January 21, 2025 • 20 mins
Rachel and Janette sit down with Kerri Sullivan, a passionate librarian and the founder of the Jersey Collective, a platform dedicated to celebrating New Jersey's local artists and culture. Kerri shares her journey from a film major to a public librarian, highlighting her work on the anthology "New Jersey Fan Club: Artists and Writers Celebrate the Garden State," which aims to challenge stereotypes about the state and showcase its diverse voices. The conversation delves into Kerri's creative projects, including a unique Go Fish card game and a sticker vending machine featuring local artists. With insights on the beauty of New Jersey's landscapes and cultural offerings, this episode is a heartfelt tribute to the Garden State and its vibrant community.
Kerri Sullivan
Jersey Collective
Newark Branch Brook Park
Newark Museum of Art
The Nork Project
Iris Bookstore
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi Rachel, hey Jeanette.
Today's podcast is with KeriSullivan.
Who is Keri?
What have you learned aboutKeri in our interview?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I've learned a lot about Keri.
First of all, I learned thatshe's a librarian and I love
that.
She is the founder and creatorof the Jersey Collective, which
is a website, also an Instagramaccount, which is all things
Jersey, and she supports localartists who do illustrations and
photographs and anything thatis sort of Jersey related, so
(00:31):
check that out.
And then also, she is theeditor and curator of a really
awesome book the New Jersey fanclub.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
She's kind of like a Jersey expert now, so we did ask
her in the interview at thestick to the end what her
recommendations are, and we hadsome of our own to pile on to
hers.
But so please enjoy thisinterview.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Basically a Jersey love fest.
Listen up and love New Jerseyeven more.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Carrie hello.
Thank you so much for joiningLost in Jersey.
Hi thanks so much for having me.
You do so many things.
You do the New Jersey Fan Clubbook, and then you have the
Jersey Collective, which is areally popular Instagram that
you seem to have many artiststhat you feature on.
That.
Is that your main thing, thatyou, or how do you describe
yourself with what you?
Speaker 3 (01:24):
do.
Yeah, so Jersey Collective I'vebeen running for over 10 years
now.
It started in 2014 when I wasin grad school, and it started
just as like an Instagramaccount that different people
could take over every week, andthat was kind of.
My focus was just giving peoplea platform to share whatever
they wanted, as long as it wasrelated to New Jersey, and back
then you could only do photos onInstagram.
(01:45):
So it was photography based andwe did meetups and gallery
shows and things like that, andthen over time I kind of just
found other ways to use that asa launching pad for any kind of
thing I wanted to do.
If I could find a way to make itNew Jersey related, it would
become a Jersey collective thing.
So now we kind of publish workwith other artists, like my
(02:07):
boyfriend, who's an illustrator.
We did a go fish New Jersey gofish card game together last
year, so that's been out forabout about a year now.
My book kind of came about,partially because of Jersey
collective as well, whichRutgers University Press
published.
It's an anthology about NewJersey, so kind of a similar
thing to the Instagram account,just bringing a bunch of voices
(02:28):
together all about New Jerseyand yeah, so that's kind of and
this isn't my full time job.
I'm a public librarian, so thisis just what I do on the side
for fun.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, I saw that you're a librarian.
Give us a little bit of abackstory how it all began Like.
So you're from New Jersey,you're from Mammoth County.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah, I'm from Mammoth County Originally.
I've bounced around a littlebit.
I've lived a couple differentplaces.
I'm in Essex County now, butbut yeah, I've bounced around
and I left for college, butbesides that I've only lived in
New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
And and from what I've read about the book is that
it's kind of a collection togive people an idea that this
kind of reputation that NewJersey has is not founded.
I mean the reputation that themedia seems to have with the
Jersey Shore and the mafia andeverything.
It's kind of pigeonholed thisday and I think the book is
(03:25):
geared towards telling peoplehey, it is just such a variety,
so many things.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah that's definitely part of it.
Yeah, I wanted it to feel likea book for people.
It could do a couple differentthings.
People who really know NewJersey and love New Jersey would
find it a nice read becausethey could kind of connect with
it in that way.
But I also think it does helpchallenge some of those
stereotypes that people mighthave about New Jersey as well.
(03:51):
Like if they read it, theymight look at the state in a new
way or learn something theydidn't know before, or just
learn about a part of the statethat they were unfamiliar with.
So that was definitelysomething I was thinking about
when I was working on it.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
I'm also fascinated about you being a librarian,
because I love books.
I'm obsessed with books BothJeanette and I are and we always
talk about like once a month,we give out our picks of, like
our top favorite reads.
