B EAST Magazine website

This juicy ‘Meat’ issue is the 13th incarnation of the magazine, and even the B.East seems to have fallen under the evil auspices of that unlucky number. What was supposed to have taken six months dragged on for much longer as things didn’t just go pear-shaped—they went bear-shaped. A longtime editor found the Berlin start-up world more lucrative than plain ol’ magazine publishing and went AWOL (Joel did, however, turn in a blistering attack on meat ‘Meat is Mordor’ at the last minute). Models who agreed to a grisly, meaty photo shoot changed their minds after seeing the bloody images, and revoked their permission. Advertisers who had stayed loyal to the magazine despite our many antics pulled the plug, while magazine sales continued their steep decline.
Despite these hurdles, we’ve managed to pull together a meaty issue to celebrate that muscular animal tissue that makes the East so bloody good. Perennially provocative photographer Mikael Vojinovic came through with a pussy, beast, meat shoot with ribs as meaty mini-skirts ‘Meat the Beast’. A Vice President at Riga’s Air Baltic photographed a traditional pig funeral—replete with post-slaughter vodka—at a Latvian village. I shot a ‘Three Little Pig Stages’ fashion shoot in a rustic pig farm outside Kiev, where each of the little beasts had their own name, Borya being the leader of the pack. Massive, muddy Borya—who’s captured here with emerging Kiev model Nadia Shapoval—loves sausages, as all pigs do. Hey, they’re the original cannibals.
Meanwhile, high-energy Chris MacArthur photographed New York ‘characters’ with veggies, emphasizing that the meat is within all of us. London’s Dalston Beast Al Jackson bumped into a Spartak football fan (who are also known as ‘Meat’) during Monday night footie, and did a Triple Six on him. As part of our drive to cover more of the real ‘East’, we have an essay about ‘Meat Being the New Black’ in India, and the rich Indians’ obsession with exotic meats.
Many readers probably assume that B.East is pro-meat de facto, given our grisly stance on most issues. However, that’s not the case. We’re as concerned about heinous industrial meat practises as others, and realize the toxic nature of some meat products. Meat itself though is too beasty a topic not to be covered by our magazine. We’ve tried to bring a balance, however, in this issue, celebrating meat as part of traditional culture, while slamming it’s production and packaging by big corporations. (See the essay on ‘The Future of Meat’ p. ..)
This issue will be promoted by launch events in Berlin and Kiev. It’ll also be available for digital download on otherediton.com. We’re not sure what comes next, but expect something from the Far East in the near future. It’s time we took that leap into the emerging Beast in the East.

You can check it on Issuu at BeastMeat

Tags: 13, Beast, issuu, meat, nadia shapoval, other edition

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