EDITOR’S NOTE

Over the course of my life, I’ve perfected the art of performance. I’ve learned, through trial and error, how to perform. For love. For my career. For social media. For myself. And not only have I learned how to perform, but I’ve learned how to perform well. I know what sticks and what doesn’t. When the audience wants to see humor, anger, or me shed a tear. Up until this point, I haven’t questioned being constantly on stage, living for an audience that patiently waits to see what’s next.

This year, though, the art of performance started to feel a bit overwhelming. I stopped being able to tell where the performance ended and I began. I treated life as a constant stage, editing my emotions in real time so that the audience would like me more, root for me more, praise me more. And I began to question: Is this really a good way to live? To live life as an everlasting performance? Even more so, do I even have the ability to stop performing? Has it become so intertwined with who I am that it just never ends?

I still don’t have the answers to any of these questions, and to be honest, I don’t know if I ever will. I do know, however, that asking these questions has made me more aware of the ways in which I perform, and the ways in which I want to stop performing.

The art in this issue explores performance, the different ways curating a life can look, and how each of us navigates the line between living and performing. To the contributors of this issue, thank you for sharing your art with us in a vulnerable way that allows us to see the person behind the performance.

To the readers of this issue, I hope you leave inspired to break from the curation of humanity that all of us fall victim to, even if it’s only every once in a blue moon. I hope you’re able to not only clear the seats in your theater of life, but step out of the audience yourself, and truly live, rather than simply perform the act.

In a world that is becoming increasingly digital, please remember to live beyond the screen. Live authentically. Live unapologetically. And most importantly, live for yourself.

With Love,

Keiarra McLean

Editor-In-Chief