you,
dressed in a formica yellow flower-print skirt
dark eye’d long leg’d, sweet lip’d,
took a pull from the bottle and
blew a line of smoke into the sky,
laughing “fuck them!”
(it didn’t really matter who)
and I fell into it then…

The tenth issue of Four Minutes to Midnight explores the idea of radical beauty (a theme inspired from this year’s Memefest) interpreted through the words and images of over 30 artists. Our ‘anniversary’ issue is the thickest (and prettiest) one yet, clocking in at a tidy 180 pages.

Some of my personal favorites among the diverse work featured in the issue include a selection of poetry from American ‘outsider’ poet F.A. Nettelbeck, two collaborations between myself and Montreal photographer Dita Kubin, a series of beautiful, seductive portraits painted by Kevin Ledo, and the surreal illustrations from my former student Ilinca Balaban.

I’m also incredibly proud of this issue’s fugue which in itself pulls together fragments from over 20 artists and writers. John and I worked incredibly hard to compose what we feel to be the best expression yet of the core ideas that started this project years ago, hanging out in his basement apartment, fuming at the world…

Many thanks to this issue’s contributors:
Hoda and Dima Adra, Caroline Aquin, Ilinca Balaban, Emily Kai Bock, Simon Carrasco, Marilyn de Castro, Kyla Chevrier, Grant Collins, Ian Finch, Jesse Ferguson, Jason Gillingham, Sacha Guney, Alexandra Hall, Erica Ruth Kelly, JP King, Dita Kubin, Kevin Ledo, Tony de Marco, Billy Mavreas, Maria Mavrig, Joshua Mensch, Debbie Millman, F.A. Nettelbeck, Omen, Catherine Rizzetto, Christopher David Ryan, Valerie Sanguin, Hilary Schaenfield, Clare Sheldon-Williams, Louis Sobol, Vincent Tinguely, Visualingual (Maya Drozdz & Michael Stout), Caroline Weaver, and Colin White.

A special thank you to Patrick Beauduin for his belief in this project and myself, giving generous financial support for the issue’s production.

Download a PDF of issue 10 (18.6 MB).

The Chronographical Survey #3, issue 10 reviewed by Kenneth Fitzgerald.