hello again friends! i’m reviving my newsletter from its temporary hibernation to share some exciting news with you: there’s a new print publication of criticism and experimental writing about art in Portland, and it’s called INITIAL!!! and even more exciting (to me, at least) is that this is a project i have had the pleasure of working on in collaboration with my co-editor, Jaydra Johnson.

if you want to know more about Initial and even read the first issue, please join us at mother foucault’s bookshop this coming friday, january 30 at 7pm for a launch party and reading event. check out our beautiful flyer below:

curious about what the party will be like? here’s what Jaydra says in her newsletter:

“We are super excited about the writing and art in issue 1 and hope to see you at the launch party this Friday at 7pm at Mother Foucault’s. In addition to a generally convivial atmosphere replete with off-brand seltzer and the bottle of pre-mixed Negroni my neighbor gave me as a housewarming gift, we’ll have some short readings and talks from contributors. At a typewriter table, you’ll be able to respond to work in the issue (and potentially appear in the next one!). We will also have a piñata you can beat the shit out of in the back garden, which supports Virtua Gallery and a local piñata maker whose store burned down and whose son was kidnapped by ICE. What will be inside? What other grim surprises await at the party? Time will tell!”

Jaydra is wise. she also shared some additional intel about how to get you hands on a copy of the magazine, even if you can’t make it to the party on friday:

“Initial will have a website, but we hope the magazine will be a tool to further connect the local arts community. To that end, attending an event or visiting a stockist (MF’s, Nationale, others TBD) in person to purchase will be strongly encouraged for those who are able. Formal information about ways for out-of-towners to purchase the mag are forthcoming, but for now you can Venmo me with your preferred shipping name and address in the comment field. Issues are $10-20 pay what you can. Media mail postage is, what, $1.50?”

are you the kind of person who likes a little preview to help you decide if you want to go allll the way down to a “bookshop” in person in january for some kind of weird event thingy? ok fine! here’s a short excerpt of the essay i wrote, about Stephanie Simek’s 2025 exhibition Binnenstebuiten (whole #33) at False Front gallery, for the first issue of Initial:

The inside of the vessel is virtually flayed across a three panel screen occupying nearly a full wall inside the gallery. During the day the image is washed out and difficult to parse, but as the sun sets the colors and shadows of the projection begin to intensify. The picture resolves into a troglodytic garden of wet-looking patches, crazes, boils, and blisters of acid yellow, turquoise, creamy droplets held in tension by the parched black clay interior. 

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I went to Yellowstone Park, or rather, we stopped there briefly on our way across the country in the summer of 2020. Skies throughout the Mountain West were filled with orangey wildfire smoke. The bacteria mats covering the floors of geothermal pools looked like the inside of Simek’s vessel (but I didn’t know that yet). They were feathery and sponge-like and it was hard to tell how thick they were. They were alive, and it is said they are quite delicate and sensitive to contamination by foreign bodies. A visitor got in trouble that year for tossing a rotisserie chicken into a pool. Someone’s sunhat was floating on the surface of a mudpot, creating the illusion that their body had sunk vertically into the muck.

did you love that?? join us on friday for more, find a copy around town (soon) or get in touch directly at seahorsesunited(at)gmail(dot)com with any questions you may have! please note, Initial will not have a social media presence and our website is currently a work in progress. for now it exists only in the three-dimensional paradigm of ink on paper. pretty radical! hope to see many of you this week : )

xoxo martha