Flannel gets the picture, leaves the picturesque

Many successful magazines are born from a humble and occasionally illicit beginning. From Hearst to Hefner, there’s a precedent that exists in the world of the self-published that offers some context to the trespassing tendencies of one magazine’s editorial staff.

“We would sneak into another school, print them at night and cut them up with an X-ACTO knife,” said Sean Collinson, co-found of Maine-based photo and literary "zine" Flannel.

Ultimately it was convenience and not a court order which convinced Collinson and the rest of the tresspassing Flannel team to go legit. “It was too labor intensive, that’s really why we started with working with a printing house — we would watch a movie and I would get like, six cut,” he said.

Founded by Collinson and fellow UMaine student Travis Bourassa in 2008, the irregularly published zine started off as a project for Collinson’s graphic design class and soon spread far from the Orono campus.

“We put a couple pictures online somewhere and in one of the comments someone from Kansas said they wanted a copy. It hadn’t really occurred to us to mass-produce it,” said Collinson.

“The original intent was to publish friend’s photographs and artwork as just a fun thing to show to our friends,” said Bourassa.

Three years and five issues later, Flannel has grown beyond the founder’s expectations and stands as a unique and contrarily tangible example of work from young Maine artists, photographers and writers.

Friday night, the Flannel team celebrated the release of their latest issue — the first to be completed in Portland — with a show at Geno’s Rock Club as part of First Friday Art Walk, followed by a live punk/hardcore show organized by Flannel.

The zine has changed a little over the years, with creators nixing hand-sewn, 8-by-8 inch pages for glossy, 6-by-8 pages bonded and printed by a Bangor publishing house. Another change came with charging a steadily increasing fee to keep the founder’s from debter’s prison, but at the heart it’s still a threadbare, do-it-yourself effort. The cost is $10.

“We’re still losing money,” said Collinson.

“Yeah, we were still losing tons of money, but now you get a big poster and sticker with every issues to make it a little more worth it, but it is 50 pages of high-quality art work,” said Jessica Harvey, executive editor of Flannel.

“After almost three ears, we’re going to try and start breaking even,” said Collinson.

The zine skews toward a decidedly un-Wyeth-like depiction of life in Maine, so don’t expect lush landscapes of rocky coasts and charmingly weathered lobster traps here — cigarettes, surfing and nudes are more likely Flannel fare and issue #5 features a sickle-wielding Grim Reaper on its cover.

“You have the face of Maine then you have what Maine really is to people who live here,” said Harvey.

“A lot of people get really confused when we say that Flannel is by Mainers for Mainers. We got in a little trouble when we started saying ‘we’re anti-lighthouse, we’re anti-lobster”, but we try not to put in work that looks like it could be sold in Bar Harbor, we try to keep it more raw and badass and offensive as possible,” she said.

To that extent, Harvey is happy to report that the zine already passed the dad test of offensiveness. “My dad was upset because we had a pair of [breasts] in this issue, but we’re not really making it for my dad,” she said.

So, then, who is it for exactly?

“First and foremost it’s for ourselves, it’s for a younger crowd that’s into this stuff. That’s why you have stuff like death and brutality — that's just part of hardcore, punk and metal music, that aesthetic,” said Bourassa. “I mean, we are Satanists,” he said.

“Oh yeah, we’re in a cult,” Collinson agrees sarcastically.

The zines reputation has grown steadily in Maine’s art community over the last few years, and the founders say they often receive submission from artists who they’ve never met or even heard of. Issue five features a few recognizable Portland names; Maine College of Art students, photographers Bryan Bruchman, Robbie Kanner and Ron Harrity, head of local record label Peapod Recordings.

“It took us over a year to collect enough artwork to make it a thick issue,” said Harvey.

“Hopefully it will get more popular at some point and it won’t take as long,” said Bourassa.

In an era of blogs and tweets, Flickr accounts and cameraphones, Flannel is a throwback of sorts. Sure the founders could have easily, cheaply launched a blog that showcases all the same work, but it’s the zine’s tangible niche value which sets it apart from such digital counterparts.

“People are interested in having something tangible and there’s nothing else like this in the state of Maine now, so there’s a hunger for it,” said Collinson. “We have more of a niche audience and I think that niche still wants something like this.”

“I think art blogs and photo websites can get easily looked over, but if you have a physical book in your hand it’s kind of hard not to see,” said Harvey.

The concept is not dissimilar to the niche value some place on certain music formats like vinyl and cassette tapes — when anything can be found for free in a digital age, doesn't a one-of-a-kind product like Flannel pack a little something extra? “I think having something tangible gives it more worth,” said Bourassa.

The team’s long-term goals for the zine remain humble for now. “We’re at a point now where we might even break even, someday maybe we’ll even make money,” said Collinson.

“I think the coolest thing would be to see other magazines like this start up in Maine, because what we’re doing really isn't that difficult, it’s just a matter of staying motivated and focused,” said Bourassa.

To learn more about Flannel, order an issue, or find out more about contributing, visit flannelcollective.com