Issue 8 Preview 🕯️
Playing with light, playing with dark—December stuff!
My friend (and recent collaborator) referred to the pacing of the issue we made together as “rapid and instinctual,” a phrase that is so perfect I can’t get it out of my brain. In fact, that editorial style, that cadence, is precisely what I wanted for Treehouse. After 7 years hemming, hawing, and finely-tuning a (yes I know, it was great!) biannual magazine, I wanted to create something with such a breakneck speed that there was no way to overthink it. Trust the instincts and just keep moving.
This month, I had an extremely hard and fast deadline, as I leave town for the rest of the month and even I’m not so crazy as to pack my long-reach stapler with me on vacation. And so, the past few weeks have been a real exercise in rapid and instinctual creativity. Honestly: I think it worked out just perfectly. No hemming and hawing!
Our December cover is by artist (and friend!) Glen Baldridge. This particular print is from a zine of his that I really love, Animal Selfies. For a larger show, Glen took a game camera to the woods in Rhode Island and printed these really otherworldly, very eery images from when the camera misfired and took a photo of nothing visible. Animal Selfies was a companion zine of animals caught looking directly into the camera. With or without subjects, the game camera series is some of my favorite Glen work (and there are a lot of things to favorite, frankly).
Inside, we start with a project I put together after losing myself looking at some inspiring images of shadow puppets. The continuity of this issue came together by accident (or more likely subconsciously!). I actually happen to love this very dark time of year and I love all the inventive and beautiful things people come up with to do in the dark. These puppets are just such a delightful, sorta poetic interplay of color and light and dark.
And then we have Marjory’s solstice dinner! Many months ago, dear friend Marjory Sweet said “I want to do a thing for Treehouse!” and so we devised a re-telling of a newish tradition: Her solstice feast of the seven fishes, pulling together seven great friends (aw). We spoke to Allison Cekala about it, knowing that, because she’s a skillful photographer (so much so that this phrase feels like an understatement..), she would be able to artfully achieve the very low light photography we were envisioning. Cozy, darkness, friendship, light!
Then, as a little spin-off to our seven fishes feature, a DIY project, also from Marjory: wee candles, made from bayberry wax, set in oyster shells. I mean, come on now.
Finally, we end with a different kind of image this time. While our intrepid columnist Ambrea takes a pause on memes, I have been scouring my imagination on an adequate coda for this issue—for this year! And I’ve decided, inspired by the cover of my partner’s recently released record, to delve into the Met’s open access archive. You’ll have to get yourself a copy of this zine to see what I’ve pulled up!
And that’s December folks! And that’s… 2023, too. Thank you, as ever, for being here.
💡