A YEAR IN PRISMA
Louise Anderbjörk
Dear PRISMA readers,
Happy holidays! It is an amazing feeling to once again be writing your December editorial article as founder and Editor-in-chief of PRISMA. This time last year, I was writing the introductory editorial article for PRISMA’s very first issue, telling the story of how PRISMA came to be. Now, 11 issues and 79 published articles later, I am very proud to be able to continue that story and share some highlights of the exciting growth PRISMA has experienced in 2023.
When PRISMA launched in December 2022, it was just 7 undergraduate friends from St Andrews who made up the editorial team and wrote our first series of articles. By the end of February, however, we had published works of another 11 student photographers and were steadily increasing our reader base within the university.
It was fantastic to see PRISMA’s outreach grow, and in March we received our first submission from a university-external photographer who had worked professionally with photography in Scotland for over 30 years. This was a big first step towards our aspirations of creating a diverse photography community, where amateurs and professionals alike could meet and exchange their passion for photography, all within one magazine.
Following that, we were thrilled to be able to continue this exchange in person at our first local photo exhibition at the end of March, where we met many of our photographers and readers for the first time. With our community growing, the PRISMA editorial team expanded too, and we entered the summer months welcoming four new members to the team. Several of them graduated in June, marking a shift away from operating primarily as a St Andrews student magazine, to now having an international team working with outreach across the world. Our first article produced by an international photographer was published in June, and since then our international contributions have amounted to works from 67 photographers from 16 different countries.
Following somewhat of an admin makeover behind the scenes, we launched our brand-new website in July. Along with a full online archive of all published photos stories and editorial articles, the website introduced our new mailing list that shares our issues and newsletters to you monthly - be sure to sign up if you haven't already! Come August, several members of the PRISMA team headed to Edinburgh to work at the Edinburgh Fringe for a month. There, we gained our first official press accreditation, as members of Fringe Media, and build new relationships with local publications and industry professionals.
We were thrilled to also receive press access to the Royal Edinburgh Military Tattoo, marking our first media appearance at a major international event. Back in St Andrews, the autumn months were among our most successful outreach months of the year. We were honoured to be invited as guest speakers at two local speaker evenings, where we shared the story of PRISMA. Thanks to St Andrews Photography Society, we also led our first photography workshop, which highlighted the wonderful scope of photography and the many ways there are to get involved in photojournalism, even as an amateur photographer. Finally, we were very grateful to have been asked by United Nations Association St Andrews to co-host a photography competition, and subsequent exhibition, on the theme of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. The competition and exhibition evening at the Rusacks Hotel was a great success, and we are delighted to have met some incredible local professionals with whom we now have exciting projects in the works for the year ahead. So, that effectively brings us back to today.
Reflecting upon this past year. I just want to extend a massive thank you to each and everyone of my team members, our photographers for their hard work, and you, our readers, who have made this all happen. PRISMA could not have gone from a mere idea in 2022 to where we are today without you, so thank you for supporting us!
This article first appeared in PRISMA, Issue 11.