GoSee Tip : PogoBooks & Zines. Release party with have-to-have publications at Idrawalot Gallery Berlin and the anti-glamorous world of Ulrike Biets

A hidden treasure! We discovered independent publisher PogoBooks by sheer accident. The publishing house carries a refreshing range of limited photography and art books, editions and zines in small print runs.

“We encourage and support young talents from photography, painting, illustration and contemporary nonsense. PogoBooks believes in print, PogoBooks believes that paper is the future. We are a platform. We are an archive. We are a collective”, says Claudio Pfeifer, who launched the publishing company in 2010 and has already published over 40 books and zines ever since.

Even after just a few weeks in existence, PogoBooks already sported an elaborate range of publications - which was celebrated last Thursday (23rd of February) in the Berlin IDRAWALOT Gallery. The showroom was the perfect backdrop for cherishing the new books and E-Zines by the following artists: Girlcore Mag (UK), Miriam O´Connor (Ireland), Ale Formenti (Italy), Helene Juedy (Belgium), Ansgar Wilken, (Germany), Viktoria Lisbet (USA), Irina Yulieva (Russia).

Watch out! We are particularly impressed by the newest publication by Belgian photography artist Ulrike Biets. The photographer from Brussels got her first camera at the tender age of six – and never let go since. With her documentary style, she captures everything she happens to run into – people, music, fashion, stories and everyday life, life as it is and not as it could or should be. Being a child of the eighties, her photographs often have a smoky character and feature animals on more than one occasion.

We wanted to find out more "I never studied photography, so I’m what they call a self-taught photographer. I went to the university and got my masters in philosophy, but it never gave me the kind of satisfaction I was looking for. People tell me often that in my work, I probably use everything I read and wrote during those years. If so, than it has to be on an unconscious level. Because I kind of re-educated myself in a way that excludes overthinking as much as possible. And that’s maybe how it is showing in my pictures.

I show life in its most raw, the way we see it, not the way we want to see it, the way we think it is, not the way we like to think it is. That’s also why I practically never work with a concept. Even in my most set up photography, like fashion or editorial shootings, there is always some kind of documenting, some anti-glamour. I like to interweave the model’s personal character, life or situation with what is going on in my head.

That’s also why I like to work with film and point & shoot cameras. It leans more towards the core of my photographs, which is honesty. I don’t manipulate the image, the only manipulation lies in my decision of what to shoot and show - which is very personal, and, I hope, very genuine too."

We are pleased to show a preview of her book here on GoSee. If you're interested, Ulrike's book and all other magazines and publications featured in this article can be acquired from PogoBooks.