February 12, 2005
Strange Attractor
Strange Attractor launched their first journal last winter with the idea that they would regularly put them out semi-annually. The fact that the first one took over a year from start to finish should have tipped them off how hard it would be, but you can’t blame the editor’s for their optimism. However long the wait, it is well worth it. The first issue was filled past bursting with wonderful oddities; stories on the London underground, cargo cults, Blackpools lost wax museum, experimental weapons, 19th-century anarchist bombers, H.P. Lovecraft, etc — close to three hundred pages of curious writing and art. The mission of Strange Attractor, the editor writes, is to “celebrate unpopular culture.” The journal is concerned “with the marginal; those cultural, historical and technological grey areas that defy conventional categorizations; the wide-open, in-between spaces so often missed, ignored or deliberately papered over by the coin operated automatons who preside over so much of contemporary popular culture.” And, in spirit, at least, who can argue with that? The design is also a striking mixture of Victoriana and more contemporary graphic elements. Strange Attractor is apparently a larger project. Their radio shows and “information happenings” have been going on for quite awhile. The journal is only the latest extension of their mission.