> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://hyperallergic.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # A Journal for Emerging Photography Endures in Print - URL: https://hyperallergic.com/a-thematic-journal-for-contemporary-photography-endures-in-print/ - Published: 2014-04-16T11:02:45.000Z - Updated: 2025-11-24T16:33:37.000Z - Description: Since it was founded in 2004 by photographer Sophie Mörner, Capricious magazine has been issuing contemporary photography narratives organized around broad themes. - Author: Allison Meier - Tags: Art, masculinity, Photography, #wp, #wp-post, #image-position-hidden, #Import 2025-11-24 07:03 (2014, 2015, part 1) ![Susan Surface](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine07.jpg) Susan Surface’s photograph in Capricious – Issue No. 14: Masculine (all images courtesy Capricious) Since it was founded in 2004 by photographer Sophie Mörner, [*Capricious*](https://becapricious.com/volumes?ref=hyperallergic.com) magazine has been issuing photographic narratives organized around broad themes. The three most recent issues tackle water, masculinity, and boundaries. ![Lina Manousogiannaki](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater3.jpg) Lina Manousogiannaki’s photograph in the Capricious Water issue (click to view larger) It’s an ongoing experiment in how you present emerging fine art photography, from the conceptual to the concrete, in a biannual journal, as well as the [Capricious 88 space](https://becapricious.com/exhibitions/visit?ref=hyperallergic.com) on the Lower East Side, where they’re currently exhibiting [work by Petra Collins](https://becapricious.com/exhibitions/upcoming?ref=hyperallergic.com). (Fair warning: the *Capricious* website is much harsher on the eyes than the magazine.) Although they’ve been publishing for a decade, even in these past three issues you can see the format evolving to something more slim and glossy for the recent [*Boundaries*](https://becapricious.com/issues/issue-no-15-boundaries?ref=hyperallergic.com) issue published this February. But what’s ongoing is a hands-off approach to explaining each photograph; sometimes all an image has is a name, no date, no title. That can be both good and bad, as you’re left to focus on the images, but sometimes without context a greater meaning is lost that could root it in a time and place. As Mörner writers in her *Boundaries* introduction, “I will leave it to you, to perceive, rather than telling you about what I see.” (There is some text related to the theme, but it feels more like its own mini-issue on ideas of separation caught within the current of photos.) ![Sarah Soquel Morhaim, "Accidental Sea"](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater5.jpg) Sarah Soquel Morhaim, “Accidental Sea” ![Geert Goiris, "Liepaja" (2004)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater1.jpg) Geert Goiris, “Liepaja” (2004) from the Capricious Water issue ![Katheryn Love](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater2.jpg) Katheryn Love’s photograph from the Capricious Water issue In the [*Water*](https://becapricious.com/volumes/2/issues/issue-no-13-water?ref=hyperallergic.com) issue from December 2012, ideas of conservation and daily interactions with liquid flow from oil spill photographs by [Daniel Beltrá](http://www.danielbeltra.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com), to [Stepanka Peterka](http://stepankapeterka.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com)‘s “Have Mercy” with a rainbow dappled over the spray from a hose on a suburban car, to [Sarah Soquel Morhaim](http://sarahsoquel.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com)‘s “Accidental Sea” of cassette tapes, bits of plastic, and bottles strewn in a manmade wave. Guest editor JOFF writes in an introduction: “I wondered how aware we are as artists? And to what degree do we use our work to make a change? And should fine art consciously be created to address these problems of he world? I realized the answer lies somewhere in between.” In *Boundaries*, there is a similar dichotomy between interpretations, with [Virginie Rebetez](http://virginierebetez.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com)‘s *Tokoloshe* series on South African witchcraft including those who practice it and their tools that morph from a perceived reality to a conjuring device; [Charlotte Lybeer](http://www.charlottelybeer.be/?ref=hyperallergic.com)‘s portraits of members of the furry fandom in their costumes contrasted to their mundane homes; and [Bindi Vora](http://www.bindivora.co.uk/?ref=hyperallergic.com)‘s *Lustre* series examining just the surface of processed chromogenic color paper. ![Collin LaFleche, "Matt, Will, Henry and Ray" (2007)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine03.jpg) Collin LaFleche, “Matt, Will, Henry and Ray” (2007) from the Capricious Masculine issue ![Nicolia Howalt, "Car Crash Studies Untitled Exterior #6" (2009)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine04.jpg) Nicolia Howalt, “Car Crash Studies Untitled Exterior #6” (2009) from the Capricious Masculine issue ![Peter Croteau, "Mountain II"](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine05.jpg) Peter Croteau, “Mountain II” from the Capricious Masculine issue This mix of ideas from around the world, from vastly different perspectives, feels strongest in the [*Masculine*](https://becapricious.com/volumes/2/issues/issue-no-14-masculine?ref=hyperallergic.com) issue published in the fall of 2013, something of a chaser to the 2008 *Feminine* issue. Looking at “what masculinity might be today,” the *Capricious* team combed through around 500 submissions to excavate a “masculine” that is “gentle but still aggressive, it’s violent, but safe, it is things that we can identify with, but also things that we never understood.” As with the other issues, it’s really the images that convey this tenuous link of attributes into a narrative, with the cover going from a sneaky reveal of an actual reptilian snake emerging from the zipper of some tight jeans, to a woman wearing no pants with a motorcycle helmet. There are charging bulls, mounds of dirt, guys using chainsaws, stoic-faced horse jockeys, scraped paint from car wrecks, and everything phallic both literal and suggestive (ex: locks on a chain etched with the words “hardened” and “tuff stuff”). As with all of the *Capricious* issues, it is a bit all over the place stylistically and conceptually, but that is the engaging experience created through the magazine with its culling of the unexpected, along with a blurring of clichés from the expansive world of contemporary photography. ![Anders Petersen](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine01.jpg) Anders Petersen’s photograph from the Capricious Masculine issue ![Anne Hall, "Penis in Sky" (2011)](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine02.jpg) Anne Hall, “Penis in Sky” (2011) from the Capricious Masculine issue ![Richard Perez](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciousmasculine06.jpg) Richard Perez’s photograph from the Capricious Masculine issue ![Sara Cwynar](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater4.jpg) Sara Cwynar’s photograph from the Capricious Water issue ![Seth Fluker](https://storage.ghost.io/c/51/f8/51f871d8-b6be-4a73-b958-0ca4fff0110a/content/images/hyperallergic-newspack-s3-amazonaws-com/uploads/2014/04/capriciouswater6.jpg) Seth Fluker’s photograph from the Capricious Water issue *The* Water*,* Masculine*, and* Boundaries *issues of Capricious* [*are now available*](https://becapricious.com/?ref=hyperallergic.com)*.*