Message in a bottle, memory on a cloud
Kassi Grace
https://twitter.com/kassi_grace
https://medium.com/@thecolourgrace
Message in a bottle, memory on a cloud is a full-colour A5 zine featuring a gorgeous thought exploration of communication, memory, and relationships in digital and physical forms.
My heart, zine friends. My heart.
Message in a bottle, memory on a cloud opens with an acknowledgement of the traditional peoples of the land the zine was made on before gently guiding the reader into a journey of communication, distance, and the strange existence between the worlds of the physical and digital. Each page features a thought snippet, one to a few sentences, along these themes. Each snippet is accompanied by a sketch, both places on lovely and colourful hand-drawn backgrounds. For me, these really added to the almost ethereal feel of the journey of this zine.
This zine is… beautiful. It really is to me. I’m not sure if it’s a matter of having grown up as the internet and computers were becoming more standard in schools. (To the point I can remember when I was a child wondering why I would want to look something up on a computer when the encyclopaedias were right there in the library as well.) Or it could be the mix of memories as well as gentle wondering about letters, messages in bottles, and more.
I feel like I’m not explaining things well at all, but perhaps that’s because I’m still in such a contemplative space after reading it. Perhaps, my favourite quote… As someone who has had and has many online and long-distance relationships of different kinds, I do want to share this:
“I have lived, and I have loved on a piece of paper.”
I must admit I had to sit with that one for a while because it brought me back to so many different memories.
I think what really got to me about this zine is that there wasn’t any pure right or wrong in it. No pure condemnation of the digital or loathing of the physical. Things are as they are, and these contemplations are simply that – contemplations that you can take into your own mind and use as a means by which to start exploring your own feelings about life.
Message in a bottle, memory on a cloud was a truly unexpected zine that has left me with so many more thoughts and feelings than I could have expected to encounter. I feel like Kassi’s gentle wanderings are something everyone should consider reading.