Masthead
Ritual Devices is a new English-language literary micro-journal of Surrealism created to stimulate and sustain creative focus amongst the I-COAST community of Surrealists and beyond. Published three times per year and accessible freely via the internet, each edition carries a limited number of original and provocative contemporary works by international artists who labour in the related realms of the unconscious, the automatic, and of dream. Insiders and outsiders are welcome.
Physically based in rural Catalonia, home of Surrealism, Ritual Devices is a non-profit literary journal created by practitioners for practitioners with no money object in mind. Our enrichment is the collective unconscious. Surrealism isn’t owned by anybody, but one must practice in the field to have a stake in it. Ritual Devices is an outlet for this desire, and comprises an archive of contemporary Surrealism. Conceptually, the micro-journal adopts the following ideas not as principals, but as foils: modular, portable, lightweight, disposable, accidental, mistaken, assemblage. All experiments with language, including asemic texts, are welcome to submit to the archive.
Who We Are
Comprising an active network of contemporary surrealist practitioners affiliated with I-COAST (International Cooperative for Arts, Sciences and Technology,) this micro-journal offers writers and artists an extended reach for their work through our cooperative creative network.
Daniel O’Reilly
Editor-in-Chief
Daniel O’Reilly is a writer, musician and visual artist living in Catalonia, Spain. His affiliation with the North African group of Surrealists extends to the International Exhibition of Surrealism in Cairo in 2024 where he exhibited literature, web-art and sound-art, and at the Centenary of Surrealism at Andre Breton House, France, where he performed the new composition ‘Incantation for Dead Avant Gardes’ alongside his wife Marianna and I-COAST Director Mohsen El Belasy.
Mohsen el Belasy & Ghadah Kemal Ahmed
Directors, I-COAST
Mohsen el Belasy & Ghadah Kemal Ahmed are the CEOs and founders of I-COAST & Sulfur Editions, an independent publishing house dedicated to surrealist and transgressive art, and are seen as chief engines driving the Surrealist resurgence. They serve as the editors-in-chief of The Room Surrealist Magazine, an international platform connecting contemporary surrealists worldwide.
Submissions
Ritual Devices is seeking original, previously unpublished work which engages with the contemporary practice and dissemination of surreal art. This is to be interpreted in the broadest, non-exclusionary sense. We publish an electronic edition three times per year which is distributed via multiple mailing lists to our expanding networks.
Subscribe to Ritual Devices via The Unstitute’s mailing list.
Ritual Devices is a micro-journal and publishes up to 10 artists’ work per issue. We limit content so readers take in each contributors’ work without being subject to the fatigue plaguing screen-readers everywhere. Each edition will carry multimedia pieces to furthermore enhance the reader’s experience of contemporary Surrealism.
Publishing schedule: New Year, Spring & Fall
Submissions window: 1st October - 31st November (New Year Edition January) 1st February-31st March (Spring Edition in May) 1st July-31st August (Fall Edition in October)
Our call for work extends to the following categories:
Prose: One piece up to 2,000 words.
Poetry: Up to 2 poems, or 2 A4 pages equivalent.
Asemic Text: Up to 2 pieces (images) in jpeg format.
Art/Photography: Up to 2 pieces in jpeg format.
Audio: Submit a link, up to 10 minutes of audio.
Please write the subject line as follows: Subject: Ritual Devices Submission - Prose* (*replace with your work category.)
Attach your work as a .docx file for text, or high resolution jpeg images. Do not paste text or images into the email itself.
Prose and poetry should be single spaced, in Times New Roman 11pt with standard paragraph formatting/indentations.
Multimedia submissions, (short video up to 10 minutes, audio up to 10 minutes.) Send a link to the site where your media is hosted. Please do not attach the media to the email. If accepted, you will be asked for the embed code for your piece to be inserted into the micro-journal.
Please include a biography of 100 words, along with a recent photograph (jpeg, 800 x 1000 pixels max,) plus your social media handles and/or website.
We only consider original, unpublished work, but not all work will make it to the final cut. The editor’s decision is final.
Submissions should be sent by email to theunstitute@gmail.com
Ritual Devices is an inclusive journal, and we welcome material from any artist who offers genuine insight into the surreal process. Material which is deemed defamatory or which offers prejudice is entirely unwelcome and will be disposed of with glee.
Artificial Intelligence is no substitute for human creativity. Slop will be disposed of.
There is no fee for submissions, and there are no payments to contributors. Ritual Devices is an expanding archive of contemporary Surrealism. This is not a commercial enterprise. If you wish to support the micro-journal, consider becoming a Patron of editor Daniel O’Reilly
Privacy Policy
We only collect names and emails for the sole purpose of evaluating and publishing submissions. If you sign up to The Unstitute’s email list, you will also receive periodic emails from us relevant to Ritual Devices micro-journal. We never share your data with third parties, and we do not use tracking cookies. You can request that your personal data or bio be updated or deleted by contact us here
Terms of Submission & Publication Rights
By submitting your original, unpublished work to Ritual Devices, you agree to the following terms regarding publication rights and data privacy:
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First Worldwide Serial Rights: You grant Ritual Devices the exclusive right to publish your accepted work for the first time anywhere in the world, online and/or in downloadable digital formats (such as PDF).
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Reversion of Rights: Immediately upon publication, all economic and publication rights revert back to you, the author. You are completely free to republish, anthologize, or sell your piece elsewhere after it has appeared in Ritual Devices.
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Perpetual Archival Right: You grant Ritual Devices a non-exclusive, perpetual, royalty-free right to host, archive, and keep your work available online as part of the specific journal issue in which it was originally published.
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Creative Commons Licensing: To support our rights-free, open-access mission, your work will be published under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) license. This means readers are free to download and share your work, but they must credit you, cannot use it for commercial purposes, and cannot alter or edit your text.
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Author Warranties: You guarantee that the submitted work is entirely your own original creation, that it has never been published anywhere before (including on personal blogs, public forums, or social media), and that it does not infringe upon any existing copyrights.
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Moral Rights: Ritual Devices fully respects your moral rights (derechos morales) under Spanish law. Your work will always be attributed exactly as requested, and no substantive editorial changes will be made to your text without your explicit written approval.
Cookieless Privacy & GDPR Compliance
Ritual Devices operates a strictly cookie-free website. We do not track you, use browser cookies, or share your data. We collect only your name, email address, and short author biography for the sole purpose of reviewing and credits-listing your submission. By emailing us your work, you consent to the storage of this minimal contact information for editorial communication. You may request the permanent deletion of your contact data at any time by emailing us.
Social Media
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