So I wanted to know, though,because librarians are so
important and to me I think backto my experience growing I grew
up in Long Island with mylibrarian at our local library
(04:27):
was so wonderful and helped mepick out books, and sometimes
they even showed movies likeWilly Wonka's Charlie and the
Chocolate Factory.
But how did you decide tobecome a librarian, and how is
what is that journey like?
Speaker 3 (04:42):
yeah.
So for me it was a littleroundabout.
A lot of people are likeEnglish majors and then they
become librarians.
I was actually a film major soI was really into photography
when I was in high school and Iliked writing.
So I my brain was sort of likeoh, if you go into film you get
to do kind of both those things.
So while I was in college Iwent to Drexel University in
Philadelphia and they have likethis thing called the co-op
(05:05):
program where you have to spendusually it's like six months of
your college.
At some point you have to doyour co-op.
So you do like an internship.
So I did mine at theMetropolitan Museum of Art with
the photographs department.
They were looking for someonewho had experience with like
film negatives for an archivalproject.
So I was working with um.
(05:25):
I don't know if you know thethe street photographer, deanne
Arbis.
She did a lot of um streetphotos in like the 60s and 70s.
You definitely.
If you saw some, you definitelyrecognize them.
They're famous, but so they haveher archive there.
So I was doing a negativerehousing project, um with her
film negatives and I was likethis how do you, what job Like I
never like occurred to me,because I really liked history
(05:47):
too growing up.
Like my jobs when I was in highschool I worked at historic
living history places so I didlike dressed up and gave tours
and things like that.
So like I was always, you know,it was kind of a an interesting
like a mix of stuff that Ireally liked, like history and
working with photography andbeing in a museum setting, and
so I was just like what is, whatis this?
And the person who wassupervising me was an archivist
(06:09):
and she's like oh, you have toget your master's of library and
information science if you wantto work like in a job like this
.
So this could be kind of aninteresting route to go, like
I'll just, you know, finish youcan, you can major in anything
and then be and then go to gradschool for library science.
And then I went to Rutgers forgrad school and got my MLIS and
from there I kind of realizedthat part of the reason I didn't
(06:30):
want to work in film wasbecause of how not stable it
could be and how you don't knowif you have health insurance or
if you're going to have a joband a lot of you know, you're
kind of bouncing around and Ididn't think I really wanted to
do that.
So then I learned that a lot ofarchives jobs are also like that
.
Some of them are grant funded.
So I ended up getting apart-time job in a public
(06:51):
library when I was almost donewith school and I had never
really considered like I wasn'tsure that I was interested in
public libraries, but then Irealized it was a lot more
interesting than I had thoughtoriginally and I just really
liked it.
So I've been in publiclibraries for about 10 years.
I've worked a couple differentplaces and had a couple
different positions.
I currently do all of the adultprogramming for my library, so
(07:13):
I plan like the whole calendarof events for adults.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
And I really like it that you took a kind of a
practical route for likestability and you know your,
your life yeah but but as weknow, you know, the first thing
that we know about you is thatyou have a kind of an artistic
you know face to the public,which is really kind of I love
that that people are like.
(07:36):
You know, I'm first, I'm goingto make sure I get the
foundation and safety down anddo it in something that,
surprisingly, you ended upreally enjoying, you know.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Yeah, no, I really like my job and I think that
they kind of work together in anice way too.
I think there's a lot of thingsthat my my day job life and my
out of work life kind of have incommon is like trying to do
things that bring peopletogether, give people
opportunities to learn newthings or to connect with other
people.
Jersey Collective projectitself has been around since
(08:05):
2014.
The book I started working onit was a multi-year process.
I started working on theproposal, so for nonfiction
books, for people who don't know, you have to write a book
proposal to try and sell it to apublisher or to an agent.
You basically are kind ofmaking a business plan for your
book.
So you're kind of makingsamples, you're writing like why
I'm the right person to do thisproject, what it's kind of
(08:28):
giving people a sense of whatit's going to be.
So that I spent more time onthat than I probably needed to.
But I like really wanted to doa good job and I'd never done it
before and I'm kind of justusing books I got from the
library to figure out how to doit.
So I kind of spent like acouple of years working on that,
which is probably more than youhave to do.
And I started working on thatprobably in like 2018 or so, and
(08:51):
then I finally sent it to aneditor there in early 2020.
And signed the contract withthem in summer of 2020.
And then I had nine months tomake that book and then it came
out in June of 2022.
So that was kind of thetimeline with all that, yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
So I mean, once it got accepted it was kind of the
timeline sort of actuallyhelpful for me because I was
(09:29):
going to work.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I was working in person pretty much the whole
time.
We had a brief period of timeright at the beginning where we
were closed, but working in apublic library, we have to go in
.
So we were back in person in, Ithink, late June of 2020.
So I was going to work andcoming home and working on the
book.
