Are you a writer? Some days I like to think I am.
I will start washing clothes, go about my mundane life, when all of a sudden, a stretch of words comes to me that needs to be written down.
I’ll blast a series of sonnets from my fingertips only for the inspiration to be gone the next day.
And on that next day, I think I’m an artist with purple and green watercolors stained on my kitchen table from drawing lavender and other flowers all day on loose-leaf paper.
Then every now and then, when I’m not the writer or artist, I see something striking that I know I must capture on film and I’m a self-proclaimed photographer.
Do we have to put a label on the things we are and make us happy if we live through art in all its forms?
Whether you’re a writer, artist, photographer, or all three, Tuesday is the last day to submit your work in all its glorious fashion to Gallery: A Literary & Arts Magazine here at UTRGV.
With the deadline coming up, the editors of the magazine sat down to chat about what they go through when selecting pieces and what they are centering the theme on.
Editor-in-Chief Darrian Kirksey described the experience of picking out what will be published because, let’s be honest, who isn’t curious how that works?
“It’s a lot of fun. We sit as a class right now, and then we have groups by each thing. We have poetry, fiction, visual arts,” Kirksey said. “So we sit there and we go through it, and the class gives a sense of what they feel. We talk about it. If it’s a photo, we talk about the coloring, the aspects of it, how it would go well with the magazine, if it would go with a poem.”
For this year’s issue, Kirksey found inspiration in diversity and wanted that to be the central theme, a celebration of life with all of its many faces.
“I want to focus more on the diversity of the world, so that’s why I’m focusing on traveling,” she said. “I want all aspects of life to be shown in this year’s Gallery.”
Prose Co-Editor and English sophomore Grecia Ramirez reiterated Kirksey’s desire, with her own admiration for the work that has already been submitted so far.
“We’ve seen so many variations,” Ramirez said. “We’ve seen traveling. We’ve seen inner troubles that people have had.
“Whether it’s where they come from or how they feel, it’s been pretty enlightening. A lot of us didn’t know that so many students felt the way they did. So it’s been pretty eye-opening.”
More than anything, students are writing about cultural repression and issues that have impacted them while living in the Rio Grande Valley, giving literary and artistic representation to Mexican-American lives through their work.
Poetry Editor Ashley Hernandez believes the magazine can educate those outside of the Valley on cultural problems the university’s students go through.
“I think especially here, because we’re a border city, and with everything that’s been going on in the country, we get a lot of poems that speak on that,” Hernandez said. “I think it shows a lot about the students that go here, and if you were to put it out and give it to someone, I think you could read it and have an idea, hopefully, of the culture of the university.”
Art and Design Director Alexa Mendoza Esquivel differed in her hope for the magazine but in an artistically endeavoring way.
She hopes the magazine can work as a connection to art students at the Visual Arts Building, to feeling more connected with those on the main campus in Edinburg.
“I would love to see more people from the [former] annex, the Visual Arts Annex, to feel like they can put themselves out there,” Esquivel said. “To feel like they are being showcased on the main campus.
“Sometimes, there’s this feeling of disconnection between both of our campuses, so I want them to feel like art really matters. … The Gallery has a lot of poetry and prose, and sometimes I feel like artists feel like, ‘OK, my art is just going to be complementary to what is going to be in the Gallery,’ which is not true. Art can also be showcased as the main point.”
If you are afraid to submit your work, Hernandez has some advice for you.
“I would say just go for it, because you’re never going to know unless you try it,” she said. “It’s better to get feedback and not be published, than to have it to yourself and never know if it needs work or if it’s going to be good enough.”
The deadline is Tuesday night, so if you’re still on the fence about it, now is the time to throw fear out the window and just do it.
Submissions are accepted at https://gallery.submittable.com/submit.
