Say cheese! Same Paper’s latest photography magazine is all about cracking a smile

A smile is an infamous entity in the photography world; from the pursuit of an authentic one, to the complete Mona Lisa-esque disdain toward them in high-fashion shoots. So whether a smile is sought after or rejected, it’s often a consideration for those behind the camera, and for its third photography magazine Closing Ceremony, the publishing studio Same Paper has made the facial expression its central theme.

The Shanghai-based studio is well loved for its thoughtful photography publications. In 2020 we covered Still Life, a collection of 13 photographers’ responses to the pandemic. This time round Xiaopeng Yuang, founder of Same Paper, explains that the team wanted the three-years-in-the-making Closing Ceremony to look more toward the photography industry. How photographers are moving beyond the limits of photography and using their practice as a language, how the medium may continue to exist in a creative environment occupied by short videos, and how – throughout all of this – you can continue to make images in a “light and tender way”. On top of this, through the curation of Closing Ceremony Same Paper aims to make photography more democratic. While Xiaopeng recognises that the lines between ‘amateur’ and ‘art world’ photography are being increasingly blurred, many photography publications still polarise the two.

Directing us to some standout moments in the book, Xiaopeng lands on Chris Maggio’s work. When first running the story by the Same Paper team, Chris said that he wanted to hang around in New York taking serious portraits, only to then retouch them with a smiling filter. Though, instead of being met by sombre faces, Chris ended up capturing a horde of smiling faces. Xiaopeng also highlights Feng Li’s photographs of a pig, a visual story that doesn’t include smiles but will certainly induce them. Apparently one day when travelling home Feng came across a stray baby pig, and, thinking it was a miniature pig, took it home. It soon became clear that the pic was in fact a regular sized pig, and now after the care of his family, the pig is pretty massive. “The pig has stayed with his family over eight years, and become an important family member,” Xiaopeng says.

When it came to the design of the Closing Ceremony, the studio wanted people to see it and consider it a general, all-encompassing magazine rather than simply a photography publication. To tackle this, the designer Juergen Maelfeyt was enlisted on the project to make a magazine that was “mixed” and allowed the images to interfere with one another, rather than taking the minimalist approach more commonly adopted by photography magazines, Xiaopeng explains. For the title, Juergen created a rubbery, spiky font that looks like “tigers teeth” mid-laugh, and for the two alternating front covers a picture of Feng’s pig and a portrait of Roe Ethridge’s grinning daughter were selected – both of which trigger “joyful feelings”. As soon as the audience lays eyes on the cover, Xiaopeng hopes that they realise they’re about to encounter something funny.

Primarily, Xiaopeng says the magazine is about expression and enjoyment; expression for those whose work is included, and enjoyment for those who encounter their work. He hopes as well as providing creative inspiration, the magazine might trigger its readers’ imaginations, reminding them of moments and stories that caused a smile to break out on their face.