The Spring/Summer and 10-year anniversary issue of Port – featuring musician Akala, actors Matt Smith, Katherine Waterston, Malachi Kirby and Caleb Landry Jones, chef Merlin Labron-Johnson, artistic director Kwame Kwei-Armah OBE, architect Sou Fujimoto, filmmakers Ramin Bahrani and Takashi Miike, alongside writing from Bhanu Kapil, Jack Underwood and David Keenan. Five formidable talents grace the cover of issue 28. Akala, the award-winning musician and Sunday Times bestseller, writes a deft and explosive polemic in our Commentary. Sci-fi royalty (and everyday royalty) actor Matt Smith talks to Anna Smith about life under lockdown and the allure of vampires. Anglo-American actor Katherine Waterston talks to Michael Shannon about motherhood, climate change and the limits of language. Rising British star Malachi Kirby talks to Jason Okundaye about vulnerability and the joy of sharing Black British Caribbean history following his turn in Steve McQueen’s powerful Small Axe anthology. John-Paul Pryor, meanwhile, enters the rich sonic world of actor and musician Caleb Landry Jones. For our anniversary special, guest editors Linsey Young (curator of contemporary British art at Tate Britain), Andrea Trimarchi and Simone Farresin (founders of Studio Formafantasma) and award-winning actor Michael Shannon curate our art, design and film sections respectively, profiling and commissioning some of the most inspiring critical thinkers working in their fields today, including artist Anthea Hamilton, architect Paulo Tavares and director Ramin Bahrani. Elsewhere, we examine how legendary filmmaker Takashi Miike has elevated his singular brand of shocksploitation to auteur cinema, acclaimed Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto reflects on the fundamentals of his trade, while Deyan Sudjic OBE illustrates the joy of great design with Pentagram partner Jon Marshall. As ever, we have also shot this season’s finest threads and accessories. In our Commentary – in addition to Akala – authors Jack Underwood and David Keenan share exclusive extracts from forthcoming novels, Matthew Turner analyses the shifting symbolism of the beach in landmark prose and poetry, and Bhanu Kapil provides a poem from her recent T. S. Eliot prize winning collection. Finally, in the Porter, author Jeremy Atherton Lin looks at the beginnings and endings of queer sites of belonging, Michelin-star chef Merlin Labron-Johnson writes about the joy of growing his own produce, the artistic director of the Young Vic, Kwame Kwei-Armah OBE, passionately argues on the necessity of theatre, and Jeremy Leslie, founder of magCulture, investigates the print and digital front-cover arms race.
