The Slack Trilogy by Mike Brodie and Mia Justice Smith

In April of 2024, independent publisher Latopaper released the first in a trilogy of zines celebrating the life of a young woman named Mia Justice Smith, a carefree spirit and close friend of Brodie, who died tragically young at the age of twenty four due to an overdose.

Eight months later the concluding chapter was released and like the two that went before, disappeared like smoke in the wind.

Even though the books may already be gone, I feel that they are important, important enough for you to know about them.

Mia Justice Smith aka Slack was the travelling companion and girlfriend of seemingly “reluctant” photographer Mike Brodie,the young artist whose seminal debut release A Period of Juvenile Prosperity (2013, Twin Palms) charted his carefree lifestyle criss crossing the USA, hopping freight trains and photographing his tribe of friends and acquaintances as he went. Slack, it seems was an integral component of his whole experience

Seemingly reluctant?

Well, because after the phenomenal success of "Juvenile Prosperity", along with its follow up volume of polaroids Tones Of Dirt And Bones (2014, Twin Palms), Brodie disappeared from the world of photography, saying that he had given it up “for good”.

True to his word, over the next ten years he went on to train as a motor mechanic before ending up working as a diesel engineer - somewhat appropriately - for the Union Pacific Railroad.

However, away from a crestfallen and expectant audience, his continuing love of the art form combined with the sheer joy of image making, meant a camera was never far from his side.

The photography resumed and.the archive began to grow once more.

Then in 2024 (nearly a decade later) not only did Brodie team up with Twin Palms once again for the monumental Failing (another blisteringly honest visual account of those missing years, but that’s for another review), he also partnered with the wonderfully hip and underground independent imprint, Latopaper, for the Slack Trilogy.

Away from the epic Twin Palms books, The Slack Trilogy blends the work of both Brodie and Smith to form a tribute, study and ultimately, love letter to Slack.

These raw zines are the antithesis of the luxury and glamour associated with the veteran Californian publisher and in many ways far more appropriate in design, scope and feel for Brodie and Smith’s uncompromising and unapologetically intimate personal odyssey.

Published in numbered editions of one hundred copies per volume (the first two were additionally signed by Brodie), Latopaper also took the decision to produce an unspecified number of emergency copies. Simply marked with an X these were meant to replace orders lost in transit and also to throw a lifeline to those caught off guard by the scramble to secure a copy.

The zines form a kind of relay between their respective archives, with volume one being solely Brodie’s work, volume two blending images from the lenses of both and finally the third volume allowing Mia’s photography to shine.

The diaristic feel and flow to Slack Trilogy means that the small format combination of annotated pictures, prose and ephemera have taken the epic scope of Brodie’s seminal book and pared it down to a quiet conversation, a series of reminiscences that speak of friendship, travel and the theatre of lives lived.

It is also undeniable that the rebellious, carefree nature of their Hobo existence emanates from every page.

But more than that, a fond farewell to times and people that only come once in a lifetime.

The Slack Trilogy is published by Latopaper.