Rookiemag History #3: Beginnings 2.0 With Savana Ogburn
Part two of my interview with Savana Ogburn.
Savana Ogburn (she/her) is a photographer, collage artist, animator, and set designer based in Atlanta, Georgia. Savana contributed photographs, collages, DIYs, and more to Rookiemag between 2015 and 2018.
PART 2
Sarah Isenberg: So, are there any parts of Rookiemag that you still think about, or have affected you as an adult? Any articles you’ve gone back to years down the line that still feel prescient? Or that have maybe affected you differently as an adult than it did as a teen? What lasting effects has Rookiemag had on you as an adult?
Savana Ogburn: Obviously the visual stuff has really stuck with me, and played a big part in who I am artistically. Also, I read the first issue of the newsletter and very much agree on the “How Not to Care What Other People Think of You.” I remember my cousin— I have a cousin who’s like five years younger than me— for her thirteenth birthday or something my mom wouldn’t let me buy her the yearbook for a variety of reasons. [sarcastically] We love the south, we love the bible belt. So I copy-pasted that [article] into a document and put it in an envelope for her because I was like “This is it!” I remember that article feeling really important to me, but I need to revisit it, it’s been a long time. Also, at the time — the way they published a lot of work for and by queer people and about the queer experience, which at the time I was like “I’m reading this because I’m an ally! What I’m feeling right now is allyship.” And when I think about it now, it’s really normalized a lot of things for me in ways people at my high school couldn’t. In a way that emo music couldn’t. I had Teegan and Sara. That was it! That’s very important to me. I can’t— off the top of my head, I can’t think of any particular articles. I’m gonna have to go back and look later, when I’m ready to go down the rabbit hole.
SI: I love that story of you literally printing that article out and giving it to your cousin! I have cousins who are like 16 and 12 right now, and I’m like— how do I introduce this to them in a way that’s not like Older Cousin? I just want [Rookie] to be a resource for them so fucking badly because it was so amazing for me. I don’t know how to be like “this thing is really cool,” but without forcing it onto them, because they’re so not going to be receptive if I’m like “hey kids! Here’s this thing you should know about from when I was your age!”
Sorry, I had to.
SO: Totally! And I don’t know if it worked on my cousin. I know that she was into a lot of the same music as me at that point, so I was like “maybe this will feel like a natural progression!” I don’t know if it did. Even the way— and I have my yearbook here— the way that they talked about bodies and sexuality— I don’t know what I would think right now, had I not had this. Being in the bible belt, being in shit garbage sex ed classes that don’t talk about queerness, that don’t talk to you about your body as if it’s the normal funny thing— groundbreaking!
SI: No completely! I remember reading my Rookie Yearbook, and truly like one of the first articles in Yearbook One is like the “Do it Yourself” how to masturbate article. Having that be out, in the world written by women, is so opposite of the male gazey— opposite of clinical sex ed. Truly a revolution.
SO: Yes! I have the collage that was paired with that burned into my brain. That was such an important article too. Nobody was doing it like Rookie.
SI: And really, in my opinion, nobody’s done it since.
SO: Agree.
SI: Kind of going off of that, what are some aspects of culture today that you, hands-down, 100% think would not exist without Rookiemag, or were affected by Rookiemag? I kind of talked about this a little bit in the last newsletter, but like the Petra Collins/Olivia Rodrigo video— that would never have happened!
SO: I was nodding my head furiously reading that.
SI: Other things like that! I broke down in my notes app a list of things where ok, these definitely would not have happened [had Rookiemag not existed]. They are: the Olivia Rodrigo music video, the movies Booksmart and Shiva Baby, Susan Alexandra Bags...
SO: Ok, definitely— and there’s been a million people that have written about this, so I’m not going to talk about it that much— but the Petra Collins aesthetic is everywhere! The Petra Collins aesthetic is selling you razors, which is BIZARRE, and I can’t even go into it. So many of the things visually— so many photo trends: the vaseline filter, the sparkle filter— all of that shit came from Rookie, I will not hear otherwise. Also, I think about— I think about a lot of the websites now that are geared towards women and that have been since Rookie time, but once Rookie blew up, they started adopting the really talky trying-to-be-big-sister styles. I think about Rookie— obviously it feels very genuine, because it was. It was authentic, whatever that means. The articles that said “Literally the Best Thing Ever!” And no shade to them, I interned with them, but I think about Refinery 29, and their headlines are the same but it doesn’t feel real. It doesn’t feel comfy in the way that Rookie did.
SI: Or even Man Repeller, to an extent, was trying to build off that colloquial nature of their journalistic style and it— sometimes it worked really well, but sometimes it felt a little off, it didn’t quite land.
