👋✨ HUGE welcome to the many new subscribers who joined this week, thanks to Substack featuring my writing. The recognition came with a fancy gold badge, which my daughter thought was cool (though, she added, it would be better if it “wasn’t on a screen.” Point, kid.)
I wish this dispatch could be entirely celebratory as I’m excited to share some of my design process on a new look for Being Alive. I want more joy. Less heartbreaking death. I don’t want to write about Nex Benedict.
None of us should know Nex’s name. Nex’s parents shouldn’t have to reassure reporters and the internet masses that their preferred name will appear on their gravestone. There shouldn’t be reflection pieces about Nex’s dimples and love of cats.1 We shouldn’t be able to watch footage of Nex laying in a hospital bed greeting their school’s resource officer.
Nex was bullied. By girls in the bathroom. By school administrators who looked the other way. By the Oklahoma state school superintendent who restated his intentions to erase trans people in The New York Times.2 By the former Brooklyn realtor turned social media influencer appointed to the state-wide committee advising on approving books for public schools despite only visiting Oklahoma once.3 By a state legislator who calls us “filth.”4 By too many people—none of whom I want to elevate by naming specifically.
I’m sick to my stomach that these words I drafted weeks ago about an incident from thirty years ago are disgustingly relevant.
The first time I read about someone like me in the media, it was a true crime story. Years before Hilary Swank won an Oscar for portraying Brandon Teena in Boys Don’t Cry, I read about the rape and killing of a teenage trans man in my dad’s copy of The Advocate. I studied the article while lying in my bed. I stared at Brandon’s face for a very long time. I was 13.
When I wrote the above, it was the opener to an essay on why I felt compelled to change the gender on my government documents. I was using the anecdote to illustrate why all trans people have a fear of violence woven into their bodies. I cut the section, thinking I’d come back to build a whole essay around Brandon when I was ready. But now I can’t get Brandon and Nex out of my mind; I’m having refracted déjà vu.
The specifics are different, yet the media swirl feels all too familiar. After Brandon died, the media roasted him all over again. The headlines and the reporting framed Brandon as the problem: a spectacle, a thief, a confused lesbian… a liar.
I guess I’m heartened that by putting these two tragedies next to each other, we can point to some progress. Most of the current coverage takes Nex’s gender identity seriously. But the itch for the crime tick-tock, the hyper-focus on Nex’s cause of death, has me reeling. I am already recoiling over an inevitable limited-series podcast. However well-intentioned journalists will be and the necessity of documenting what happened, I wish Nex’s last minutes were not under a microscope.
This week, I spent my flights back and forth to Oakland sketching new logos for this newsletter. It was a delight to skip paying for wifi and instead let my mind wander with the clouds, the light, and the solitude.
I debuted the newsletter’s current aesthetic a year ago to coincide with a name change and the essay 17 Reasons for Being Alive. The design was always meant to be temporary. I made something quick and functional, but it felt too cold. And the entire ethos of this writing practice is about inviting in more joy.
The sketching was fun but a little aimless. When I got home yesterday, I sat down in my studio and applied the same process I use with clients on myself. Starting with a brief.5
Next, I went to my library and pulled some references. I knew I wanted to somehow nod to the pink, blue, and white striped transgender flag. Activist Monica Helms designed the flag in 1999. It first flew over Phoenix Pride in 2000 and now lives in the Smithsonian Institute’s collection.6 The flag is now so ubiquitous—there’s even an emoji 🏳️⚧️!—but I remember in college painting the large interlocking male & female symbol ⚧ on campus because it was the only shared visual that represented transgender people.
But what else did I want to draw from? Flipping through Andy Campbell’s “Queer x Design,” I landed, as I often do, on the iconic Silence = Death Collective’s design from 1986.
Yes. This. Always. As simple as it is arresting. The poster and its derivative buttons, shirts, and beyond were in wide circulation in my youth, just as my father was coming out as a gay man. As my friend’s dads were dying of AIDS. Made by a group of artists led by Avram Finkelstein in 1986 and later adopted by ACT-UP, the design is one of the most searing examples of protest art. The group intentionally used the language and style of advertising to reach a broad audience. It worked. I imagine, well past their expectations.
I started to sketch out a concept utilizing the reclaimed (from its evil Nazi origin) pink triangle and the Gill Sans Condensed Bold typeface. Then I remembered an article I read earlier in the day about the new James Turrell art installation opening at a Manhattan private school. This new Skyspace, “Leading,” is one of a series of more than 85 all over the globe. Each Skyspace invites viewers to sit at length and watch the open sky transform at sunrise or sunset, along with a programmed light sequence. If you are new to Turrell, watch this film from director Jessica Yu.
All of Turrell’s work revolves around perception.
We think the sky is blue.
We forget to realize actually that we awarded it its color. So if I change your circumstance, or your context, or vision, then I can change the color of the sky.
—James Turrell
Turrell’s views on light remind me of the gift that transgender offer the world: freedom to change.
From Dr. Beth Harris’ Smarthistory conversation on Turrell while sitting in a Skyspace:
“Everything is contingent. Everything is related to everything else around it. It makes me think there is no one truth; everything is dependent on human vision, or what we bring to it, our own perception.”
The more I immersed myself in Turrell’s words and work yesterday, the more I wanted to infuse his spirit into my new creation. I started to play with color and light. Started to imagine what it would feel like to be in a quiet room, looking up at a triangular opening to the sky. Reflecting on possibility and change.
In the NYT write-up of the new Skyspace, third-grade students from Friends Seminary sit on teak benches staring into the changing lights, encouraged by their art teacher to draw whatever object comes to mind from the color that speaks to them. Students and parents are invited to attend weekly meditation sessions in the room. The entire community is invited to dream. Meanwhile, in Owasso, one of Nex’s gay classmates told reporters he carries a bulletproof backpack, just in case.
I don’t usually show works-in-progress publicly, but in the spirit of opening up to possibilities, below are the resulting concepts. Shared with tremendous appreciation for the inspiration from Helms, the Silence = Death Collective, and Turrell.
Would love to hear what you think in the comments, or reply to this email.
Get outside and see the sky this week.
xx Kyle
“Nex Benedict Loved Cats and Video Games and Reading” (Autostraddle)
“How Libs of TikTok became a powerful presence in Oklahoma schools” (The Washington Post)
“Listen to the audio of Oklahoma Sen. Tom Woods calling LGBTQ+ community 'filth'“ (The Oklahoman)
FWIW Client briefs are MUCH more detailed.
Thanks for sharing your design process, Kyle. They're all great, but I'm also partial to #1 and #3 for their simplicity and contrast, especially if seen as a smaller thumbnail, which is where I most often notice Substack logos. Sending love to the LGBTQIA community.
I like top right (not sure which number that is).💜