Whether or not they were readers of the original Holiday, an American magazine which ran from 1946 to 1977 and regaled its audience with texts by famous writers and tasteful photographs of the hedonistic lifestyle, fans of quality reporting are sure to love the Holiday of 2014.
Revived by l’Atelier Frank Durand, a French art direction studio, Holiday, which returns for its 373rd issue, is bi-annual and bilingual (French and English). Its large format and full-page photos force the reader to hold the slightly rough magazine at arm’s length. And naturally, Holiday is better seen at a distance and at its own pace.
At the height of elegance, the series by Josh Olins and Karim Sadli is matched with a short story by Arthur Dreyfus whose mind wanders across Ibiza. We pass through the Amsterdam apartment of photographers Inez and Vinoodh in Amsterdam and the streets of Madrid. Everything is executed with perfect taste. Holiday is one of the most artistically assured publications to come along in a while, although less sure is that its strait-laced content can make us forget, from the earliest pages, the origins of the magazine, which was originally designed for “For all of those who see ‘GO’ signs on the horizon.” Faulkner, Hemingway, Kerouac, Capote and Miller wrote for the magazine, while Robert Capa, Cartier-Bresson, Slim Aarons and others took pictures, making the magazine, which attracted an enormous readership and paid its authors handsomely to travel around the world.
While Holiday 2014 still showcases the work of artists, it is less inspired by the spirit of the Dharma Bums. Let’s hope that hedonism can lighten the mood when it gets too serious.
13 €
More information on http://www.holiday-magazine.com/
