Employees of the Month

PAIGE AARHUS We asked Paige to write us a short bio, and this is what she sent: “My name is Paige Aarhus and I am a freelance writer and photographer in Africa. I enjoy binge drinking and getting extorted by gangsters, and I hate skateboarders, longboarders, hippies, fashion, music, and ‘hipsters,’ purely because it is trendy to do so. I have nearly destroyed myself via moonshine, pirate hunting, exploding volcanoes, and broken-down vans since my relationship with this fine publication began. I was once named employee of the month when I worked at Starbucks. That was the worst job ever. Are we at 150 words yet? Pretty close. La la la la, I love American Apparel and Viacom, la la. Close enough.” See THE MUNGIKI, THE TALIBAN, AND ME PHILIP HARRIS When Bob Odenkirk told us that for this month’s page he wanted to create an “Occupy”-era update of Currier and Ives’s classic “Central Park, Winter” etchings, our initial reaction was “Shit, Bob, where do you think we’re going to find someone who can do that? All those guys are dead.” After a frantic scramble, we found the perfect guy: Philip Harris, an illustrator from Devon, England, who specializes in ultradetailed drawings inspired by Victorian and Edwardian styles that he creates using old-timey dip ink pens given to him by his grandfather. In a few short days, young Philip was able to bang out an idyllic winter tableau of protest and police brutality that will bring tears to your eyes as surely as if you had been pepper-sprayed. See BOB ODENKIRK’S PAGE AARON LAKE SMITH

Aaron alternates his time between New York and North Carolina, which causes him to rove up and down the I-95 corridor like a ghost. Probably best known for his perambulatory fanzine

Big Hands, in 2009 he turned his gorgon gaze to journalism, seeking out seams in the contiguous fabric that blankets the world. Since then he’s traveled to a lot of small towns and interviewed a lot of people, including Steve Albini, who, during their interview, took a giant verbal shit on Sonic Youth, as he is wont to do. His last article for VICE, “Vive le Tarnac 9,” was about a group of anarchist saboteurs who live in a village in the French countryside. See PEELING ONIONTOWN  MALIN BERGSTRÖM

Swedish illustrator Malin Bergström is from Malmberget, a Lapland hamlet way up north famous for having a humongous crater right in the middle of it that’s slowly but surely devouring the town. When we first got to know her she was flashing her tits and smoking in the bathrooms of Stockholm clubs. Now we couldn’t imagine a party without her. Last year, she adopted a fluffy Pomeranian puppy named Helmut, and before we knew it she had a bun in the oven. Nowadays she spends her time making fudge, changing diapers, and producing illustrations on impossible deadlines. For this issue, Malin illustrated the violent Asian owner of an LA gas station who is the central character in Sam McPheeters’s new novel.

See THE LOOM OF RUIN JACOB AUE SOBOL

Danish photographer Jacob Aue Sobol’s work always looks a bit like stills from a film that you would want to watch multiple times, but only when you’re sober or else it might bum you out. His trademark black-and-white contrast-heavy style has won him a Leica European Publishers award, World Press Photo of the Year, and membership in the world-famous photography collective Magnum. We’ll get around to interviewing him properly at some point, but this month he was in Korea and he was too busy taking amazing photos to take our call. PS: For whatever reason, our associate editor Ellis Jones thought Jacob’s name was “Jacon,” which produced lots of inside jokes about “eating Jacon and eggs.”

See A FEW FROM ‘STORIES’