R.08: A New Creative Era

Early yesterday we met at our studio on Canal Street where two boxes of zines and a bright-yellow newspaper box awaited us. We loaded the newspaper box onto a dolly, then rolled it a few blocks to the front of 31 Canal St between Ludlow and Essex in Downtown NYC. Inside we stacked copies of a new zine called A New Creative Era.

A New Creative Era is Metalabel’s eighth release. It’s an optimistic call to shift from the hyper-individualism of our age to a new focus on collaboration and mutual support. It was created in the spirit of its subject: a collaborative and sincere appreciation of the experience of making creative work together.

This zine began as a conversation among the Metalabel squad a month ago. One idea built on another and another, and before we knew it zines were being printed and distributed on a NYC sidewalk. The music-like flow came from how deeply we feel what’s inside. Pure sincerity.

For the next week, you can pick up a free copy in the yellow newspaper box in front of 31 Canal Street. We’ll be refilling the newsstand with new copies each morning.

Our friends outside of NYC can experience this too. We turned the zine into an immersive microsite at newcreativeera.com where you can read it, download and print it, and co-sign and join a New Creative Era.

We’ve also made a record for A New Creative Era that offers a physical copy to US-based collectors. Copies are available via onchain record (.0099 ETH/$2) and traditional credit cards ($2 plus $5 shipping). Zines ship to US addresses only.

Join the New Creative Era

In addition to the publication, we’re hosting spaces IRL and virtually to gather people moved by this spirit.

On June 22 we’ll host a session in NYC and on June 29 we’ll host a session on Zoom. These are spaces for creative people to share their practices and learn from each other.

Apply to join these sessions and the New Creative Era here.

Further Reading

• The Quorum DAO Anthology: This week saw an interesting first: after their initial onchain record sold out in a few hours, Quorum released a 2nd edition of their record for the DAO Anthology zine. Grab a copy onchain or via traditional e-commerce here. We like this experiment and love this drop.
• The Idiot exhibition: Last month we shared The Idiot, a Quality Drop for a film exhibition in NYC on June 11th. The show is completely sold out, however people can still join a live Twitch stream of the exhibit. Collect The Idiot record here.
• We curated an Are.na page with New Creative Era energy. View and add to it here.
• Check out New Creative Era online or collect a copy of the zine. We’re excited to explore this new energy with you. :) :) :)