Hey, you. Yeah, you, all of you.

This is my official welcome, my official thank you, my official expression of appreciation and gratitude for your interest in and excitement for Render: Feminist Food & Culture Quarterly.

I started this project about a year ago, as my senior thesis, and I fleshed it out (ha, see what I did there?) last fall, within just one semester—a 32-page prototype.

I still can’t believe that, not even a month after defending (and passing!) my thesis, I hit the ground running with my new friend and business partner, Danielle Knott, our Executive Director. (Shout out to MacKenzi for getting us in touch!)

Render is becoming more than I’d ever imagined, and while I’m absolutely THRILLED, I’m still in a state of disbelief! So, my most sincere and eternal thanks goes to everyone who guided me through the development of Render (I’m talking to you, KRB!), and also to those who are becoming involved in Render and turning it into a living, breathing magazine. And, of course, to all of you—our followers, our soon-to-be readers, our supporters, our community!

With that, I would like to extend an official call for contributors for The Flesh Issue. This first issue is actually a reissue of the  prototype, to which I originally assigned the theme of Flesh according to my own personal history and relationship with food.

My history with food is a story of self-deprivation in the name of independence, and ever-present obsession and disorder—and I know I’m not alone. There’s a complex relationship between Americans and their food, but that relationship is especially complex between women and food in that 75% of American women endorse unhealthy thoughts, feelings, and behaviors related to food and their bodies, according to a survey sponsored by Self magazine.

The Flesh issue is all about the relationship between food and body. I chose it so that I could reflect upon and rebuild my personal relationship with food, but our intent for Render is for it to be a community project within our readership of food-lovin’ feminists, so we’re opening it up to YOU! 

We need contributors! Send us your ideas, show us your work. We’ve got a magazine to make!

 

Gabi de León, Founder & Creative Director