Today the new English version of the famous Azerbaijani magazine ‘Baku’ was presented in Moscow. This magazine has been distributed in Russian for several years, but the first English issue appeared in London just recently. However, it is not a mere translation of the already existing magazine: the only thing it has in common with the Russian version is its name and, of course, the chief editor.
“Four years ago ‘Baku’ magazine appeared in Russia. It told the Russian people about our country, our culture, our history. But I’ve always wanted to create an international version of this magazine, and at last it appeared on October 4. Now our magazine will be read not only in Moscow and Baku, but also in London, Paris, Berlin, Rome, New York and in many other cities of the world,” Leila Aliyeva, the magazine’s chief editor, told journalists. According to her, the magazine focuses on people: prominent Azerbaijani artists and writers or ordinary Azerbaijani people living all over the world.
Leila Aliyeva hopes that the English-language edition will be as much of a success as the Russian one, as this one focuses on art, culture, fashion and other topics interesting to a wide audience. The English edition will appear 4 times a year. ‘Baku’ magazine's editorial board hopes to make presentations of the magazine in New York, Berlin and Paris.
As for creating versions of the magazine in other languages, the chief editor said that it would take some time: "We were working on the English edition for 4 years. It would have been much easier if we’d just translated the Russian version, but the target group here is completely different, so we had to start from scratch". Ms Aliyeva stressed that the English edition focuses more on culture and art, while the Russian one focuses on social, historical and political issues. For example, the first issue of ‘Baku’ in English has a large article about popular Western artist Mr.Brainwash, who created a painting especially for this occasion.
As for the general conception of the magazine, the chief editor said that each issue will focus on a special topic: the image of fire runs through the first edition, the second one will be connected to the theme of the colour white. Azerbaijani artists will work on each issue creating special art-projects exclusively for ‘Baku’. Ms Aliyeva said that she is very happy to have such a team working with her, as they all understand the general idea of the new edition.
By VK
