Support the project: A note on world-building and beginning again

Dear Friends,

I find myself at the edge of two wildernesses–that of the natural world, which is rich, thriving and alive, which I know and love as home, and that of the speculative future we are already in, of technology, AI and the question marks it has arrived in public discourse about the value of writers. One of these wildernesses commands my respect and is my greatest ally and friend. The other is foreign to me, and incites my apprehension–an unknown stranger that I am wary of. In San Francisco, the details of this tension are materially present and in our faces. Perhaps, even if the dystopia hasn’t hit your outward reality yet, you can relate.

We often talk democratizing access and increasing representation in the arts, but in the years since the pandemic, have we really invented better stakes for all, or are we only tokenizing with a cleaner performance? What have our collective intentions meant in practice and how do we get to the art world paradigm we want to inhabit? How will literary writers survive? Or more to the point, how are we surviving? If the wider collective could experience what it takes to live on the frontlines of this moment as a literary creative, would AI already be put to bed?

We live in a world that consistently devalues the labor of artists and writers–monetarily and in other ways. How do we create a world that respects its creatives? How do we initiate stability and mutual power in our industries?

Crystal and Flame is an art writing journal and small press project that reflects my relationship to these questions, and forms my attempt to play in the field of answers as an art writer, editor, and literary entrepreneur. I have ideas for strategies we might employ to shift financial models and paradigms in favor of artists. I cannot know until I initiate these ideas what they will lead to. I know that this project has the capacity to function as a vehicle for experimentation for these attempts–at minimum, providing a platform for the conversation to grow, and at maximum, yielding new systems and paradigms. I know that our collective cultural health is connected to our willingness to prioritize valuing the health of artists and writers—who are the gills and medicine people of our society—which includes and necessitates an expression of compensation that does not yet exist in practice.

We have an incredible crew of writers, editors, and designers who are actively working on getting beautiful, hope-instigating and world-building content to you. We are currently creating at cost. There is nothing new about this–it is how things have been done for a long time. But just because we’ve done things a certain way for a long time, doesn’t mean we should continue.

I recently watched a feel-good flick called Begin Again in which Kiera Knightly plays a musician who decides that the music industry does not have her interests at heart and invents her own color wheel of success. She does it by a sequence of wild collaborative acts with other individuals who understand that they are in it together. This is the sort of world-building and collaboration we need to co-create to make lasting change.

If you believe in a paradigm that is artist-led and a future that is wild, help us bridge a gap of $15,000, which will support our team and cover nonnegotiable start-up costs.

While this will not be the last fundraising ask I make on behalf of this project, it may be the most important. While we invent creative solutions to the above problems, we are still operating within the old systems, which means our core team is actively taking a financial hit to bring forth the future art world we hope to inhabit and re-make with you.

We are within sight of our launch; the next moments are crucial. Will you help us bridge the gap?

Can you help us with a gift of $50, $100, $250, or more? There are no small gifts. But consider the worth of a new world, and to the degree your pockets are warm and lined, I invite you to give in congruence with that value.

Donate via Zelle: (510) 641-6518 or crystal.flame.mag@gmail.com

What you will be making possible and helping bring to the world:

The launch of an open-access digital journal of art writing, including brave experiments and new ways of approaching what art writing can do and be
A print edition of the journal with new and “best of” content from the year (published by a woman-owned printer in San Francisco)

What the journal will offer:

Interviews with artists across mediums and cultures
Speculative art writing and ekphrasis
An art-focused divination project
Poetry, hybrid work, and invented forms
The Cursebreaker’s Folio – a special folio dedicated to writing about the work of artists who are creating about israelpalestine, and about questions of identity and peacemaking in the holy land in ways that interrupt stagnancy and inflammatory thought-patterns in the collective that feed cycles of violence.
Opportunities for direct engagement among writers and readers for the purpose of opening the site of arts discourse and recasting writing and thinking as shared, collaborative, and community-engaged acts
And much more!

Where your dollars will go:

Directly to the pockets of our writers, editors, and designers to support their vital labor
Honorariums to participating and contributing artists
Nonnegotiable start up costs, such as web fees and image copy fees

Donate via Zelle: (510) 641-6518 or crystal.flame.mag@gmail.com

Thank you for your support!

This project has the potential to create a ripple throughout literary publishing and the art world(s) and to expand cultural vibrancy and community health and joy in numerous creative sectors. This paradigm-shifting work is possible in collaboration with the support of you and others like you. Please join us in creating the art world of our shared future. You can donate to this project at the links above. If you are interested in becoming a sustaining donor, funding a particular aspect of the project, or would like to deepen the conversation about how arts funding might grow in integrity and leverage power for artists, please reach out to Maura: maura@crystalandflame.com.

Whether or not you’re able to give at this time, please take a few moments to share this note with your family, friends, and community. If you can forward this page to 3 or more people, that would expand our reach and help considerably.

We’d love to stay in connection, let you know when the journal launches, share news about our upcoming events, and give you fundraising campaign updates. We promise not to spam you, and to send messages only when we have news. To stay on our mailing list, sign up at the bottom of the page.

Please note that Crystal and Flame is a punk endeavor, not a 501c3. This may change in the future. For now, your donation is not tax deductible. There will be other rewards for your presence and involvement, but they will be punk rewards: Authentic, bright, hardcore, gravitational, and possibly hot pink. More details about all of that are coming.

Thank you for reading, donating, forwarding, and most important of all, for being here on this earth at this fulcrum moment.

With gratitude–

Maura