Max Olijnyk

This is a zine I made with a short story and accompanying photos. It’s about taking Fred and Tess for a walk, and looking for a coffee, and the repetition of life, and finding comfort in that, and … busting for the toilet.

The Design Files invited me to write one of their Monthly Musings columns. I accepted immediately and wrote this piece about my struggle with the idea of having a cleaner. Hilarity (and several encouraging comments) ensued. And yes, Tina the cleaner read and enjoyed it.

Aggressive, fast and loose, Eric Dressen’s style of skating is one you can see echoes of in many of today’s top pros. Now a world-renowned tattooist, designer and illustrator, Eric still lives and breathes skateboarding. I had a brief chat with him on his last night in our country, at the end of a tour…

Read more

Every six weeks, my hair suddenly shifts from George Clooney to Alan Partridge overnight. I suppose it would be interesting to see which salt-and-pepper-haired screen icon it takes after next (Dumbledore?), but I’ve never been able to stick it out long enough to find out. When that fateful day rolls around, I text my…

Read more

I wrote this story not long before Fred was born and I was freaking out about becoming a father and a grown up and all that stuff. It was published by Vice.

I wanted to know why people like dressing in lycra and riding expensive bikes around, so I gave it a try, and wrote this story about the experience. It was published in the Broadsheet newspaper, then republished online.

I’m not a huge sports fan, in fact I actively dislike football, but other members of my family love it. They love it in a way that makes me question why I dislike it so much. They see the humour in it, the depth in it, the magic of it. I just see rapings…

Read more

This Classic Max is about my neighbour Giuseppe and his dog Gracie. I changed their names to Roberto and Nina to protect their identities.

This Classic Max is about the time I lost my phone and then found it again. It doesn’t sound interesting, or funny, but I think it sort of manages to be both.

 

The phone booth shone like a beacon from the top of the hill, illuminating the street in a fluorescent glow. We always stopped to check it for coins on our way to the shops. Then we rolled back, salt and vinegars and one point two five litre cokes in hand, the lines in the…

Read more

I’m not a big fan of Shaun Gladwell, but as a skater, I’m constantly aware of his work. I got to speak to him and while I still think he’s a bit of a kook, he was friendly enough.

 

I wrote this story about my friend Brett, who is the funniest person I have ever met. It was published by Vice as the first instalment of my Classic Max column.