Katherine Magazine 2026 No.1

'KATHERINE' Noir' is the first volume from the KATHERINE' collective, founded by Rkia El-Jably and Tim Gallé after meeting in Paris in March 2025. It is the first issue of a collection destined to expand. Photography in France remains a largely individual world; it is precisely this lack, as well as the desire for self-representation, that drove them to create their own space. 

Coming from different backgrounds, they share the same relationship to the image: direct and uncompromising. Yet, their practices remain distinct. Rkia El-Jably works from an instinctive approach to daily life, anonymous silhouettes, subway doors, family intimacy with memory work as a guiding thread. Tim Gallé, a photographer and bookseller, claims a deliberately raw gesture missed focus, underexposure, JPGs pushed to their limits viewing them as formal choices rather than errors. What interests him is what the city has at its deepest, not its sharpest. 

The images are taken digitally, on film, or on a phone, compulsively depending on the moment. The book is less a book about Paris than a book with photos taken in Paris: the city is a context, not the subject. More than 500 photographs were selected and debated to keep only the essentials. The book was then composed like a fresco; each image had to hold its own with the next, forming a whole that is both coherent and frenetic. The layout and art direction are handled by Rkia El-Jably. 

The cover is a collaborative creation with artist Bettina Rosaria, whose original drawings adorn the object. Producing something demanding while maintaining an affordable price was an obvious choice for them: photography is an expensive medium, both to practice and to consume, and there was no question of the object itself becoming an obstacle. The book is meticulously crafted: 21 × 28 cm, 108 pages, 130g coated paper, matte laminated cover, bilingual French/English edition, printed by Pulsio Print. Published completely independently starting April 2026