As I tried to come up with a colour scheme for my portfolio, I found myself gravitating towards a lovely muted palette of greys and blues. I looked down at my beige sweatshirt and white jeans- my 5th neutral-toned outfit of that week and thought… I don’t recognise myself. What happened to the colour, the energy that got me into this school. My work in the first term, though it didn’t hit the mark had a hand-drawn type punk spirit – my most memorable scamp being a woman graphically giving birth to a shark. The stress and the need to strive towards professionalism of the second term so far means my work is structurally more sound and is way classier but I feel a part of me is lost.  That art school girl with the ink under her fingernails and the urge to create, create, create by any means necessary, yeah she’s gone awol. 

Serendipitously, ‘Indie Sleaze’ has been all over my Instagram feed for a bit now. Fear about the return of American apparel disco pants and Terry Richardson ( how little did we know) gave way to a nostalgia trip when I started seeing people repost ‘Super Super’ magazine covers. 

Super Super was a small magazine that ran from a barren dishevelled office round the back of the less trendy parts of Whitechapel. For a moment between 2008 and 2011, it captured the zeitgeist of the East London party scene at its most chaotic and glorious. For one messy summer, before reality kicked in and the need for stable employment kicked in, I found myself in and out of the office assisting shoots, illustrating features and the odd bit of journalism.  The magazine itself looked like it was designed by a semi-blind child on Microsoft paint. Littered with typos and emoticons, no sense of hierarchy and clashing colours and patterns. Literally the antithesis of every lesson about craft we’ve had since the start of SCA. But it was loved for its vibrancy, daringness and the way it captured the zeitgeist and energy of the time so perfectly. 

I felt compelled to dig all my copies out of my mum’s loft to remind me of the girl I used to be. Messy and chaotic yes but fearless and brimming with the ‘ Punk ‘ spirit that Marc is always urging us to channel. Sitting there surrounded by cheap paper already pulling away at the staples, I resolved to return after half term stronger and less afraid to take risks. Embodying the spirit of the magazine (but hopefully without the typos).