So that was all I did for allthat time.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
I know when you got all the people to contribute to
the book.
How do you determine you knowwhat you're going to put in,
what you're not going to put inIn your mind did you have an
overarching theme of showinglike it has to come from every
corner of the state?
Definitely, yeah, that was all.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Definitely, stuff I was thinking about was how to
make it as like wide of a rangeas possible.
Both in the subjects thatthey're about, there's pieces
that are really personal storiesthat people wrote about their
own lives, but there's some kindof New Jersey tie in, and then
there's also reallystraightforward, like little
history sections about you knowsomething interesting or some
(10:26):
kind of nature thing there'ssomething about, like the
ecology of the Pine Barrens, andso I really wanted to just kind
of cover a lot of ground.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
So those are all things I was thinking about,
were you surprised with whatsome of the submissions that you
got then then went and drovethere immediately Like I feel
like I would be wanting to seeeverything that somebody told me
about in this state.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Yeah, yeah there were some things that I learned a
lot, too, putting the booktogether.
There were definitely areas ofthe state that I didn't know as
much about, especially thefurther south we get and away
from the coast I'm like I don'tknow what's going on down there,
so I definitely wanted toinclude stuff like that.
But yeah, no, it was definitelya really cool experience of
(11:09):
wading through all that stuff,and not everybody had super
positive things to say either.
There is a lot of.
I know the subtitle of the bookis like there's the word
celebrating the garden state,isn't it?
But it's not a totalcelebratory book.
There are a bunch of essaysabout people kind of grappling
with either moving to the stateor leaving the state or coming
back after living elsewhere.
(11:30):
Like there's definitely alittle more um complexity in
what people were thinking aboutdid you find that a lot of it
was about?
food.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yes, there's definitely a lot of food um well
, let's talk a little bit aboutthe artwork that we see on these
cards and also the sticker artthat you do tell us a little bit
about.
These go fish cards and who'sthe?
Speaker 3 (11:53):
artist behind those?
Yeah, so the artist is namedalex flannery.
He is my boyfriend, um, he did.
He's also essex county uh, mostof his life, um, but yeah, so
he did the all the illustrationand the design and it was my
sort of direction of this issomething I think would be cool
to do, and he's just the best.
(12:14):
So there was no one else Iwanted to work with for that for
sure.
But, yeah, I think that's beenan exciting part of kind of
expanding beyond just being anInstagram account that people
can share photos on is gettingto work with different artists
to bring different like items tolife.
So we did the go fish cards andthen, of course, made a bunch
(12:35):
of stickers with the art fromthe cards, and I have a couple
other stickers that are outthere too that different artists
have designed.
The other fun thing I have is asticker vending machine, so
it's a physical vending machine.
I saw that it's so cool, yeah,so it's actually going to be
popping up in Montclair for acouple of weeks, starting on
January 25th.
(12:55):
It'll be there until February15th at Iris, the art bookstore
on Valley Road.
I don't know if you've been.
It's one of my favorite places.
It's fairly new.
Yeah, it's new.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Yeah, it's new, new.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
I haven't been there maybe this is a good excuse to
go um it's yeah, I'm definitelygonna go, but yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So the sticker machine I bought a bunch of
years ago and it sat on myliving room floor for a while
and I realized what I wanted todo with it was curate series of
stickers that are by differentartists from New Jersey or who
live in New Jersey, have somekind of New Jersey connection,
and just kind of bring it aroundto different places.
So sometimes it'll staysomewhere, like this one, it'll
(13:34):
be there for three weeks.
Sometimes I just bring it withme when I do like a one day
market and people can swap.
You know, if I'm on site I'llgive them quarters for their
bills.
But if you know, if peoplevisit it at a location, if they
can bring their own quarters,that's always great.
And yeah, and then you just geta little nice piece of little
art, very accessible price of adollar, and you can stick it on
(13:56):
your water bottle or your laptopor whatever you want to do with
it and you're supporting alocal artist and just kind of
spreading the Jersey love.
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
I really like that.
That is so cool.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
I'm looking at it right now.
Okay, we're definitely going topost that.
This is going to be up forpeople and it'll help the new
bookstore.
Nice, yeah, that place isamazing.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
I also do a monthly newsletter on Substack where I
do a little like five or sixquestion Q&A with someone every
month who I think is kind ofinteresting or doing something
interesting, and then I havelike links of other New Jersey
things and you know, like ifthere's some interesting kind of
fun New Jersey related culturereference or something like I'll
(14:36):
put that in there.
