Kimberley Jev

Inventory

Kim's R4NT presence spans 2009 alone: seven magazine articles and nine blog posts, all published between June and November. A debut intern who arrives mid-summer to cover music and fashion, she quickly establishes herself as a sharp cultural observer with an eye for emerging scenes — from Nigerian pop to lazerbass, streetwear to visual art — always asking what happens when communities push against mainstream constraints.

Voice

Conversational and propulsive. She builds arguments through interviews, site visits, and firsthand observation rather than abstract critique. Her prose moves fast, often breathless, stacking evidence and linked examples to make a case: Calgary doesn't know good taste, so watch what happens when its talent leaves. She name-drops extensively — Travis Taddeo, Feist, Tim Okamura, House of Dangerkat — to trace how art succeeds by abandoning the city, then returns as international validation. Blog posts are looser and more personal: travel notes from Nigeria, festival dispatches, short bursts of enthusiasm. Magazine pieces are tightly reported, featuring interviews about hustle and the gap between local support and global recognition.

Topic mix

Magazine posts cluster around art, film, and product culture: fashion design, sneaker collecting, film reviews, video-game hardware, street art. Blog posts lean harder into music discovery — Buraka Som Sistema's Kuduro, Ghislain Poirier's lazerbass, Moby's introspective turn — and cultural tourism. A notable thread: Nigeria appears twice (D'Banj's reality TV, personal travel essay). Fashion and streetwear show up across both formats. She treats the Nintendo DSi and Kanye West sneakers with the same seriousness as gallery openings.

Evolution

Early posts (June) announce her role explicitly: "Hey guys, I'm Kim. The newest R4NT intern!" By August, she's aboard a plane to Nigeria on short notice. By September's long personal essay, "Oh Intern-Et Where Art Thou?", she's processing infrastructure, community, and the weight of privilege in connection. The arc moves from consumer to correspondent, from reviewing products to witnessing lives — in Lagos, on reserves, in House of Dangerkat's rehearsals.

Standout pieces

• Pushing The Corporate Boundaries — Her most ambitious essay. Argues Calgary's fad culture prevents artists from thriving locally, forcing talent like Feist and Tim Okamura to find success elsewhere first.
• Oh Intern-Et Where Art Thou? — A 5,000-word meditation on two weeks without reliable internet in Nigeria and subsequent visits to First Nations reserves. Traces connectivity, community, infrastructure.
• Runnin The Poirier Riddim — A deep interview with Montreal's Ghislain Poirier about lazerbass, global touring, why diaspora fuels music innovation.
• It's Actually Good To Be Here — On Calgary street artist Van Charles's gallery installation and the power of a simple affirmative slogan to shift a depressed city's mood.
• Dreams of Africa — A short love letter to Buraka Som Sistema's mixtape, tracing Kuduro from Angola through Portugal into electronic fusion. Her most lyrical blog voice.
• In Retrospect: In Michael We Trust — Unfinished draft reflecting on Michael Jackson's death through media memory and fan devotion. Rare moment of raw vulnerability.

Throughlines & fun details

A throughline: Talent needs permission to leave. Calgary's artists go to Toronto, Montreal, New York, London to be recognized — and then the city celebrates their return as proof of its culture. She documents this pattern across fashion, music, art, and even graffiti. A second: Community survives infrastructure collapse. Nigeria without internet, First Nations on reserves, South Rakkas dancers in Edmonton — Kim finds kinship and resilience in spaces tech overlooks. The fun part: her softest writing happens on music. The blog posts about Moby, Buraka Som Sistema, and Poirier's live shows show a critic who listens first, judges second. A short, intense, deeply curious run.