Here's a lovely article from the Wall Street Journal on reinventing the magazine. It seems a number of publishers worldwide are also exploring the possibilities for publishing post-internet, where the need for communicating concrete visual information is obviated and we're liberated into creating publications that can appeal to all of the senses. It's really inspiring to see these other visions for what magazines can be. I must admit, some of them, like T-Post, gave me a slapping-my-head, "Why didn't I think of that?" moment:






No, that's not a picture from the magazine. The T-shirt is the magazine! The text is printed on the inside:



Every six weeks subscribers get a new issue. T-shirt subscriptions aren't a unique idea. Custom T-shirt Talk has a nice rundown of a number of them right here. However, T-Post is the only one I know of that actually does it as a magazine, with it's issues about current news items or events.

One magazine that the WSJ article talks about, La Lata, gave me a "get off your butt and do it!" moment. La Lata, or "The Can" is "un contenedor de objetos artísticos que se sirve de una lata de uso alimenticio para su distribución" which my rusty Spanish translates into, "Art in a Can." It's a wonderful idea which a number of artists have used in the past, most notoriously by Piero Manzoni who sold his own excrement, or "Artist's Shit" in a can for the price of gold in 1961:




Considering that a can of his Artist's Shit sold at auction in 2007 for $80,000, it was a real bargain in 1961!

The idea of art in a can has personal significance for us because of this:



That's a Brakeley Canning Co. label. Before Jess was Jess LeClair, she was Jess Brakeley. Jess is the conceptual heir to the Brakeley Canning Co. Jess' grandfather sold off the company's assets in the 1960s after America's love affair with canned lima beans ended. We've been planning on reviving the family business for years now only with canned art products instead of lima beans. Maybe seeing La Lata's success will be just the kick we need to finally do it!

There are a number of other drool-worthy publications mentioned in the WSJ article. I really think this is just the tip of the iceberg, though. It only makes sense for publications to evolve beyond paper. The boring ones are going to become purely digital, while the worthwhile ones will redefine what we think of as publications altogether.

My only complaint is that I can't afford any of these publications! The cheapest issue of La Lata is around $20, US, and goes up to around $280. The entry level to T-Post is around $70. It really makes me wonder if Callithump! is going about this all wrong, selling capsules of art for 50 cents. But then again, we really want everyone to be able to enjoy what we do! Then again, it's really hard to break even at the prices we charge, and we'd really like this to be sustainable, not a financial burden. Sigh. What to do, what to do...

Serendipitously, the WSJ article led me to this:






How wonderful is this? La Mas Bella, who has been alternative ideas of publishing since 1993, have been doing their own art-in-a-toy-capsule vending machine, the BolaBellamátic, since 2008! I'm jealous that in Spain they use balls instead of capsules. They're much more aesthetically pleasing than our nightmare drug from Hell capsules. You can read more about their capsule vending machine here. La Mas Bella issues magazines in a variety of beautiful and innovative and expensive formats, while still offering their Art Balls for one Euro. This strikes me as a nice balance between art for everyone and art that you actually get paid for! This is something we'll be exploring in the future!