Blast (magazine)

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The first edition of Blast, June 1914

BLAST was a short-lived magazine by the Vortizisten , an early English modernist group of artists . Only two issues were published, the first in June 1914, the second in July 1915. A third edition was announced for autumn 1915, but was no longer published because of the First World War .

layout

BLAST was edited by Wyndham Lewis, who also wrote many articles himself. Important authors were Ezra Pound , Rebecca West and Ford Madox Ford . The booklet was published in large folio format . The word BLAST ran diagonally across the title page . The typography of the magazine was decidedly experimental, several bold, sans serif , large-format fonts were used. In this design, the magazine was similar to the publications of the Futurists and Dadaists . The numerous illustrations came from, among others, Wyndham Lewis , Jacob Epstein and Henri Gaudier-Brzeska .

The first issue

The first edition was introduced by the Vortizist manifestos written by Lewis and Pound. The first manifesto consists of a list of things that are either condemned or cursed ( curse and blast ) or praised ( bless ). The damned things include England (because of the climate, the amount of water around it, etc.), France (because of its sentimentality, its sensationalism, etc.), the British aesthetes , specialists, good craftsmen, amateurs, journalists, humor, Sport and much more. The things praised include England (because of the ships, the seafaring, its ports, etc.), the hairdressers (because they put a stop to Mother Nature for little money), the English humor (because of Swift and Shakespeare etc.), France (because of its Vitality, pornography etc.) and much more.

In the second manifesto some principles are formulated, namely:

  1. Our concerns are beyond action and reaction.
  2. We start from conflicting statements about a chosen world. Construct a brutal structure of youthful clarity that stands between two extremes.
  3. We fight on both sides.
  4. We fight first on one side, then on the other, but always for the SAME cause that is neither one side, nor the other, nor ours.
  5. Mercenaries were always the best soldiers.
  6. We are primitive mercenaries of the modern world.
  7. Our cause is nobody's business.
  8. We add humor to humor. Incite civil war among peaceful monkeys.
  9. We only want humor when it has fought like a tragedy.
  10. We only want tragedy if it can hold its sides like hands folded over its stomach and throw out a laugh like a bomb.

The second issue

The second number mainly contained essays and editorials by Wyndham Lewis, plus some of the first poems by TS Eliot , poems by Pound and a story by Ford Madox Ford. The First World War, in which some of the artists involved were killed, made an end to the magazine. In Wyndham Lewis' words: "All of Europe was at war, and a bigger explosion (originally: 'Blast') than mine had pretty much taken the wind out of my sails."

Authors

Visual artist

expenditure

Editions of Blast 1 and 2 were reprinted by Black Sparrow Press (1982), ISBN 0-87685-521-4 and ISBN 0-87685-523-0

Web links