“We’re all ghosts, we all carry inside us, people who came before us.”
–Liam Callanan, The Cloud Atlas
GHOSTS ARE A METAPHOR FOR THE PAST, they manifest themselves in our consciousness, memories, dreams... Real, imagined, fabricated, manifestation of superstition or mental illness, folklore, friend, foe? Whatever they are, ghosts are a constant fascination, a recurrent topic in literature, film, fashion, art, photography – the unknown and unexplainable spike our imagination and creativity. We fantasize about the afterlife, we find beauty in the ethereal. For centuries, ghosts have fueled the imagination of many cultures around the globe. There have been innumerable stories of ghost encounters. Some spend their lives trying to prove their existence, maybe a reassuring concept that we never completely lose our connection to the ‘other side', or go away with our last breath, we have simply ‘passed on’... Certainly a comforting thought as we live through the COVID-19 pandemic.
We were right in the middle of our work for this issue when the world shut down and our lives changed, possibly forever. We paused for a while and reassessed, we readjusted and continued on, but not without challenges. Besides the obvious physical and mental difficulties of working in isolation on a print publication, keeping focus and high spirits whilst the world is in deep despair and extreme sadness is a tall order, yet our artists, contributors and friends soldiered on to make it possible. Thank you all for your courage and support.
The world is left with more questions than answers, but in time—if we really pay attention—we can heal and be better than before. We owe it to all who have left us so abruptly and tragically, and to those who have put their own lives at risk for us. The planet is giving us a shake down, albeit a cruel one, and time to pause. Society wants us all to focus on maximum productivity – often to the detriment of creativity, sustainability and craftsmanship – but does this not limit our experience of what the world truly has to offer? Together, we can reinvent the world, from this Dystopia we can try to create some amount of Utopia.
Editor/ Creative Director
Pan
Design/ Art Director
Nobi Kashiwagi
Contributors (in alphabetical order)
Ai Takahashi, Akti M. Konstantinou, Alice Hualice, Anna Battista, Anna Sui, Ash Foo, Barbra Lee Grant, Benoit Delhomme, Bill Mullen, Cameron McMillan, Carolina Pavlovskaya, Chantal Ariëns, Christina Cacouris, Deborah Turbeville, Elizaveta Porodina, Elya Strezhenyuk, Gemma Avery, Gill Button, Isabel Reitemeyer, Jake Wood-Evans, Jen Smith, Jennifer Alfano, Jessica Whitlow, José Quijano, Julia Rada, Juliana Schurig, KYoung, Lacey Minot, Lune Kuipers, Marcus Schaefer, Maria-Aurelia Riese, Marla Belt, Nanni Grobe, Norman Wilcox-Geissen, Pam Hogg, Paul Westlake, Peter Gray, Philippe Miletto, Phoebe Shakespeare, Rebecca Arnold, Robert Montgomery, Rodarte, Sabrina Mandanici, Sara Wacksman, Sayaka Maruyama, Stephen Lewis, Suzume Uchida, The Scissorhands, Tomihiro Kono, Vesna Vrdoljak, Vincent Bousserez, Virgin Shen, Wolfgang Tillmans, Yael Eban, Yuka Hirac.
cover: Photograph by Marcus Schaefer
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37 × 26 cm, Softcover, 2020, 978-1-7338824-1-5