Home vs Away: The land of in-between
- PhotoED Magazine
- 23 hours ago
- 4 min read
“I haven't been everywhere, but it's on my list."
— Susan Sontag
Blurred lines would best describe our first edition of this year, themed Order vs. Chaos. We had anticipated that photographers’ contributions would have a polarity that defined order and chaos separately. It turned out that, behind the scenes, the practice of producing crowded, busy, layered works was actually a way for artists to simplify, dissect, and find order and calm in our increasingly busy world. Meanwhile, some of the simplest compositions were layered with intensity and underlying chaos. Ultimately, there could be no clear line between order and chaos.
In this edition, we find ourselves in the same situation. As we anticipated defining Home and Away as separate spaces, the artists featured here challenge these boundaries and investigate an ambiguous middle ground.
In this issue, we travel through images and stories from around the world: New Zealand photographers visit Antarctica, an Alaskan analogue photographic artist goes on a 14,000-mile road trip through the American West, and a Canadian with a Holga observes vacation culture around the world in a time of climate crisis through strategic double exposures on film.
Meanwhile, in a world that frequently resembles a tumultuous storm, Martine Côté’s lighthouses provide viewers with a serene kind of guidance towards the concept of Home.
While routes of transit frequently cross through the same physical places that characterize Away as a realm of discovery, the idea of Home represents an entirely distinct emotional landscape. We may think of Home as a single physical place, but artists in this issue took a different approach by considering it as a conceptual space, a place of feeling accepted and secure.
Camille Turner’s work over decades has been rooted in historical research and personal experience with focus on diasporic identities and the generational repercussions of colonialism. Best known for her “Miss Canadiana” project, her perspective may be personal, but she poses a universal question: When will I feel at home?
Driven from their homelands by circumstance, the individuals and families we see in Ruth Kaplan’s book Crossing — a documentary about the journeys of asylum seekers crossing at a Canada / U.S. border point — is dedicated to “those in the land of in-between.” Although their stories are unique, they have all left the familiar to seek Home as a new place of refuge, security, and hope.
Other artists in this issue including Pooya Nabei, Elsa Hashemi, and Mehrana Nazari also share deeply personal immigration stories through their work.
Crossing other borders, Amina Mohamed works between two places to foster a new generation of women working in photography. While living and fundraising in Canada, she runs programs in Africa that provide training for young women working towards employment as photojournalists.
As you'll see in the print edition, we have again taken the opportunity to flip the script on how readers experience our magazine. From the cover, the publication opens as per usual, but somehow concludes in the middle. Flip the print edition on its back to find another beginning, a different entry point, through a second cover, again concluding in the middle.
My hope is that the work featured here offers you an expanded perspective on your own ideas of Home and Away, and that however you’re moving through the world, the work of these artists allows you to make time to consider the ripple effects of your own presence as a traveller or community local.
This issue features:
Martine Côté’s LIGHT HOUSES by Alan Bulley
Camille Turner: Living History into the Present by Melissa Bennett
An Old Reverie, Pooya Nabei for Langara College by Arlo Jukes
Cameras For Girls by Sherry Chunqing Liu
Wish you were here. Vacation culture in a time of climate change, by Sarah Palmer
Antarctica: The Frozen Muse. Two NZ photographers one unique continent.
Arrivals and Departures. A photoED patreon patrons feature
Western Consumption by J. Jason Lazarus
PORTFOLIO featured artists
From our International Call for submissions:
Diane Holmes (CAN), Sophie Derouin (CAN), Dominique Philippe Bonnet (FR) Jo Panasiuk (CAN), Jordan Potae (NZ), Elizabeth Siegfried (CAN), Mary Beth Doble (USA), Jackie Weik (USA), Elsa Hashemi (CAN), Mehrana Nazari (CAN), Krista Charbonneau (CAN), Olga Bondarenko (CAN), Sungsoo Lee (G), and Avigail Ramirez (USA).
This edition also features...
Photo book recommendations by Alan Bulley
Change Made: A lens on the beautiful game by Sid Naidu
E. Haanel Cassidy: Seeking transcendence by Cassandra Spires
The POIESIS Collective by Craig D’Arville
+ MORE!
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This issue could not have been made possible without the support of: Tamron, Nikon, The Photo Historical Society of Canada, Beau Photo, Harcourt House, Think Tank Photo, and Total Image Works.
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A very generous anonymous private donor passionate about supporting Canadian women in photography, our Patreon Patrons, Downtown Camera, and Front Row Insurance.