I try to do lists ofopportunities for writers and
artists that are New Jerseyspecific, like I see if I see a
call like a photography contestlocally or something like that,
so I put things like that inthere we are very excited about
seeing the sticker thing in this, our neighborhood.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I'm really excited to ask you what our final question
is to all of our guests,because we always ask people
something that they love aboutNew Jersey and I feel like you
know you're the right person toask You're going to need to
bring it, Carrie.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
I've been thinking about this for a while, because
when we talked about thisearlier in the week, I was like,
oh no, that's a big questionfor me.
So I mean okay.
So I have like I'll have a moregeneral answer and then I'll
give you a more specific answer.
Okay, great.
So my more general answer is Ithink one of the things I love
most about New Jersey is justthe variety across every metric.
(15:27):
Like the food variety you canget really good food from all
over the world because of howdiverse New Jersey is.
Depending on where you go inthe state, you can have some
like really incredible food.
And also just the variety oflike landscapes and you know you
can drive an hour and be at thebeach or you can be in the
mountains or you can be inrolling hill farmland like it's
(15:48):
just so different and it'sreally contained in, even though
you know, like other parts ofthe country, you have to drive
for hours to see something thatwith that much variety.
So I think we're really luckywith all those things.
Yeah, and then something morespecific and more like kind of
local is I'm going to give ashout out to Branchbrook Park in
Newark because it's reallybeautiful.
(16:10):
You know spring's going to behere, hopefully before we know
it, the cherry blossoms is areally good time to go.
if people haven't been before,that's a really nice, like first
introduction Like that's.
I think the first time I wentthere was for that.
Me too me too yeah and sothat's a really nice time to go,
but it's a really historic,really beautiful park and if
people haven't- been.
It's incredible stunning placein every season, but especially
(16:32):
during cherry blossom time thatthat is a great, great reminder
of that but also another norcthing is the norc museum of art
is incredible, oh it is.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
It's like it's a great museum.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
I think people don't realize how amazing of an art
museum that is and specificallylike art, the art collection too
like they used to just becalled the Newark Museum and
they changed it to include theof art Cause I think a lot of
people thought it was like ahistory museum, which they have
some of that but the artcollection is really incredible
and like from all over the world.
They have a really interestingcollection from Tibet that's
(17:03):
like one of their bigcollections and they have a lot
of African art as well.
I was at a couple years ago Iwas at the Barnes Foundation in
Philadelphia and I did the audiotour and they had curators from
, you know, like the Louvre andthe Met and like like these huge
world class museums all overthe world, talking about
different pieces that were inthe Barnes Foundation.
And then there was some Africanart and the curator that they
(17:24):
had on was from the NewarkMuseum.
So like they really are a worldclass art museum and have an
amazing collection.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
I just want to say the way that you pronounce
Newark.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, I was gonna ask that too?
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Is it because you're from New Jersey?
Yeah, so I would assume thatyou are saying it spot on
correctly, but I don't say itlike that.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Yeah, that's how the locals would say.
It it's rubbed off on mebecause of my proximity and how
much time we go there all thetime.
My boyfriend's a season ticketholder for the Devils and we
have a lot of restaurants welike to go to and things we like
to do there.
So, yeah, it's rubbed off on me.
So it's NERC.
Yeah, there's anotherinteresting person you might
(18:05):
want to look into who has aproject called the Nork Project.
So it's N-O-R-K Project Nork.
Yes, so that's kind of how.
I think, a lot of people there.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
We will.
We will look into that Insteadof.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Newark.
I kind of switch.
I switch on and off.
I feel like I say both.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
The touristy, touristy thing is that when
people come here who have neverbeen, I believe that the Liberty
Science Museum is the best viewof the Statue of Liberty,
absolutely that Liberty Science.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Liberty Park yeah, it's beautiful and technically
the Statue of Liberty is in NewJersey People fight about it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
But if you look on Google Maps, you'll see the
dotted line that separates newjersey and new york.
It is oh, I love that fact.
Yeah, that is such a fun fact.
That was the first fact that Iposted on our podcast, instagram
, when we first started.
It was the first fact that Iwas like oh my god, really well,
thank you so much for coming on.
And and if somebody wants tosubmit art to you to be part of
any of your projects, how dothey get?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
on.
Yeah, people can just email me.
It's jerseycollective atgmailcom.
It's on our website as welljerseycollectiveorg.
But yeah, I'm always looking towork with new people on
different things, and once thestickers kind of run down and
I'm looking for more, I usuallypost about it on Instagram to
get some new artists, because weusually do eight or nine people
at a time for that.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So we'll let people know, all right?
Well, carrie, thank you so muchfor coming on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
This podcast is produced by Rachel Martens and
Jeanette Afsharian.
Please follow us on Facebookand Instagram.
We hope you share this pod withyour friends and family and let
us know what you think.
Check out our website atlostinjerseysite and don't
forget to get lost.
