De Cheap*Journal: “There were no rules or limits”

The publication’s aim is to archive and share work amongst the MA departments, but also to give the community and the projects that quickly got produced a stage to continue living.

It was organised by Toni Wagner and Johanna Denecke, who collected all of the the students’ work and bundled it together. “It could be complex or as simple as possible,” said Toni. “There were no rules nor limits, it just needed to fit on one A4 page.”

DAE’s Editorial Team interviewed them to find out more:

→DAE: How did the De Cheap*Journal came together?
Toni: Starting in April, a group of first year MA students came together, got briefed by the creators of the first issue, and kick-started the second round of this publication. After having various meetings with Ilse Meulendijks (Head of MA programme) and Pete Fung (Community Coordinator and Tutor) where a budget and frame were discussed, the open call for entries started where students of the first year were invited to submit one project that was created in the first year of their studies.
The editorial team focused on the pages in-between, the design team handled the big design file, and the organization team kept the phone line between printing and release party organizing. On the 3rd of June, the second issue was officially released and celebrated with a female DJ set @residencies for the people.

→DAE: How important is it for you to work on a student-initiated project like this?
Johanna: De Cheap*Journal was almost my favourite project this year. It’s super rewarding to work on something self initiated and to see it through until the end. It was great to connect with people outside the normal project-based work and to see how everyone rooted for the publication to go through and how well it was received in the end.

→DAE: Could you tell me one thing you learn about school and one thing you learn about yourself from this first year at DAE?
Toni: It is easy to get frustrated with things that go wrong, but with an intention of opening spaces for voices and reclaiming ones own agency and the agency as a student body, almost anything is possible. Solidarity and community and really trying to enable voices to be heard was a key experience for me this first year at DAE.

Organisation
- Toni Wagner (CIL)
- Johanna Denecke (CIL)

Design
- Giulia Braglia (CIL)
- Maria Palomá (CIL)
- Dace Burkevica (CD)

Editorial
- Bhavneet Kaur (CD)
- Mirano Suzuki (CIL)
- Ishani Chatterjee (CIL)

Owls
- Pablo Bolumar (GEO)
- Marco Pagan (ID)
- Johanna Denecke (CIL)
- Teresa Carvalheira (SD)
- Yuanpu Wang (CD)
- Nils Axen (CD)

Toni: “A big shoutout to Ilse Meulendijks and Pete Fung without whose support this possibility would not have been a reality. Also a big hug to Mika Kranen and ZBar who always makes sure ‘good food equals good mood!’”