Elska, a project dedicated to sharing the bodies and voices of LGBTQ communities around the world, has put the spotlight on Madrid for its latest edition. Inside, readers can get to know a selection of ordinary men from the Spanish capital, introducing them through a combination of honest photography and personal storytelling.
“Elska Madrid has become the 46th issue in a project that’s been thriving for over eight years, and I know many will be perplexed as to why it took us this long to finally get to Spain” says Elska editor and chief photographer Liam Campbell. “We certainly weren’t trying to avoid Spain, I suppose it was more a case of thinking that a Spanish issue would be a breeze to make and that we’d keep it in the back pocket until someday we’d feel ready to treat ourselves.”
“It proved true that it was a treat to make our Madrid issue, but the resulting issue surprised us, especially in how moving it was,” continues Liam. “Like all Elska issues, much of people’s personalities and bodies are shared, but particularly in this issue so much heart was revealed. I cried at least three times when I first read the issue, and teared up several more times during the editing process. I expected Madrid to be a happy-go-lucky sort of city, with stories that might be light to the point of banality, but that was far from what we got. It makes me want to return to Spain again very soon.”
Inside Elska Madrid and the companion zine Elska Ekstra Madrid 16 men are introduced who were photographed in the streets of their city and in their homes, revealing their style, their mood, and their bodies. Each also wrote a personal story to make the experience even more revealing. Some of the stories include: Rodrigo F C’s piece about young love blooming at a protest march, Jose C M’s realisation that getting older doesn’t need to be the tragedy he was anticipating, Santiago F C’s revelation on how helping someone else helped himself and changed his life forever, and Ignacio P’s story that recalled his earlier insecurities and then came to embrace his body.
Elska Madrid is 180 pages and is available from a select group of shops around the world as well as for order online from the Elska website. In addition, the comparison zine Elska Ekstra Madrid is available, including five additional participants and their stories, as well as hundreds of pages of outtakes and behind the scenes tales from the making of our first Spanish series. The list of stockists and details of the subscription service can also be found on the Elska website.
