ITALY ALIVE … STREET PHOTOGRAPHY FROM MILAN, TURIN, PISA, LUCCA AND FLORENCE

Guest Writer: Robert Richardson

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Taking advantage of page layout software and good quality online printers (with offset litho production), I am presenting some of my photographs in a format that makes them available at a very cheap price (50p; €0.75; $1.50). This is different to many other self-publishing projects such as those via Blurb, with prices little different from mainstream publications.

The format is simple: a folded A2 sheet, opening to a front with titling and three photographs, and a back with four. It is a publication that can also be a two sided poster.

Italy Alive will have issues, as the name suggests, dedicated to different Italian locations. The emphasis will be on street photography, and with the first issue, Milan, showing a vital spark between tourists and the Milanese. Future issues are lined up for photographs from Turin, Pisa, Lucca and Florence.

Duty Free Lounge is an imprint for photographs from various European countries. The choice of name indicates a personal approach to visiting and enjoying other countries. Issue 1 consists of photographs from a visit to Malta in 2011. Future issues will include Portugal, Spain,Turkey, Greece, Poland, Lithuania, Germany and France.

With both imprints, photographs were not taken as part of commercial projects. The motivation was to communicate the positive and liberating pleasure from observing idiosyncrasies and situations in the tradition of classic, humanist street photography.

I am asking photography critics and photo book reviewers to consider covering the launch of these imprints and their subsequent publications, especially since they are an attempt to make photography available in a cheap and democratic format. The issues will, in an ongoing and organic way, build up to the equivalent of two books.

For further information and/or jpegs, please email robertrichardson@bobzlenz.com

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