all images © The Funambulist

The Funambulist is a bimestrial printed and digital magazine complemented with a blog and a podcast (Archipelago) edited by Léopold Lambert. Its subtitle, “Politics of Space and Bodies,” expresses it ambition to bridge the world of design (architecture, urbanism, industrial and fashion design) with the world of the humanities (philosophy, anthropology, history, geography, etc.) through critical articles written by long-time collaborators as well as new ones.

Many aspects of The Funambulist’s editorial mediums remain free and in open access (books, blog, and podcast) and readers who enjoy the forms and contents of the platform are invited to consider purchasing or subscribing to the magazine as a form of support for this form of production of knowledge. From now on, The Funambulist becomes a magazine and need your supports!

Léopold Lambert, the editor of The Funambulist, has sent a new announcement and launched his new project, The Funambulist Magazine at the offices of e-flux. Helping him to introduce the magazine were three of its brilliant contributors, Sadia Shirazi, Olivia Ahn, and Minh-Ha T. Pham (see photos and recording of the event). This new 62-page publication will now be published once every two months in both digital and printed versions. This magazine continues alongside and in parallel with the open-access platforms that constitute the blog and podcast(Archipelago), which both aim at proposing a political discourse about design, territories and the city, as well as to create an international community of thinkers and creators around these questions since 2010.

The first issue (September) dedicated to militarized cities is already published. The three following issues, respectively dedicated to the politics of suburbs (November), clothing (January), and prisons (March), are currently in the making. All of them involve articles written by talented (and often young) writers around the world, many of whom have collaborated with The Funambulist in the past.

Léopold Lambert explained that: ''this new project is an ambitious and challenging one for me: I made it my full-time activity and it involves a significant economy to run it. I am nevertheless hoping to make it work, thanks to the various forms of support you and your friends/colleagues can provide to it. This announcement is a means for me to explain these forms, susbscribe,   distribution, spread the word via social media, send student work- as well as to present the global editorial project of The Funambulist to those of you who are not so familiar with it. You may also find this information on the website itself on the page Help us!. ''

Subscribe: Each issue of the magazine is on sale on the website and the most evident form of support certainly consists in purchasing it. However, Lambert has also designed a way for you to accompany the project if you are interested to do so: it is a subscription to both print (5€/month) and digital (2.5€/month) versions, automatically renewed every month, until you no longer want to or can support the magazine and its open-access platforms. When signing up for it, you will receive your copy of the magazine, while re-affirming your support to the project on a regular basis. To give you a rough idea, 1,000 subscribers to the printed edition of the magazine would allow it to run in its current form without any other sales or external support. If you would like to subscribe, you can do so by following this link.

Help the distribution: Another way of supporting The Funambulist consists in contributing to its international spreading. You can help by contacting your library, school, university or any other institution and inciting them to subscribe to the magazine. You can also help by offering your favorite bookstore to carry the magazine: if they accept to purchase at least four copies for them to carry (bookstore price is 8€ per copy), we will send them to you, as well as an additional one to thank you. The name of the bookstore will then appear on the map displayed on this page.

Spread the word: An easy way to support The Funambulist Magazine simply consists in spreading the word about its existence, and the potential interest you have for it. Social media and blogs are certainly a good place to begin: The Funambulist has both a Facebook page and a Twitter account to which you can refer if necessary. You can also download this poster, print it and pin it in your university or wherever else you might see fit!

photo © project by James Martin

Send student work: The Funambulist originated from the will to be a helpful tool for students. The magazine does not want to forget this editorial dimension and is committed to publish two or three student projects in relation to the theme of each issue. If you know of a student project that challenges the themes to which next issues are dedicated, feel free to send them to me at [email protected]. 

> via thefunambulist.net