Photographer Kishor Krishnamoorthi, through his magazine, champions the cause of the classic photo print, finds Seema Rajpal
In the world of smartphones and tablets, where interaction with images and text often remains brief, the value of print is forever undermined. The person who perhaps knows this best, second only to a journalist, is a photographer. To turn this brief interaction of photographs into an engaging experience, print crusader-cum-professional photographer Kishor Krishnamoorthi started Concorde Zine in June last year.
Little did he know that after a year, his labour of love would be selected for the UK-based Stack Awards, a recognition given by the eponymous magazine. Concorde is not just the only magazine to be nominated in its category — Best Use of Photography — but also the only Indian magazine to be nominated. But in this path of pursuing passion Hyderabad-based Krishnamoorthi still encounters several speed breakers.
The magazine is a photo journal which picks out one theme, currently city-centric, and narrates its story through photographs — like the prestigious Hyderabad Public School where Krishnamoorthi studied and the upcoming metro in the City of Nawabs. Stories are narrated in this 32-pager through photographs, woven by one theme. Their biggest challenge however is distribution as, “distributors ask for a margin of 20 to 25% which frankly, we cannot afford,” says Krishnamoorthi, whose printing cost for 500 magazines comes up to `92 per copy and he sells them offline at `100.
He counters this by selling it bi-monthly on his website charging `130 (extra for posting and packaging) while the margin remains just 2%.
Moving away from challenges to their recent achievement, Krishnamoorthi says that he submitted his best issue for the Stack Awards — the one which had bars as its theme. Through the theme the magazine attemps ‘contrasting the pattern of consumption across class divides to illustrate the universal appeal of a havit not yet respectable in the mainstream’.
“The issue is split into two. One part shows the life of waiters and how they get by while the other compares various bars in the city from high-end to low-end ones,” he explains, saying that visually, this was their best shot. “People go through life without really noticing things around. We need to pause and notice the smaller details around us and this is my endeavour,” says the man with a mission.
“I earn my bread and butter through wedding photography, the magazine is just pure passion,” says the 26-year-old photographer. He also sheepishly admits that he runs the magazine, “pretty much by myself,” though he has contributors and friends who help. He makes a loss on the magazine every two months all in the hope that people learn to appreciate the value of print. “Print elevates the experience of photographs and that’s why we wanted to showcase the power of print.”
Reach Out: concordezine.com