Celebrate the Summer Solstice with us as we release the second issue of Lantern exploring Circle.
Cover Design:
By szilárd
Rust Parhelion is a piece in two longform parts composed for rotating loop-cycles. This is a continuation in a performative series called the Colourpalette Loop Series, in which I explore the textures and distinctions of various looping techniques. I work mainly with tape loops and envision this process as a way of experimenting with circular as opposed to linear music. The sound on each tape moves forward until it eats its own tail and begins again at its starting point.
Parhelia are phantom images of the sun–light refractions in the frozen air of the Arctic Circle–natural images representing what is both there and not there. This piece depicts two temperatures of this phenomenon. As several loops of varying length are set in motion they give the impression that the piece is moving forward and create phantom changes in the loops we hear.
szilárd is Jeremy Young. Brooklyn now; London soon.
www.palavermusic.com
soundcloud.com/palavermusic
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By M. Dane Zahorsky
Quintessence or the element that binds all others has been a fascination of mine since I was very young. This work is the opening gesture of a way to mirror the process we’ve taken up with this journal: It is a place where the aesthetic, academic, and magical intermingle; a place where the wheel doesn’t just come round but exists, like electrons at the smallest levels, in many places at once; an attempt to illustrate and illiterate the pattern, purpose, and parable within and all around us; and place to share that with others. These are the breadcrumbs left where the path has become overgrown and wrought with shadow, an invitation past the fear of that shadow and into the axis point between who we are and who we can be.
M. Dane Zahorsky has been exploring the spirit of art, place, and community in the Midwest for over a decade and has worked as an artist, lecturer, community organizer, and teacher with communities at home and as far away as Hawai’i, Beijing, Guatemala, and Roma. More at MOTUV.org.
By Jayne Marek
Nothing is Given is a selection from a meditation on poetics, natural cycles, and the nature of loss and pain. Loss of purpose while pursuing one’s life work threatens one with despair. In sections that develop images of water, circles, and other cycles, the natural imagery in Nothing is Givern soothes and eventually leads to a healing return to a mountain. Amid the poem’s stylistically diverse segments, the piece builds unity through its imagery as well as repeated use of epigraphs that, overall, point toward a philosophy of survival and grace amid suffering. The accompanying photographs evoke classic Japanese aesthetic qualities of temporality, asymmetry, and simplicity to invite a meditative repose about the balance between the shape, surface, and depth of water. What is there to fear if we learn to move with the ripples?
Jayne Marek has earned an MA and a PhD in literature. For fun, she then earned an MFA in creative writing. She publishes poetry, plays, and fiction as well as academic articles. She teaches courses in literature, writing, and film at a midwestern college.
By Lauren Herzak-Bauman
Memory Eternal is a site-specific installation invoking the space between presence and absence–the here to there–and what we do to grieve, to fill that space. The impermanence of the material is revealed as light reflects upon empty space and porcelain shards dissipate into the shadows.
Born and raised in Ohio, Lauren Herzak-Bauman connects her impulse to make art with early memories of the group home where her sister lived. Growing up around disabled children, she learned a method of non-verbal communication, similar to the way art communicates. Her objects and temporal installations address mourning and loss by converting ordinary spaces into sober, quieted places. She received an MFA from the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities and a BFA from Bowling Green State University. Recent solo exhibitions include “3650” at The Phipps Center for the Arts in Hudson, WI, and “Passages” at the Sculpture Center in Cleveland, OH. Lauren currently teaches art and practices in her studio.
By J. Maxwell Montgomery
Americans are increasingly fixated with the idea of an apocalypse. Each year there is a growing number of television series, movies, and books that focus on the end of the world. This fascination, though rooted in entertainment, comes from a deeper yearning of the human psyche to connect more fundamentally with nature. The notion of an “end” to life as we know it, though, cannot be separated from the reality there is a corresponding “beginning” that follows. This is a foundational pattern seen throughout nature, a pattern that finds expression in humanity through the conduction of sport.
A Checkered Past: The End is Only the Beginning explores the relationship between time and nature, sport and, ultimately, war. The article examines the same race run by the ancient Romans and modern Americans–a race that both have won and lost–all in accordance with the march of History.
