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In this debut issue, we transport you to the colder climes of Greenland via Olaf Otto Becker´s images from Broken Line, an awe inspiring project for which the photographer travelled along Greenland´s coastline in a rubber dinghy and documented it´s desolate landscape. Greenland´s state of flux has made it the point on the world map which has become the barometer for global climatic change. His cleverly informed and influenced topographic photographs imply that there is no such thing as an `untouched landscape´ anymore, that every natural landscape is affected by man. Of his work Becker says, “The absence of man in my photographs leads us to think about man.” In line with this idea we take a look at Candida Hoffer´s new series, In Portugal whose photographs of interior spaces from various cultural institutions also betray a constant human presence through the traces left behind and the structures created.
Elsewhere, the prolific Chinese artist, Li Wei quite literally comes crashing onto the scene with his performance based photography. His digitally manipulated images show the artist´s head thrust into the earth while his body remains rigidly vertical like some missile that has plummeted out of the sky. Li Wei´s work strikes a chord with China´s recent history and comments on the country´s contemporary social conditions. With the Olympic Games lying just around the corner we all know that it is very important for China to portray a positive image to the rest of the world given its appalling human rights record and to also rekindle a sense of national solidarity in the aftermath of the terrible earthquake that has destroyed the lives of so many people. Working on a less political level, the Italian born, Barcelona based photographer, Paola de Grenet wrestles with the challenges of representing `the other´ through her extraordinary body of work that portrays the community living in Aicuña, a tiny village in the La Rioja region of Argentina that is known for having the highest rate of albinism in the world.
We also look at the world through the eyes of another documentary photographer, Martin Parr of the legendary Magnum agency. His ongoing project Luxury, depicts the nouveau rich parading the insignia of their wealth as they swan around at fashions show, art fairs and horse races in Dubai, Durban and Moscow. Parr´s trademark themes of recreational activity, consumerism, mass tourism and globalisation coupled by his signature style that blends peculiar motifs with garish colours and quirky perspectives have gained him a world renown reputation as a master of social realism. Finally, we turn our attention to Naoya Hatakeyama´s photographs in Slow Glass which demonstrate a totally different use of the camera. The soft, defocused images taken in rainy Milton Keynes at night through panels of fogged glass reveal the painterly effects of light and shade, form and colour, line and perspective that are instrumental to the `all over´ composition. These deceptively simple yet inwardly complex pictures challenge the notion that crisp, detailed images are what photographers should strive for whilst simultaneously re-evaluating the medium and its relationship to visual perception. Enjoy the photography and please feel free to give us your feedback, we would love to hear what you think!
Tim Clark
Founding Editor