Hi Rachel, hey Jeanette.
Today's podcast is with KeriSullivan.
Who is Keri?
What have you learned aboutKeri in our interview?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I've learned a lot about Keri.
First of all, I learned thatshe's a librarian and I love
that.
She is the founder and creatorof the Jersey Collective, which
is a website, also an Instagramaccount, which is all things
Jersey, and she supports localartists who do illustrations and
photographs and anything thatis sort of Jersey related, so
(00:31):
check that out.
And then also, she is theeditor and curator of a really
awesome book the New Jersey fanclub.
Speaker 1 (00:40):
She's kind of like a Jersey expert now, so we did ask
her in the interview at thestick to the end what her
recommendations are, and we hadsome of our own to pile on to
hers.
But so please enjoy thisinterview.
Speaker 2 (00:55):
Basically a Jersey love fest.
Listen up and love New Jerseyeven more.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Carrie hello.
Thank you so much for joiningLost in Jersey.
Hi thanks so much for having me.
You do so many things.
You do the New Jersey Fan Clubbook, and then you have the
Jersey Collective, which is areally popular Instagram that
you seem to have many artiststhat you feature on.
That.
Is that your main thing, thatyou, or how do you describe
yourself with what you?
Speaker 3 (01:24):
do.
Yeah, so Jersey Collective I'vebeen running for over 10 years
now.
It started in 2014 when I wasin grad school, and it started
just as like an Instagramaccount that different people
could take over every week, andthat was kind of.
My focus was just giving peoplea platform to share whatever
they wanted, as long as it wasrelated to New Jersey, and back
then you could only do photos onInstagram.
(01:45):
So it was photography based andwe did meetups and gallery
shows and things like that, andthen over time I kind of just
found other ways to use that asa launching pad for any kind of
thing I wanted to do.
If I could find a way to make itNew Jersey related, it would
become a Jersey collective thing.
So now we kind of publish workwith other artists, like my
(02:07):
boyfriend, who's an illustrator.
We did a go fish New Jersey gofish card game together last
year, so that's been out forabout about a year now.
My book kind of came about,partially because of Jersey
collective as well, whichRutgers University Press
published.
It's an anthology about NewJersey, so kind of a similar
thing to the Instagram account,just bringing a bunch of voices
(02:28):
together all about New Jerseyand yeah, so that's kind of and
this isn't my full time job.
I'm a public librarian, so thisis just what I do on the side
for fun.
Speaker 1 (02:39):
Yeah, I saw that you're a librarian.
Give us a little bit of abackstory how it all began Like.
So you're from New Jersey,you're from Mammoth County.
Speaker 3 (02:48):
Yeah, I'm from Mammoth County Originally.
I've bounced around a littlebit.
I've lived a couple differentplaces.
I'm in Essex County now, butbut yeah, I've bounced around
and I left for college, butbesides that I've only lived in
New Jersey.
Speaker 1 (03:03):
And and from what I've read about the book is that
it's kind of a collection togive people an idea that this
kind of reputation that NewJersey has is not founded.
I mean the reputation that themedia seems to have with the
Jersey Shore and the mafia andeverything.
It's kind of pigeonholed thisday and I think the book is
(03:25):
geared towards telling peoplehey, it is just such a variety,
so many things.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
Yeah that's definitely part of it.
Yeah, I wanted it to feel likea book for people.
It could do a couple differentthings.
People who really know NewJersey and love New Jersey would
find it a nice read becausethey could kind of connect with
it in that way.
But I also think it does helpchallenge some of those
stereotypes that people mighthave about New Jersey as well.
(03:51):
Like if they read it, theymight look at the state in a new
way or learn something theydidn't know before, or just
learn about a part of the statethat they were unfamiliar with.
So that was definitelysomething I was thinking about
when I was working on it.
Speaker 2 (04:04):
I'm also fascinated about you being a librarian,
because I love books.
I'm obsessed with books BothJeanette and I are and we always
talk about like once a month,we give out our picks of, like
our top favorite reads.
So I wanted to know, though,because librarians are so
important and to me I think backto my experience growing I grew
up in Long Island with mylibrarian at our local library
(04:27):
was so wonderful and helped mepick out books, and sometimes
they even showed movies likeWilly Wonka's Charlie and the
Chocolate Factory.
But how did you decide tobecome a librarian, and how is
what is that journey like?
Speaker 3 (04:42):
yeah.
So for me it was a littleroundabout.
A lot of people are likeEnglish majors and then they
become librarians.
I was actually a film major soI was really into photography
when I was in high school and Iliked writing.
So I my brain was sort of likeoh, if you go into film you get
to do kind of both those things.