J. Maxwell Montgomery was born in a coal-digging town in central Pennsylvania. He has since traveled much of the world and has finally settled in a rural community nestled in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Virginia. He earned a Masters degree in Ancient and Medieval History and has taught students at every level from college to elementary. He currently teaches History and Technology Arts.
By Troy Payne & Charlie Vega
Radix, Latin for “roots,” examines the environmental conundrum from the level of human thought about the world, relying on the disruptive force of visual design and on the powerful change-agent that flows from exposing and uprooting poor human assumptions about nature that form the precepts of law and science and economics. Ultimately, Radix encourages us to (re)consider and (re)envision the way we think about and interact with the natural world, urging us to prune away the roots of our malconception of nature in favor of a more meaningful relationship with the land.
Troy Payne and Charlie Vega distill and refine spoken and visual elements of Black Lantern Synergy’s “lectumentary,” Cartesian Eco-FemDarkanism, into six distinct parts of a larger whole: the seeds of a 3,000 word essay have been planted and thoughtfully cultivated in the soil of our backcountry experiences. The resulting growth is meant to bring the observer beyond the realm of the eye into that of the senses engaged in wild nature. Like nature, Radix is interesting from both macro and micro perspectives and the pieces challenge viewers to engage the world deeply and in more reflective and humble ways.
By Tom Sheehan
Westerly Again recounts a piece of a long walk to the Pacific. The Saugus River flows down to the Atlantic past the First Iron Works in America (1636-42), across from my home. We drove a friend from here to a Canada-bound train to start his walking journey west across Canada. We didn’t see him for 10 years.
Tom Sheehan served in 31st Regiment, Korea, from 1951-52. His books are Epic Cures and Brief Cases, Short Spans, A Collection of Friends, From the Quickening, Korean Echoes, and The Westering. His published and upcoming short fiction can be found in Rope and Wire Magazine, Rosebud Magazine and Ocean Magazine. Tom has received eighteen Pushcart nominations for his work.
Developed as part of the greater dialogue about the human condition, I am a Pagan explores humanity’s role in the cosmos: Who are we? What are we doing here? Part essay, part artistic exploration, this work attempts to answer these questions through the conjunction of art and architecture, the primary means for (hu)mans to express these relationships. Originally exhibited at the Centre for Creative Practices in Dublin, Ireland in 2010, I am a Pagan is a search for collectivity in Paganistic human experience.
LIONarchitecture was started in 2010 by Matt Teismann and Charles Vega. Be it exploring the great symbiosis between natural and the built, or merely discussing the validity of a language of architecture which has persisted through time, LIONarchitecture is not a practice necessarily as much as it is a dialogue. Their work includes the exhibit ‘Urban Green-House Project,’ and publications ‘Futureless’ and ‘Anti-Haptic Experience.’ More at lionarchitecture. com.
By Jon Steinhagen
On any given night these chairs will be filled by people who are filled with ideas and opinions that are filled with preconceived notions that are filled with contradiction. Listen.
Book Club is a circle of voices within voices, an eavesdropping, a narrative set in a continuous present that reaches out for creative readers. Every text we read shows us how to read it. Read it.
Jon Steinhagen is a member of Signal Ensemble Theatre and a Resident Playwright at Chicago Dramatists even though he majored in English and grew up wanting to be a cartoonist. He reads all the modernism and post-modernism (and beyond) he can find, writes “fictions,” and has never been part of a book club.
By Troy Payne
[r:]EVOLUTION in Ten is a chronicle of ten years of writing, thinking, breathing, and riding this beautifully-adorned rock around the Sun punctuated by a ritual celebration of each successful revolution with written reflection. Honesty, vulnerability, strength, contraction and growth laid bare as a tree viewed in cross-section. This is me.
Troy Payne is a photographer, writer, attorney, and environmental advocate currently living outside of Portland, Oregon, near the Mt. Hood National Forest and preparing to spend a year on the Pacific islands of the Republic of Palau. A published author and lecturer on environmental ethics, Payne’s art and philosophy extend from his love of nature, penchant for collaboration, and desire to know a better way. More at blacklanternsynergy.com.
Lantern Journal