Elska is a project centered on traveling around the world, meeting a selection of everyday local guys, and introducing their city and their lives to readers through honest photography and personal stories. Below, photographer Liam Campbell shares exclusively with GayCities a selection of photos and behind-the-scenes commentary about some of the beautiful men he met in Haifa, Israel for the latest issue.
Dotan M
The decision to make an issue of Elska in Israel came after countless requests from readers. However, I suspect that what they were hoping for, if not at least expecting, was an issue in Tel Aviv. At first, I was expecting that to be our target city as well, but I also felt strongly that it was necessary that an Elska made in Israel would reveal the country’s diversity. So when I read that Tel Aviv was around 90% Jewish, I decided to search elsewhere. Then I discovered Haifa, the country’s third-largest city, which includes a much more diverse ethnic makeup of Jews, Arabs, and a large community of people from the former Soviet Union.
However, even with Haifa as our choice, the diversity didn’t come automatically. Although I have always ‘scouted’ for participants in Elska with the principle that anyone is welcome regardless of their age, body, ethnicity, etc., I was concerned when initially most of the men coming forward were from the Jewish community. The first guy I met in Haifa was Dotan M, and when I shared my sentiments with him I was so heartened to hear that he felt the same. He immediately grabbed his phone and started texting some of his Arab friends in the city to invite them to my project. His help is a major reason why this issue has almost equal representation from the Haifa’s ethnic groups, and why I ended up photographing a mammoth twenty-two men in the city!
George N
I knew this session would be special from the moment I met George. He showed up at our meeting point wearing a t-shirt with Arabic script on it, and I felt this was a fantastic way to represent Israel in Elska as the multicultural country that it is. And then when I asked him what it meant and he responded, “love”, things felt even more blissfully fateful because the word ‘Elska’ actually means ‘love’ in Icelandic. That’s why one of the photographs from this scene was put on the cover of an alternate edition of this issue (the other edition has another Arab on the cover, made clear through his wearing of a keffiyeh, the headscarf famous in Palestine).
It wasn’t just the first scene of this Shoot that was so amazing though. There was the scene of him nude apart from a crucifix earring, revealing his pride as part of Haifa’s Christian Arab community. And then there was the scene of him donning a handmade dress made of long rope fringe, which he made swirl around his body as he spun from side to side. And finally, there was a most magical scene, where he inexplicably wore nothing but a red-and-gold Gryffindor scarf whilst holding a wand. I always ask the guys I shoot to wear whatever they want for their shoot and to be as natural as they can… but it’s certainly always a treat when someone turns up so naturally eccentric.
Semion K
I met Semion on my fifth day in Haifa, three days after one of the most awful shoots I ever had. That shoot was with Dia, who is the keffiyeh-wearing subject on this issue’s cover. The tragedy of that session was not down to Dia though, it was down to an accident where I stepped on a nail whilst shooting him nude in an abandoned house in the Wadi Nisnas neighborhood. Being a single-minded workaholic on my shoot trips, I ignored the injury, but over the next few days, the pain and swelling had me limping pathetically through the next few days of shoots.
Noticing my struggle, Semion decided to mention that he was a doctor by profession. I couldn’t believe my luck! Although I didn’t want to ruin the mood of our shoot with my problems, he kindly offered to take a look at my foot, whereby he was able to calm my anxiety tremendously, including assuring me that if I was going to have contracted tetanus, I’d have had symptoms by now. Almost instantly the pain reduced, and I had one of the lightest and loveliest photo shoots of the trip, a shoot full of laughter and joy. This was lucky too because our shoot involved climbing up to the top of the gloriously gorgeous Baha’i Gardens.
Hany A
My typical approach to a photo shoot is to work without any plans whatsoever other than to have a starting location and to ask the subject to bring a few different looks of their own style. Then we just sort of walk around and explore the person’s neighborhood whilst chatting and snapping pics, followed by going home to relax, chat some more, and take more pics. This method suits me because I find it inspiring to discover a person and their environment without expectation. And I think it suits the subject too, most of whom have never done any sort of photoshoot before, letting them remain relaxed and unencumbered by worries of what poses to do or what sort of moods to convey.
However, occasionally I meet a guy who hopes to use the experience shooting for Elska as an opportunity to live out a model fantasy. Like Hany, who came prepared not only with a selection of outfits to wear but with a range of moods and poses ready. There was a moment though where I managed to break his flow, resulting in a little laugh that I captured with my camera. I thought it was so cute and natural and of course authentic, but Hany wasn’t happy about it at all, demanding I delete the shot of him smiling immediately! I did as he instructed, but later I did manage to catch him smiling again, and when he didn’t seem to notice me snap that picture, I took that as permission to keep the shot, and to publish it. Hopefully, he’s not upset about it now, smiles are always beautiful!
Yehonathan B Y
One of the most memorable participants in the Haifa, Israel issue was Yehonathan. Like George, he had an especially weird and wonderful set of clothes prepared for our shoot. Most of them I can’t share on Gay Cities however, so I have to show you the most basic version of Yehonathan, not the ones of him in a strappy black mankini, nor of him in the tight black slip dress that hugs every curve and ‘bump’ phenomenally, nor the ones of him in nothing but a chain mail collar.
Still, what I think was most interesting about Yehonathan was the story he shared with us. It’s such a common experience for queer people to leave the villages, towns, and cities they come from and move to the largest city they can when they come of age. In the Israeli context, that would be Tel Aviv, a city some have even called the gayest city on Earth. Indeed a couple of the guys in this issue contributed stories about feeling compelled to move to Tel Aviv one day, but trying to resist their love of Haifa. But Yehonathan made the opposite journey, moving from his native Tel Aviv for life in Haifa. In his story, he explains how difficult a transition this was, feeling at first lost and frankly bored to death. But in time he discovered the city’s charms and some excitement as well, which was there but just took some time to discover.
Boris L
To say that Israel is a complicated place is an understatement, but what I felt most strongly from my experience meeting twenty-two Haifa men was that they loved their city whilst acknowledging the downsides. Of all the men though, I think it was Boris who expressed the most joy about life in Haifa.
Originally from Ukraine, part of the city’s huge community of immigrants from the former Soviet Union, making up 25% of the population, he knew what it was like to experience Haifa with fresh eyes. Boris acknowledged that it wasn’t an easy process to find a home here, which included extensive Hebrew language studies and other assimilation projects, but he found the support from the community and many new friends key to motivating him. With their help, he was able to construct a happy new chapter of his life. For our shoot, he chose to take me to the beach, which he says his is favourite thing about living in Haifa. That and the people of course, who he described as the happiest in Israel. All that sun and sea and sand can’t help but make people cheerful.
The latest issue, ‘Elska Haifa Israel’ is available in a limited edition print format as well as in an electronic version. A companion e-zine called ‘Elska Ekstra Haifa‘ is also available containing a dozen more men and their stories, plus hundreds of pages of bonus outtakes, behind-the-scenes tales from the making of this series, and a guest feature by the Dutch Artist Rik Besselink.