So while I was in college Iwent to Drexel University in
Philadelphia and they have likethis thing called the co-op
(05:05):
program where you have to spendusually it's like six months of
your college.
At some point you have to doyour co-op.
So you do like an internship.
So I did mine at theMetropolitan Museum of Art with
the photographs department.
They were looking for someonewho had experience with like
film negatives for an archivalproject.
So I was working with um.
(05:25):
I don't know if you know thethe street photographer, deanne
Arbis.
She did a lot of um streetphotos in like the 60s and 70s.
You definitely.
If you saw some, you definitelyrecognize them.
They're famous, but so they haveher archive there.
So I was doing a negativerehousing project, um with her
film negatives and I was likethis how do you, what job Like I
never like occurred to me,because I really liked history
(05:47):
too growing up.
Like my jobs when I was in highschool I worked at historic
living history places so I didlike dressed up and gave tours
and things like that.
So like I was always, you know,it was kind of a an interesting
like a mix of stuff that Ireally liked, like history and
working with photography andbeing in a museum setting, and
so I was just like what is, whatis this?
And the person who wassupervising me was an archivist
(06:09):
and she's like oh, you have toget your master's of library and
information science if you wantto work like in a job like this
.
So this could be kind of aninteresting route to go, like
I'll just, you know, finish youcan, you can major in anything
and then be and then go to gradschool for library science.
And then I went to Rutgers forgrad school and got my MLIS and
from there I kind of realizedthat part of the reason I didn't
(06:30):
want to work in film wasbecause of how not stable it
could be and how you don't knowif you have health insurance or
if you're going to have a joband a lot of you know, you're
kind of bouncing around and Ididn't think I really wanted to
do that.
So then I learned that a lot ofarchives jobs are also like that
.
Some of them are grant funded.
So I ended up getting apart-time job in a public
(06:51):
library when I was almost donewith school and I had never
really considered like I wasn'tsure that I was interested in
public libraries, but then Irealized it was a lot more
interesting than I had thoughtoriginally and I just really
liked it.
So I've been in publiclibraries for about 10 years.
I've worked a couple differentplaces and had a couple
different positions.
I currently do all of the adultprogramming for my library, so
(07:13):
I plan like the whole calendarof events for adults.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
And I really like it that you took a kind of a
practical route for likestability and you know your,
your life yeah but but as weknow, you know, the first thing
that we know about you is thatyou have a kind of an artistic
you know face to the public,which is really kind of I love
that that people are like.
(07:36):
You know, I'm first, I'm goingto make sure I get the
foundation and safety down anddo it in something that,
surprisingly, you ended upreally enjoying, you know.
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Yeah, no, I really like my job and I think that
they kind of work together in anice way too.
I think there's a lot of thingsthat my my day job life and my
out of work life kind of have incommon is like trying to do
things that bring peopletogether, give people
opportunities to learn newthings or to connect with other
people.
Jersey Collective projectitself has been around since
(08:05):
2014.
The book I started working onit was a multi-year process.
I started working on theproposal, so for nonfiction
books, for people who don't know, you have to write a book
proposal to try and sell it to apublisher or to an agent.
You basically are kind ofmaking a business plan for your
book.
So you're kind of makingsamples, you're writing like why
I'm the right person to do thisproject, what it's kind of
(08:28):
giving people a sense of whatit's going to be.
So that I spent more time onthat than I probably needed to.
But I like really wanted to doa good job and I'd never done it
before and I'm kind of justusing books I got from the
library to figure out how to doit.
So I kind of spent like acouple of years working on that,
which is probably more than youhave to do.
And I started working on thatprobably in like 2018 or so, and
(08:51):
then I finally sent it to aneditor there in early 2020.
And signed the contract withthem in summer of 2020.
And then I had nine months tomake that book and then it came
out in June of 2022.
So that was kind of thetimeline with all that, yeah.
Speaker 1 (09:07):
So I mean, once it got accepted it was kind of the
timeline sort of actuallyhelpful for me because I was
(09:29):
going to work.
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I was working in person pretty much the whole
time.
We had a brief period of timeright at the beginning where we
were closed, but working in apublic library, we have to go in
.
So we were back in person in, Ithink, late June of 2020.
So I was going to work andcoming home and working on the
book.
So that was all I did for allthat time.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
I know when you got all the people to contribute to
the book.
How do you determine you knowwhat you're going to put in,
what you're not going to put inIn your mind did you have an
overarching theme of showinglike it has to come from every
corner of the state?
Definitely, yeah, that was all.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
Definitely, stuff I was thinking about was how to
make it as like wide of a rangeas possible.
