Back in 2012, we hosted a public viewing when Germany gloriously defeated Greece during the European Football Cup, aided among others by our friend Kohei Ito, who supplied some visuals relating soccer to graphic design. At the time, he already had plans to launch a magazine dedicated to football aesthetics, and three years later, we hold in our hands Shukyu.
Aptly launching on the theme of ‘roots’, the first issue of Shukyu is a visually immaculate collection of photographs, stories, graphics and ephemera around football culture. Leaving aside the usual blurb on athletes and personalities, it features beautiful photo essays on the architecture of football stadiums, a story on the origins of the Japanese Football Journal or Juergen Teller’s self-documentation of his football fandom. Unfortunately, it is entirely in Japanese, but then again, images speak for themselves and visually already it is such a treat. Congratulations!
