Fall 2023
—From the Editors
Let’s start with some questions:
Have you begun wearing your mittens yet?
Are you warm enough?
Where do you go when the sun goes down?
What kinds of conversations are important to you?
Are you having them?
As we sit in our bubble, safe and reflective, we contemplate the absurdity of our world. Awareness of our ecosystem makes us question our place within it. Inside looking out, we see that the edges are fraying, shards flying, far-reaching, threatening to puncture the tenuous membrane at any given moment. Has the bubble popped? Pinch that shard between your index and thumb, and look. What is it? Maybe it carries a sound from where it came from. Maybe it scratches you, or maybe it’s gentle. Consider, now that you’re exposed, how susceptible you are to other potential ruptures.
Suddenly changed, you feel the urge to make, hurting like a bruise. The urge to be seen and heard prickles under the skin.
This Fall 2023 issue of v.1 conveys our desire to connect and the fear that we’ll miss our chance. When we extend our hand, we want someone to take it. When we have something to say, we hope someone will listen. Even more, we hope someone will understand. How much is lost in translation during a conversation? What does it take to peel away the pleasantries, to strip our words down to their raw, vulnerable truth?
In our words, find an open letter, a pigeon, a concrete mite, a glob of glass, a set of instructions, and a home—as vehicles for earnest understanding. Witness our first studio visit column—Starchive—and meet the artists featured within it. In our design, find bubbles miraculously connecting thought to speech to print. In our shared time and space, find a malleable realm open to everyone and, most of all, you.
And if your hands are cold, we’re always here to share our mittens.
Ollantay Avila
Graciela Batista
Deanne Fernandes
Katherine Fu
Karina Garbarini
Michael Gunn
Samantha Hernández
Graciela Batista
Deanne Fernandes
Katherine Fu
Karina Garbarini
Michael Gunn
Samantha Hernández
Kobe Jackson
David Legrand
Angelina Rodgers
Mina Troise
Arete Xu
Tonia Zhang
Mei Zheng