Both in the subjects thatthey're about, there's pieces
that are really personal storiesthat people wrote about their
own lives, but there's some kindof New Jersey tie in, and then
there's also reallystraightforward, like little
history sections about you knowsomething interesting or some
(10:26):
kind of nature thing there'ssomething about, like the
ecology of the Pine Barrens, andso I really wanted to just kind
of cover a lot of ground.
Speaker 2 (10:33):
So those are all things I was thinking about,
were you surprised with whatsome of the submissions that you
got then then went and drovethere immediately Like I feel
like I would be wanting to seeeverything that somebody told me
about in this state.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Yeah, yeah there were some things that I learned a
lot, too, putting the booktogether.
There were definitely areas ofthe state that I didn't know as
much about, especially thefurther south we get and away
from the coast I'm like I don'tknow what's going on down there,
so I definitely wanted toinclude stuff like that.
But yeah, no, it was definitelya really cool experience of
(11:09):
wading through all that stuff,and not everybody had super
positive things to say either.
There is a lot of.
I know the subtitle of the bookis like there's the word
celebrating the garden state,isn't it?
But it's not a totalcelebratory book.
There are a bunch of essaysabout people kind of grappling
with either moving to the stateor leaving the state or coming
back after living elsewhere.
(11:30):
Like there's definitely alittle more um complexity in
what people were thinking aboutdid you find that a lot of it
was about?
food.
Speaker 1 (11:38):
Yes, there's definitely a lot of food um well
, let's talk a little bit aboutthe artwork that we see on these
cards and also the sticker artthat you do tell us a little bit
about.
These go fish cards and who'sthe?
Speaker 3 (11:53):
artist behind those?
Yeah, so the artist is namedalex flannery.
He is my boyfriend, um, he did.
He's also essex county uh, mostof his life, um, but yeah, so
he did the all the illustrationand the design and it was my
sort of direction of this issomething I think would be cool
to do, and he's just the best.
(12:14):
So there was no one else Iwanted to work with for that for
sure.
But, yeah, I think that's beenan exciting part of kind of
expanding beyond just being anInstagram account that people
can share photos on is gettingto work with different artists
to bring different like items tolife.
So we did the go fish cards andthen, of course, made a bunch
(12:35):
of stickers with the art fromthe cards, and I have a couple
other stickers that are outthere too that different artists
have designed.
The other fun thing I have is asticker vending machine, so
it's a physical vending machine.
I saw that it's so cool, yeah,so it's actually going to be
popping up in Montclair for acouple of weeks, starting on
January 25th.
(12:55):
It'll be there until February15th at Iris, the art bookstore
on Valley Road.
I don't know if you've been.
It's one of my favorite places.
It's fairly new.
Yeah, it's new.
Speaker 1 (13:05):
Yeah, it's new, new.
Speaker 2 (13:06):
I haven't been there maybe this is a good excuse to
go um it's yeah, I'm definitelygonna go, but yeah.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
So the sticker machine I bought a bunch of
years ago and it sat on myliving room floor for a while
and I realized what I wanted todo with it was curate series of
stickers that are by differentartists from New Jersey or who
live in New Jersey, have somekind of New Jersey connection,
and just kind of bring it aroundto different places.
So sometimes it'll staysomewhere, like this one, it'll
(13:34):
be there for three weeks.
Sometimes I just bring it withme when I do like a one day
market and people can swap.
You know, if I'm on site I'llgive them quarters for their
bills.
But if you know, if peoplevisit it at a location, if they
can bring their own quarters,that's always great.
And yeah, and then you just geta little nice piece of little
art, very accessible price of adollar, and you can stick it on
(13:56):
your water bottle or your laptopor whatever you want to do with
it and you're supporting alocal artist and just kind of
spreading the Jersey love.
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (14:06):
I really like that.
That is so cool.
Speaker 1 (14:07):
I'm looking at it right now.
Okay, we're definitely going topost that.
This is going to be up forpeople and it'll help the new
bookstore.
Nice, yeah, that place isamazing.
Speaker 3 (14:16):
I also do a monthly newsletter on Substack where I
do a little like five or sixquestion Q&A with someone every
month who I think is kind ofinteresting or doing something
interesting, and then I havelike links of other New Jersey
things and you know, like ifthere's some interesting kind of
fun New Jersey related culturereference or something like I'll
(14:36):
put that in there.
I try to do lists ofopportunities for writers and
artists that are New Jerseyspecific, like I see if I see a
call like a photography contestlocally or something like that,
so I put things like that inthere we are very excited about
seeing the sticker thing in this, our neighborhood.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I'm really excited to ask you what our final question
is to all of our guests,because we always ask people
something that they love aboutNew Jersey and I feel like you
know you're the right person toask You're going to need to
bring it, Carrie.
Speaker 3 (15:07):
I've been thinking about this for a while, because
when we talked about thisearlier in the week, I was like,
oh no, that's a big questionfor me.
