Editorial Philosophy
"The best way to predict the
future is to create it" – Peter
Drucker.
LookUp (working title)’s philosophy centres around the idea of
sustainability. In environmental terms, sustainability means using the
resources of today while ensuring not to detract from the needs of the future.
LookUp extends the use of the word
sustainability by applying it to any world issue. For example, sustainability
as applied to consumerism may allude to the idea that the contemporary society
is not balancing its need for material wealth with a seemingly forgotten need
for the happiness within. LookUp is
about reclaiming the true essence of design: creating an object that solves a
problem or rectifies a societal need; a feature that can be said is missing
from much contemporary design, especially in fashion.
Business Placement
LookUp provides what no other fashion/ lifestyle magazine provides: a second
dimension. LookUp does not aim to
sell garments, epitomise the beauty of the latest fashion styles, or convey the
latest celebrity intrigue, to the public. LookUp combines the love of amateur craft such as Frankie, the environmental concerns of Peppermint, the parody of Adbusters,
the format subversion of Is Not Magazine,
the satire of Zoolander, I Hurt I am in Fashion and the Onion, and the Utopian future ideas in Kelli Anderson and the Yes Men’s hoax New York Times in 2008.
Target Market
In contrast to the
Fashion/ Lifestyle magazines of today whose Target Market is always a fairly
specific age group and gender, LookUp
prefers to look beyond age and other less meaningful demographics and reaches
out more to a group of people who share in the philosophy that the only thing
standing between the world we have and the world that could be is the dream of
making it so. LookUp embodies the
quote of Peter Drucker, a creation aspiring to be future by design.
Objectivity
The objective through
the definition of LookUp’s philosophy
is to reach out to a society which is not always aiming to attain a sustainable
future. Through its target market, it endeavours to encourage critical thought
and activism and, through consumer demand, eventually force creative business
to change its own philosophies.
Content
LookUp will achieve its objectives through a series of creative
endeavours and collaborations that seek to encourage critical thought and
provide visions of the world we could have. The content will be
intellectual and largely based on theory, and many parts will involve the technique of satire. Imagery will
be largely artistic and conceptual, while written pieces will be closer to
literary works, rather than journalism. Advertisements will be exclusively hoax
ads/ spoof ads/ or serious ads only from business/ companies who parallel LookUp’s vision. The publication will
include basic things one might expect to find in a magazine such as horoscopes
and crosswords, however these will be deconstructed either through parody, or
changing their essential uses. LookUp
will also include photography and art that returns to its most basic forms:
displaying the beauty of raw practice and creative talent, as well as
showcasing the older practices of lithographic printing.
Outcome
LookUp is not just a “magazine”, it is also about confronting the very
definition of “magazine”. It publishes two poster magazines as street art each
year with the aim of encouraging user input on the theme, running alongside its
online forum, all of which is documented and included in the annual
publication. LookUp ensures its
practices adhere to its own philosophy including fair trade, use of sustainable
resources, and encompassing forgotten practices of printing by its relations
with the Big Fag Press team.
Topicality
The theme of Issue 1 is
Fashion, specifically looking at psychological sustainability with regards to
self-image, and how this is situated in the realms of body image issues,
practice within fashion systems, the ideal body and self esteem.
It draws on Plato’s
theory of forms which looks at the concept of a perfect form that exists
outside of reality. (Plato Symposium 210E) For example beauty has a
perfect form that we aspire to. The fashion industry constantly provides us
with a fantasy world through catwalks, advertising, and imagery, and I am
concerned with society’s lack of ability to critically separate this fantasy
from reality (Franklin 2010).
LookUp’s philosophy aims to create a fantasy
of its own, which is a world that operates prioritising what ethically and
morally would make a better world. This issue is therefore aimed at consumers
of fashion with the capacity to critically analyse the difference between
reality and fashion’s ideal form as well as change consumer demand and
ultimately reach the fashion industry in order to instigate practices which fit
within LookUp’s better world.
Business Structure
LookUp is not-for-profit, independently published, and relies on grants
through promotion of charity organisations. LookUp publishes limited edition copies of its magazine and Street Art
Posters, which can be purchased online. Money from sales pays for printing, and
splits the rest among contributors.
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