by Swim Press
We’re surrounded by pretty and soft things like flowers shedding their petals in the wind and animals hiding in the wilderness. What is the relationship between us and them? Plant, animal, human?
In the same way that most of our ideas come to us, the theme Flora & Fauna was a late night epiphany had by our social media manager Vic. When she presented it to the group during one of our meetings, we instantly loved it as well!
The idea of having a dual themed issues (and dual covers!!!) was something we loved. It added a fresh spin on Swim Press and we knew we’d quite twice as many amazing submissions from you all!
Though we did start to think about it more: why is Flora & Fauna a good theme for issue 04? As much as we love it, we also want to make sure it’s creative enough that you can all find inspiration from it.
There’s a lot to talk about when it comes to nature. Our first thought is the soft and sweetness of it all. Our imagery around this theme has consisted of lots of baby animals, specifically fawns, and bright pink and white flowers. We often ascribe nature with innocence and beauty.
So much of writing can be about creating a space for exploring trauma and darkness – which we love. But we wanted to offer an issue where tenderness and peace could be explored as well. From the images of birds flying free to apple trees growing, bees humming around them.
The cyclical nature of Flora & Fauna was also something we hoped our readers would discuss, the constant life and death; and the constant giving and giving and giving. Nature is also often equated to femininity, which in turn is equated to kindness – we wanted to see some of that.
But nature holds a darker side as well. As beautiful as this flower may be, it’s highly dangerous, and it’s that very beauty that invites you to get poisoned. The animal kingdom is often cruel, mothers rejecting their infants, survival of the fittest, predator outrunning their prey. Fruit rots and attracts maggots, plants are carnivorous or poisonous or addictive. And perhaps worst of all, humans are animals, and we have committed many crimes.
So, this isn’t just a one-faced issue, literally, as always we wanted to create as much narrative variety as possible, both for fiction and poetry, as well as for our photographers and artists.
It helps, also, that the three of us took the same module at University called “Place and Landscape”, so we have a special relationship with descriptions of nature and beautiful landscapes and vivid imagery.
Issue 04 is available for pre-orders TODAY and we are so excited for each and every one of you to get your hands on a copy and enjoy the fabulous work of our contributors! x
swim press 