All forms of public art—music and cinema especially—have magazines that can claim in all candor, as the bi-monthly Fisheye does: “Fisheye is a photo magazine about society. Fisheye is a society magazine about photo. Fisheye is a specialized magazine but not one for specialists.”
The fact that such a magazine now exists for photography confirms its rise to the ranks of popular art. So far, photo magazines have been reserved to a circle of enthusiasts, erudite aesthetes and semioticians. With Fisheye, named after the ultra wide-angle lens popular in street culture, a “new generation” of fresher, more instinctive reader will discover new things, people and places through photography—at least that’s what the magazine is betting on, even with all the risks that such a challenge entails.
With energy and passion, famous contributors, and a clear and simple layout, this bimonthly is celebrating its third issue. They already seem to have fulfilled their first objective: don’t be too wordy. On the other hand, their photo choices could use a little more punch. Let’s hope that their targeting to the greater public won’t keep them from exploring real subjects through photographs that are powerful, sensual, raw and daring. And let us also hope that their writers will feel free to speak their minds, avoid tired old subjects and kick up a little dust, especially when it comes to the medium’s icons. Music and film journalists have been doing it for a long time, but it remains all too rare in the world of photography.
Fisheye, we wish you luck.
4.90€ – Bi-monthly
For more information, visit Fisheye Magazine:
http://www.fisheyemagazine.fr
