blume magazine 001

Join us for the launch of blume magazine Issue 001.

This edition of our annual collaborative portfolio features 6 photographic projects, showcasing considered visual storytelling from Georgia, Syria, Sudan, Bangladesh, South Korea and the UK.

Featuring contributions from Tamuna Chkareuli, Hosam Katan, Saad Eltinay, Ashfika Rahman, Janice Chung and Sam Elstub. Edited by George Burke, Jaspal Channa and Laila Sieber.

About Issue 001:

“blume began as a platform to showcase considered photography and visual storytelling. Where Issue 000 piloted our collaborative and sustainable approach, Issue 001 aims to extend our editorial reach. Building on the desire for more collaborative autonomy within the visual arts, it remains important to us to give photographers an opportunity to contribute to the editing and publishing of their work. This process of close communication allows for productive and unexpected conversations, which leads to thoughtful and stimulating edits. For this issue, we have sought to curate a series of projects that simultaneously uncover and examine the relationship between people, place and space in a global context. We chose photographers with a personal connection to their projects, because we believe this strengthens authorship and reinforces authentic visual storytelling.

Throughout the editorial process, another aim has been to portray the diverse local-global state of our world. We find that featuring different styles and methodologies, together, works to accentuate the common threads found throughout everyday life. This approach reveals a spectrum of perspectives, while also highlighting interrelated narratives in both purposeful and unanticipated ways. It is through this process that we hope to contribute to an enhanced collective understanding of our chaotic, ever-changing world.‬”

About blume magazine:

blume is a photography platform focusing on the relationship between people, place and space. We publish an annual collaborative portfolio in print and online, featuring authentic visual storytelling and bold editorial curation.

Each edition is hand stamped and limited to a small-batch run, combining considered narrative photography with timeless print collectability. We emphasise collaborative autonomy and editorial agency when publishing international contemporary photography.

All our products are produced in an environmentally conscious way. The magazine uses 100% recycled, carbon-balanced and FSC certified paper, and each copy is printed by machinery using 100% offshore wind energy. We work hard to source green packaging materials, and environmental consideration is etched into every production decision we make throughout the editorial process.

About the contributors and their projects:

Tamuna Chkareuli: ‘The sun is our father, the moon is our mother, the stars are our brothers and sisters’

Tamuna Chkareuli is a Georgian photographer based in Tbilisi. Having a keen interest in social issues, she mainly focuses on the communities that are oppressed, neglected or recovering from trauma, as well as disability and gender-related problems. Being attracted to the sensation of shared values, she explores the borderline between togetherness and loneliness, and the consequences of the emotional vacuum brought by individualist culture.

Tamuna's project looks at themes of community togetherness and belonging, while questioning the wider social norms and attitudes associated with special educational and mental health needs in Georgia.

Hosam Katan: ‘Resilience and daily life in Aleppo’

Hosam Katan is a Syrian photojournalist, who covered the conflict in Aleppo between 2013 and 2015. After coming to Germany at the end of 2015, he studied in Hanover and Offenbach. Hosam currently lives in Offenbach as a freelance journalist, photojournalist, filmmaker and public speaker, working on long term projects and stories about social issues and the displacement of certain communities and groups.

Hosam’s project aims to show the realities of daily life in Aleppo at the height of the Syrian conflict. Here, the focus shifts away from well-worn depictions of death, destruction and suffering, towards more constructive narratives of life, community and resilience in the face of adversity.

Saad Eltinay: ‘We are the resistance’

Saad Eltinay, a Sudanese photographer based in Khartoum, has been exercising his passion for visuals and in particular photography since 2012. Using the practice as a refuge occasionally and a method for self-expression, Saad’s observational approach in creating visuals is inspired by interest in nuances of human emotion. Questioning his surroundings and cherishing memories, he tries to ruminate on how society, culture and psychology impact human life.

Featured in the forthcoming issue of blume magazine, Saad's project offers an intimate, deeply personal exploration of events surrounding the Sudanese revolution in Khartoum.

Ashfika Rahman: ‘Suspected Humanity’

Ashfika Rahman is a multidisciplinary artist from Dhaka, Bangladesh, working in photography, text and alternative printing. Ashfika's practice straddles art and documentary, drawing inspiration from 19th century prints which she re-contextualises using contemporary media. Photography is the predominant medium through which she expresses her extensive research into the power structures and social issues in society. Ashfika’s particular emphasis on documenting past acts of violence opens the door for her work to challenge stereotypes of how we look at victims, especially minors.

Ashfika’s project looks at unwanted religious violence in Cox’s Bazar, Bangladesh. It utilises experimental photographic techniques to deconstruct social, cultural and radical narratives associated with the attacks, with tensions between different ethnic and religious communities explored through ambiguous and unexpected visual documents.

Janice Chung: ‘Motherland’

Janice Chung is a Korean-American photographer born and raised in New York City. Through her work, Chung amplifies and deconstructs her Korean-American heritage by capturing moments that are deeply personal. In doing so, she hopes to shed light on the intricate details of immigrant and diasporic life while straddling the two places she calls home, New York and South Korea.

Janice's project explores this dual cultural heritage, offering a poetic visual journey through her ancestral home of South Korea. The series was taken throughout several trips, over a number of years.

Sam Elstub: ‘Lived Space’

Sam Elstub is a photographer and landscape architect based in London and from the UK. As a lifelong skateboarder, he aims to express himself through photography - documenting the creativity, freedom and risk valued by skateboarders. In doing so, Sam looks to explore and convey what it means to be a skateboarder.

Sam's project for blume magazine examines and questions the relationship between skate culture and the built environment. Through a series of striking portraits and intimate urban scenes, the series offers a considered glimpse into the lives and communities of skateboarders in the UK.