Published Work & Creative Non-Fiction

Dove Cameron: A Profile

Tings Magazine, Spring 2018 (London)

Poise can seem like a deliriously old-fashioned virtue, especially in a world where reckless oversharing and virtue-signaling are de rigueur. Where a certain brand of crass can almost feel non-negotiable. And that's precisely why Dove Cameron's maturity, her absolute poise, as a performer and public figure feels so refreshingly modern, humble, and relatable. After retiring her successful twin-sister characters on Disney's Liv & Maddie, the 22-year-old actor/singer began another phase of a creative evolution, putting her chops on display in the Hollywood Bowl’s production of Mamma Mia, and NBC's live TV production of Hairspray, effortlessly holding her own against stage heavyweights like Kristin Chenoweth and Jennifer Hudson. This year, her star is set to catapult even higher with turns in Marvel's Agents of Shield, and the Ann Fletcher-directed adaptation of Julie Murphy’s Dumplin’, a tale of sisterhood and self-love co-starring Jennifer Aniston, that feels incredibly timely. Even while charting a career moving at meteoric pace, Cameron has managed to maintain a sense of quiet grace, intrigue, and groundedness that has undoubtedly helped her navigate an industry that can be tough on young people and especially tough on young women. We spoke with Cameron about what's in store for this coming year, rebuking lazy comparisons, and discovering a whole new meaning to sisterhood.

A Trend Report Beyond the Runway

Tings Magazine, Spring 2018 (London)

There’s a lot to parse from the negative reactions to Maria Grazia Chiuri’s dialogue with overt feminism in her collections for Christian Dior, a dialogue that continued this Spring with the use of Linda Nochlin’s seminal essay "Why Have There Been No Great Women Artists?" , the title of which was printed on the sweater of the collection’s opening look. It’s heavy-handed. Sure, it is. It’s for corporate profit. Again, sure (what isn’t these days). But those quick, terse reactions leave more pressing questions unanswered. Namely, why this is the first time, in a modern fashion context, that we’re engaging with feminism in a loud, raucous, inescapable manner? Why is this one of the first times we’re seeing a runway conversation that encourages dialogue about what it means to be a modern woman?

This spring, that conversation is center stage. Collections that debuted in the fall of 2017 are hitting stores in the wake of Harvey Weinstein’s takedown, a period where “Time’s Up” for the physical, sexual and emotional trauma inflicted by patriarchy. Fashion loves conversation in the form of a clever soundbite or headline, but many designers fervently attempt to remove their creation from the context of history.

But time’s up for that too.

On the Subject of Her Chainmail Dress

Creative Non-Fiction

Before I started grade school, my mom worked nights, managing back of house for a chain restaurant. It was about 30 minutes away from our house. Most evenings, she’d kiss me goodnight, disappear, and suddenly reappear in the morning once I awoke. Although I’m sure it killed her to leave, I never registered it as anything other than normal.

She often wore these silk blouses printed with clocks and horse-bits. Between my then limited fashion knowledge, and what I could pull from urban radio in the 90s, I falsely identified them as Versace or Gucci, and immediately figured that we were rich. I could not understand why I could not have a Coogi sweater like Bill Cosby or the Notorious B.I.G.

There was a level of reserve and effortlessness to how my mom moved in and out of space at that point that made her seem almost immortal to me. Available to help me construct mud pies in the morning and afternoon, dressed in Versace at night as I drifted into sleep, and back to start it all again once I was awake. She was my version of Clark Kent: there to save the day, without question or concern.

Philadelphia Weekly

Those who vis­ited the In­sti­tute of Con­tem­por­ary Art’s One Is the Lone­li­est Num­ber ex­hib­it this sum­mer had the chance to see something that is rarely vis­ible in mu­seum spaces any­more: a cool space to just sit, read, and re­lax. No ad­vert­ise­ments, no over­priced cata­logs pushed at you. Just a few chairs and well-worn pho­to­graphy magazines to per­use while you soaked in the show: cas­u­ally strewn West Afric­an fab­ric pat­terns, neon-colored graph­ics, old Leicas, cas­sette mix­tapes and whatever else they’d set up in the mu­seum’s loft space.

An­thony Smyrski and Dan Murphy made that hap­pen. Most known for their gritty, ad-free and nearly word­less magazine Mega­words —which serves as a me­di­um to ex­per­i­ment with their ideas free from com­mer­cial­iz­a­tion—the pair aren’t just con­cerned with the art you con­sume, but the way in which you con­sume it. For the past three years, the guys have been spe­cial­iz­ing in cre­at­ing pub­lic spaces, lit­er­ally bring­ing their prin­ted pro­ject to life.

PAFA celebrates the highs and lows of Henry Tanner and the black artists who came after him.

Philadelphia Weekly

Upstairs at the Samuel M.V. Hamilton Building at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts (PAFA) is a show called After Tanner: African American Artists Since 1940, and it looks at the contributions of Henry Ossawa Tanner—arguably the country's first African-American artist to achieve international prominence. The show is not simply about Tanner's visual legacy—that is well-represented downstairs in Modern Spirit, the most comprehensive show on the artist to date. After Tanner is about the struggle he faced in becoming the kind of artist who makes it into history books, and how he became something of a hero to black artists after him.

"There were younger artists who visited [Tanner], made a pilgrimage to see him and to show him their work and be criticized, in the best sense," says Robert Cozzolino, Curator of Modern Art and Senior Curator at PAFA, who organized After Tanner. "He did not take no for an answer to his aspirations, but rather found a way to make the career and life he wanted. And that is a profound story given the historical context."

A memorial to my late grandmother. 

Creative Non-Fiction

One of my earliest and most vivid memories is sitting at a JoAnn’s Fabrics after leaving Crozer Medical Center. I would go with my grandmother after she had her various doctor visits, spending full afternoons leafing through McCalls and Vogue pattern books, looking for something to make for a future Sunday church service.  Late in her life, my grandmother had numerous health issues, and I was often her buddy at these appointments, providing a buffer for occasionally hard news about her slowly declining health.

I often talk about my grandma in comedic or abstract ways: taking her damning, sardonic phraseology as my own, or imparting her wisdom regarding life and love, applying it to the modern situations my friends are working through. But around this time each year, as I switch my closet from winter to summer and am forced to think about what I wear on a physical and emotional level, I cannot help but think about the way in which she shaped my interest in fashion. The way I think about clothes. The way I think about presentation and propriety. And ultimately, the ways in which I am completely indebted to the woman who, despite coming from less than even modest means, never left the house looking less than perfect.