Tar Art Media will being publishing Tar magazine this October.
Publishing biannually as of 2008, Tar will showcase arts and aesthetics in a high-glossy format. The magazine, printed on recycled and “eco” paper, also promises a focus on sustainability.
“The mission of Tar and the focus of Tar is really the thing that separates us from just another fashionable-looking cultural magazine,” said Susan Cappa, publisher of Tar. “If somebody picked up the magazine it would like a beautiful handcrafted art book, but then what’s threaded throughout is this idea of social responsibility.”
Sales of the magazine will be 70% newsstand. Cappa said, however, that the audience will be very targeted, thanks to specialized distribution locations such as museum stores, specialty bookstores, retail shops and galleries. The $20 cover price also promises to keep Tar out of the “impulse-buy” category.
“When you talk about the audience, it’s someone who cares about the world that we live in and is very active,” Cappa continued. “I like to call the audience a modern cultured class, so they have high taste, high wealth and then the thing I add into that is creativity: someone who lives in and appreciates an aesthetic world.”
The first issue has a planned worldwide circulation of 90,000. Tar Art has planned a number of events to hype the launch and is also exploring some direct marketing methods.
In an effort to keep the title from getting stale over its drawn-out publishing schedule, Tar‘s design and editorial aspire to be more like that of a coffee-table book. Its 300-400 pages should comprise 30% ads — mainly for luxury items — and 70% content.
