Callithump! is a magazine of arts and literature distributed through toy capsule vending machines. An issue is distributed across multiple capsules. Each capsule contains an "article," which might be a poem, a series of photographs, a small sculpture... really any sort of creativity that can fit inside a capsule!
Callithump! is a future of magazine publishing. Some people see the World Wide Web as the death of physical publishing. We see it as liberation. The primary role of print magazines has been the timely and regular distribution of concrete information (like news or facts). This is something that web publishing is much better suited for. If the only advantage to reading the contents of your magazine in print instead of online is that you can do it on the toilet, your magazine deserves to die. The future of nonline publishing rests with a simple question: What is the advantage of the physical object over the virtual?
The virtue of Internet publishing is that it is cheap and instant. However, it’s limited to two senses, sight and sound. A physical object can communicate to every sense. The articles in Callithump! often incorporate glass, metal, string, plastic or other elements because the simple act of touching these things is something the Internet will never have.
Another virtue of the physical world over the virtual is intimacy. The means of reproduction of a physical work of art, the medium, always has a distancing effect from the original work:
Most Intimate
Creating or physically interacting with the artwork
Viewing the original artwork in person
Looking at finely crafted print of the artwork
Looking at mass-produced reproduction in a magazine
Looking at a reproduction on the Internet
Most Removed
With Callithump! we’re limited only to what can
fit inside a capsule. A capsule can contain not just a
reproduction of an artwork, but the original work itself!
You can have a direct, unmediated experience, direct from
the creator to you. It’s the most intimate you can get with
an artist without making sweet, sweet love to them.
Callithump? That’s a clever name you made up!
We wish that we were clever enough to make up a world like
callithump. It’s actually an old word that, sadly,
has fallen into disuse. A callithump is a loud and
boisterous parade. The important thing about a
callithumpian parade is that
everyone can
join in the parade! Instead of carefully
made, corporate sponsored floats, callithumpians show up
with whatever they can find to make noise, from musical
instruments to pots and pans. Then they march about the
town making as much noise as possible. A callithumpian
parade is usually celebratory, but they’ve also been used
for political purposes, usually to disrupt a distasteful
political speaker by making as much noise as possible until
they're forced to stop speaking. A callithump is also a
burlesque serenade.
We chose the word callithump because that’s what we want to
be: an exuberant creative celebration that everyone can
join.
Art from a
vending machine? What an original idea!
Again, we wish we were that clever! While it seemed like an
original idea to us when we first thought of it, there
really have been many others who have done it before us.
We’re compiling a history of them here. If you run an art
vending machine, or have in the past, please let us know and we’ll add you
to the history!
Where do I
find it?
You can find Callithump! vending machines
here:
UMaine Department of Art Gallery
Lord Hall
University of Maine
Orono, Maine
Waterfall Arts
256 High Street
Belfast, Maine
Directions
MadGirlWorld
275 Commercial Street
Portland, Maine
You can also buy it online.
Sounds fun!
Can I play?
Yes! Absolutely! This experiment won't succeed
without you!
Our mission is to provide exposure for artists, and create
new venues for people to enjoy creativity. We want you to
encapsulate your work and put it in our machinesWe'll be
posting more information on contributing soon. In the
meantime, if you've got an idea for a good Callithump!
article, let us know.
If you've got a storefront, café, or gallery and would like
us to set up a machine there, we'd also love to hear from
you.