So I mean okay.
So I have like I'll have a moregeneral answer and then I'll
give you a more specific answer.
Okay, great.
So my more general answer is Ithink one of the things I love
most about New Jersey is justthe variety across every metric.
(15:27):
Like the food variety you canget really good food from all
over the world because of howdiverse New Jersey is.
Depending on where you go inthe state, you can have some
like really incredible food.
And also just the variety oflike landscapes and you know you
can drive an hour and be at thebeach or you can be in the
mountains or you can be inrolling hill farmland like it's
(15:48):
just so different and it'sreally contained in, even though
you know, like other parts ofthe country, you have to drive
for hours to see something thatwith that much variety.
So I think we're really luckywith all those things.
Yeah, and then something morespecific and more like kind of
local is I'm going to give ashout out to Branchbrook Park in
Newark because it's reallybeautiful.
(16:10):
You know spring's going to behere, hopefully before we know
it, the cherry blossoms is areally good time to go.
if people haven't been before,that's a really nice, like first
introduction Like that's.
I think the first time I wentthere was for that.
Me too me too yeah and sothat's a really nice time to go,
but it's a really historic,really beautiful park and if
people haven't- been.
It's incredible stunning placein every season, but especially
(16:32):
during cherry blossom time thatthat is a great, great reminder
of that but also another norcthing is the norc museum of art
is incredible, oh it is.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
It's like it's a great museum.
Speaker 3 (16:43):
I think people don't realize how amazing of an art
museum that is and specificallylike art, the art collection too
like they used to just becalled the Newark Museum and
they changed it to include theof art Cause I think a lot of
people thought it was like ahistory museum, which they have
some of that but the artcollection is really incredible
and like from all over the world.
They have a really interestingcollection from Tibet that's
(17:03):
like one of their bigcollections and they have a lot
of African art as well.
I was at a couple years ago Iwas at the Barnes Foundation in
Philadelphia and I did the audiotour and they had curators from
, you know, like the Louvre andthe Met and like like these huge
world class museums all overthe world, talking about
different pieces that were inthe Barnes Foundation.
And then there was some Africanart and the curator that they
(17:24):
had on was from the NewarkMuseum.
So like they really are a worldclass art museum and have an
amazing collection.
Speaker 1 (17:29):
I just want to say the way that you pronounce
Newark.
Speaker 2 (17:33):
Yeah, I was gonna ask that too?
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Is it because you're from New Jersey?
Yeah, so I would assume thatyou are saying it spot on
correctly, but I don't say itlike that.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
Yeah, that's how the locals would say.
It it's rubbed off on mebecause of my proximity and how
much time we go there all thetime.
My boyfriend's a season ticketholder for the Devils and we
have a lot of restaurants welike to go to and things we like
to do there.
So, yeah, it's rubbed off on me.
So it's NERC.
Yeah, there's anotherinteresting person you might
(18:05):
want to look into who has aproject called the Nork Project.
So it's N-O-R-K Project Nork.
Yes, so that's kind of how.
I think, a lot of people there.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
We will.
We will look into that Insteadof.
Speaker 3 (18:17):
Newark.
I kind of switch.
I switch on and off.
I feel like I say both.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
The touristy, touristy thing is that when
people come here who have neverbeen, I believe that the Liberty
Science Museum is the best viewof the Statue of Liberty,
absolutely that Liberty Science.
Speaker 3 (18:34):
Liberty Park yeah, it's beautiful and technically
the Statue of Liberty is in NewJersey People fight about it.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
But if you look on Google Maps, you'll see the
dotted line that separates newjersey and new york.
It is oh, I love that fact.
Yeah, that is such a fun fact.
That was the first fact that Iposted on our podcast, instagram
, when we first started.
It was the first fact that Iwas like oh my god, really well,
thank you so much for coming on.
And and if somebody wants tosubmit art to you to be part of
any of your projects, how dothey get?
Speaker 3 (19:06):
on.
Yeah, people can just email me.
It's jerseycollective atgmailcom.
It's on our website as welljerseycollectiveorg.
But yeah, I'm always looking towork with new people on
different things, and once thestickers kind of run down and
I'm looking for more, I usuallypost about it on Instagram to
get some new artists, because weusually do eight or nine people
at a time for that.
Speaker 1 (19:27):
So we'll let people know, all right?
Well, carrie, thank you so muchfor coming on the podcast.
Speaker 2 (19:36):
This podcast is produced by Rachel Martens and
Jeanette Afsharian.
Please follow us on Facebookand Instagram.
We hope you share this pod withyour friends and family and let
us know what you think.
Check out our website atlostinjerseysite and don't
forget to get lost.
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