SO: It feels like adults writing it...for other adults, or trying to be cool to teens. Yeah I even think about Lorde— and not that Rookiemag made Lorde possible— but Ella has even said that Rookie was huge for her, it was really important for her. For her to have the success that she’s had writing about being a smart teen girl, and then how that turned into like 15 more “Lorde Bs.” Like there’s Alessia Cara, and all of those other girls. This has all morphed into Billie Eilish. Obviously our culture has always had a fascination with young women— problematic or not— but I think that maybe— even like Olivia Rodrigo— Olivia and Billie, thinking about how they’re singing about depression, they’re singing about mental health in way that perhaps mainstream young women in pop haven’t been able to do so in the past. Everything feels a little bit more genuine or real or something.
SI: It feels earnest. Because like— I don’t know— ten, fifteen years ago, female pop stars— the main one that comes to mind is Taylor Swift, who would just sing about boys, which isn’t a bad thing. But, if Taylor Swift started singing about topics that Billie Eilish and Olivia Rodrigo are singing about today, but in 2009 or whatever— that wouldn’t have happened! That didn’t happen!
SO: Yeah, she would have been immediately “crazy” and written off. I mean, I think it’s opened up a lot of space, and I know it’s bold to be like “Rookiemag is the reason women can say their feelings publicly!”
SI: You know, that’s not bold! I don’t think that’s a hot take at all!
SO: Ok, wow! My people. I definitely think it led to a lot of— even I think about Beyonce performing at the VMAs in 2014 with the word “Feminist” behind her. I don’t know how that would have gone over for me had I not been on Rookie all the time. I’m not saying Beyonce is a Rookie, even though that would be amazing….
SI: I think deep down she must be.
SO: Please! Petition to get Blue Ivy a Yearbook One!
SI: The people need an answer!
SO: Yes, the people need an answer! And I know that Blue Ivy needs this book. So, anyways, that happened around the same time that I’m being radicalized by Rookie in terms of feminism. All of that happened at the same time, and I was feeling very cool, making necklaces that said feminist, with ponybeads on them and shit like that. And then ow you can go to Target and buy mugs that say “Proud Feminist” and “Ask me about my Pronouns.” And I really think that’s great; that’s a net good. But I don’t know that this newest wave of feminism would have been— would have happened as quickly, or in the specific aesthetic way that it has developed— without Rookie. If that makes any sense.
SI: No, I completely agree. I think it made it both accessible and aestheticized it in a way that felt accessible, again, and comfortable. I think brands took that and ran, for better or for worse.
SO: Yeah, I mean I think it’s all a net good. I’d rather it be this way than uh, anti-women. Yeah, everytime I see like a coffee table book that says like “Thirty Badass Feminist Women in History” in a TJ Maxx, I’m like “thank you Rookie!”
SI: I think about that a lot, especially— and I hope you know what I’m talking about— in regards to that one Me and You t-shirt that said “Feminist” with like some hearts around it?
SO: Do you know how badly I wanted that?! I wanted it SO bad!
SI: I knew you would know! I always wanted it, but it was like $50 and my mom would never buy it for me, which is still devastating to this day. But I think something like that that was really— at the time 2013, 2-14, nobody was making shit like that! That was the original thought and the original design. And now, what, less than ten years later that has proliferated itself to death!
SO: It feels like— what does that word even mean? Unfortunately, but also— I totally know what you’re talking about. It’s so specific.
SI: The last question I want to end on is not necessarily a Rookie related question, but if you could give any advice to your teenage self, as you now, what would it be?
SO: I think like artistically, because obviously— well, maybe not obviously— I was like throwing myself into my work, into my photography and collage because it— because I saw something that I wanted to emulate that felt like it could be an older version of me, but also because throwing myself head over heels into making artwork meant that I didn’t have to think about the nuances of my identity. I think that I spent a lot of time trying to emulate other people— which is what you do as a teenager. But the biggest thing I’ve learned in my 24 years is that if there’s not blueprint for what you’re doing, that’s the best fucking thing you can have. Do you know what I mean? That’s when things feel artistically, really fresh. That’s when— I don’t know if there’s something about me that’s like, bizarre. I’m at a point now, at 24, where on a good day I can be like “oh, this is probably something really important about me”. Or even when I was contributing to Rookie, there was such a good influence, a positive influence on me. I didn’t comprehend that, because I was a teenager. Do you know what I mean? It’s like everything that is different is weird and bad. Even if you know intellectually it’s fine. But I think it would tell my younger self to stick to my guns artistically and personally. The things that feel weird or scary or bad, are probably really good. I think that’s it.
SI: I love that. And I totally agree— the things that are weird or scary or bad are usually the best things. Well, that’s all I have! I think we covered it; I think we did a wide swath of Rookiemag related things. This was so great, thank you so much for being a part of this!
~
Bad Reputation— Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
We’re Going to be Friends— The White Stripes
Genius of Love— The Tom Tom Club
Dreams— Japanese Breakfast
Fifteen (Taylor’s Version)— Taylor Swift
Both Sides Now— Joni Mitchell
Both Sides Now— Carly Rae Jepsen
Misery Business— Paramore
Time Moves Slow— BADBADNOTGOOD
Dancing Queen— ABBA
Come Sail Away— Styx