Deep Cuts Vol. 01 — The Black Avatar

Can we all be heard?

We live in an era where connection feels infinite—yet understanding gets lost. We're visible without context, seen but not known.

My childhood pulsed with the scent of ink and glossy paper—magazines became blueprints for my imagination. In the '90s, I combed DC newsstands for Trace, The Source, Vibe, and Italian Vogue's "All Black" issue, heart racing at each find. When Trace's Black Girls Rule issue was nowhere in stores, I downloaded the PDF—desperate to hold even a piece of it, glowing on my screen.

That issue changed everything for me. Seeing Arlenis Sosa, an Afro-Latina model, on the cover felt like a part of me had finally entered the frame. I saw the many sides of Black womanhood I'd always felt inside—different styles, different stories—each celebrated not as rare, but as essential. Those magazines didn't just include us; they made space where we mattered. They showed me, as Octavia Butler once wrote, that you can make your own worlds.

The printed word has always been used as a tool of resistance. During the Harlem Renaissance, journals like Crisis, Opportunity, and Fire!! didn't just publish Black writers—they built intellectual infrastructure, challenged stereotypes, and declared that Black culture belonged in the canon. When mainstream publishers refused access, they built their own platforms. The same impulse drove sound: when radio wouldn't play reggae, communities built sound systems. Hip-hop was born the same way. Print, music, audio—our people have always found a way to be heard when institutions refused to listen.

We're watching it happen again. Cultural institutions are under siege. Pathways are closing. Work centering our communities is labeled "divisive." Algorithms decide who gets amplified, archived, or erased.

Deep Cuts builds on that legacy. We translate spoken testimony into print, experimenting with how to preserve voice in its truest form. Born from our original research at VOYD, Deep Cuts extends that work onto the page—turning field notes and lived experience into a cultural record. What started as research has become a form of preservation.

This inaugural issue, The Black Avatar, explores how artists and technologists are constructing identity within systems never built for them. The contributors here aren't waiting for permission.

May we never stop imagining a world where we can all be heard.

—Earlecia RichelleEditor-in Chief