Eleven
This is Dek Unu Magazine. In Esperanto, dek unu means "eleven." Eleven images from a single artist. Eleven artists in eleven solo issues in each publication year. Dek Unu publishes the work of a new artist-photographer in each issue. The artist's work and words are featured in individual focus as the sole purpose for each issue of the magazine. Unlike other arts and letters magazines which might look for work from a variety of artists to support an editorial staff's theme, at Dek Unu, theme and imagery are always each artist's own.
Some have suggested that Americans are, generally speaking, ahistorical — that they are more interested in the future than in the past, and that they like it just fine that way. While the tendency to forget history may seem to be part of the natural personality of Americans, the wedge of events, particularly since the presidential campaign of 2016, suggests much more strongly that American “forgetfulness” is actually the output of the natural behavior of privilege and power — using programming, pressure, and propaganda, both subtle and outlandish, to insure its self-preservation and advance its agenda. Scientist and cosmologist Carl Sagan said, “If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us.”
Unless noted, all images
©Chuck Avery
This month’s feature, Chuck Avery, confronts one of the most significant and effective bamboozles in centuries of American history. By making current photographs of sites of conflict between workers and owners, labor and big money, Avery exposes touchpoints from the suppressed, manipulated, and mostly forgotten history of unionism. Refusing to be bamboozled, he says, “These days especially I want to unearth buried truths and question false mythologies. Post-truth can only be fought with facts and information. So here I am, practicing my version of documentary landscape. My cameras might not be the loudest voices, but they have plenty to say.“