interest there. So we're going to try out events, and see what works with what Suspira is. As far as the magazine goes, we will just carry on with the print, and maybe it will extend into digital. I suppose we will just continue with it and see how it goes.
How did you gather the content?
It's a mix between reaching out to people and networking for the first issue. For the second issue there was a lot more interest and we took submissions as well.
Are there topics within horror you want to explore in the future?
I like to keep them under wraps, as I feel it's more exciting to tease the audience in that way. I definitely want to explore like sci-fi horror, and slasher.
Do you see your team expanding?
I wouldn't mind expanding the team. But I quite like our incubation space, and taking our time. I feel like that even if it takes us 5 or 6 months, it's better. I don't think it would be any better if it was done any quicker, I feel that the ideas need to sit for a while.
No comments:
Post a Comment