The following text was derived by way of exquisite corpse

Veilance is a surrealist experiment which began in a collapsing, mold ridden, Chicago town house at a small kitchen table in 2023. HARK! In a convulsive desperation, Els Deitz and Eden Jolie were moved to pursue a project which would make community, material, and discourse inevitable to their future as writers. Hands and knees on linoleum floor, a defiant grin, knowing nothing practical, feeling around for the texture of words on paper and a shared stare with a stranger, passions preceding and moving us. A red ballpoint pen and a paper folded twenty times, at the center of an improvised surrealist game, were the words “veil” and “lance”. 

Lance began to butter the page with great effort: he was in a state of tireless exertion, which granted him immediate opulence, and bound him helplessly to Veil who billowed and bluffed, sought, and slashed with great precision–their two heads appeared on the paperskin, creased into dreams and shadows. So everything looked like this: ECNALIEVEILANCE. A double, a mirror. 

Ambivalence is our touch stone, a centered ambivalence allows us to lean into conceptual and material challenges, examining the extreme and its inverse, weighing sides of excess. We attach these challenges to our annual issues, and seek them out through collaborative book projects. As interdisciplinary writers and Chicago community members our project remains open to change aside from the imperative that Veilance will continue to be a resource by writers for writers; whether those writers are woodworkers, anthropologists, cobblers, janitors, lawyers, sluts, nuns, or children. 

Coming soon is our headquarters which exists operationally in the 20th century and is available to visit by appointment only, but (being in constant flux) can be accessed through or around any of the following events which might occur in the year 2026, those events being:

Absinthe drinking Erotica screenings

      Readings

Gallery shows Book Fairs 

Bookmaking Workshops General Hullabaloo/Brouhaha

& Salons

We are usually very excited to see you there.