Link About It: This Week’s Picks
Personal style as protest, Steven Horton Jr’s Black Justice Flag, NYC’s unusual vending machine and more from around the web
New Cookbook By Indigenous People Reclaims Narratives About Native Food
A Gathering Basket is a new, virtual cookbook by Indigenous people, for Indigenous people. Breaking from tradition, this groundbreaking cookbook includes digital recipes, essays, videos and new releases that coincide with the moon cycle. Led by Indigenous chef organization I-Collective, the book reclaims narratives about Native foodways, capturing the multiplicities apparent within Indigenous cultures. From content to funding, the publication remains independent, giving Indigenous chefs complete autonomy over their own voices. Learn more about the cookbook’s first issue, how it sheds light on Indigenous peoples’ innovations that shape food today and the steps it takes toward Native food sovereignty at The New York Times.
Image courtesy of Sharon Chischilly/The New York Times
Graphic Designer Steven Horton Jr’s Black Justice Flag
Graphic designer Steven Horton Jr has reimagined the US flag with Black Americans in mind. The bold design—inspired in part by Marcus Garvey’s Pan-African Flag and David Hammond’s African American flag—aims to represent those who don’t feel represented by the star-spangled banner which “has become a symbol of division. It is a symbol of the past. A past that embraced slavery and racism,” Horton Jr tells Dalia Al-Dujaili at It’s Nice That. After recognizing that the current design was notably absent during Black Lives Matters protests, Horton Jr set out to research flags and found there’s immense meaning behind every choice made in their designs. In the Black Justice Flag, the yellow represents the path forward and the median on streets that thousands marched upon, while the red represents bloodshed of countless Black Americans. The flag has also been designed in a 6:9 ratio, representing Juneteenth and the year 1619. Horton Jr says he hopes this design will be something “protestors could wave, symbolizing the demand for justice and equality for Black Americans.” Read more at It’s Nice That.
Image of Black Justice Flag Copyright © Steven Horton Jr, 2021
Personal Style as Protest in Nigeria’s Alté Movement
Since 2014, a youth subculture—the alté movement—has been dedicated to breaking societal conventions in order to challenge many of Nigeria’s conservative beliefs. Now, the movement’s protesting in the form of fashion. Daring make-up, bold hair styles and colors, flesh-revealing apparel, fur, feminist slogans and “nail polish on the fingers of boys and those who identify as male” are all on the list of the gender- and genre-defying style of protest aesthetic. Essentially, if it speaks to an individual sense of expression in place of convention, it’s alté fashion. This defiant style is an extension of the movement’s celebration of freedom to be and look different—especially as doing so often results in criminal profiling, police brutality or being socially restricted. Despite institutional backlash, more young people across the country are empowering one another to dress for their themselves. Learn more about this liberating fashion revolution at Dazed Digital.
Image courtesy of @dunsinwright/Dazed Digital
Exhibition Captures the Depth of Climate Change With an Ampoule of Air from 1765
At the Glasgow Science Centre, the Polar Zero exhibition chronicles climate change in a remarkable new way. Featuring an ampoule of air from 1765, the exhibit showcases the purest possible air trapped in ice, dated right before what scientists believe is the beginning of the Industrial Revolution. Artist Wayne Binitie—in collaboration with scientists from the British Antarctic Survey—discovered how to dig and analyze ice cores to display one with pure air alongside one without and reveal climate change’s effects. Through preserving the ice, the popping of ancient air bubbles and samples of the ice water, visitors can view, hear and taste the history of the planet unlike ever before. Learn more about Polar Zero‘s feat of art and science at The Guardian.
Image courtesy of Jane Barlow/The Guardian
Poster House’s “An Ode to NYC” 2021 Series for NYCxDesign
To benefit the non-profit Silicon Harlem, an organization pursuing equity for individuals without internet during the pandemic, a citywide exhibition of 75 posters—entitled An Ode to NYC—pops up at cultural destinations and iconic locations across all five boroughs. Viewers are able to scan a QR code near the works (which are by the likes of talent that includes Suchi Reddy, Debbie Millman and Ghetto Gastro) and purchase the limited edition designs from the website of the museum Poster House (which currently has the exemplary exhibition You Won’t Bleed Me: How Blaxploitation Posters Defined Cool & Delivered Profits on display now through 6 February 2022). An Ode to NYC is part of October’s NYCxDesign activations, centered around the theme “Our Future City.” Read more about it all through Poster House‘s website.
Image courtesy of Karim Rashid
Gastro Obscura Will Unveil The World’s Most Unusual Vending Machine in NYC
To celebrate the release of Gastro Obscura: A Food Adventurer’s Guide, the curious culinary book by Atlas Obscura co-founder and co-author Dylan Thuras, the inspiring and eccentric community-powered website will debut a vending machine filled with unusual items at Union Square’s FREEHOLD In The Park restaurant. It will be on site from the afternoon of 14 October through the end of the day on Sunday, 17 October, and filled with delicious yet unexpected international foods and beverages that range from the tastebud-manipulating miracle berries to canned bread and the Rwandan super spice akabanga. Read more about the pop-up at Atlas Obscura or swing by if you’re NYC-based. After the Big Apple, the vending machine will travel to Chicago and Portland.
Image courtesy of Atlas Obscura
Link About It is our filtered look at the web, shared daily in Link and on social media, and rounded up every Saturday morning. Hero image courtesy of Steven Horton Jr/Black Justice Flag
