Albrecht Tübke

- Albrecht Tübke was next on my list of photographers to write about and I just realized that Jörg posted a great review of his book Portraits. For the project Tübke traveled the world's cities taking portraits of people from all different walks of life. I liked this excerpt from Val Williams essay about the work; "Tübke has a gift for allowing his subjects to perform in their own solitary drama. "Many people", he writes, "try to hide their emotions and feelings as they go about everyday life. This public persona is often calculated to mask what is within, creating a veneer of individuality, a fabrication to hide behind." In "Citizens", Tübke has created, from real life, a cast of characters who play their parts in the urban drama. All of the people he has photographed pose in the same way, directly facing the camera, in front of a background of concrete or stained brick wall...These are people with their own secrets, joys; anxieties, dreads and anticipations, but we can only wonder as to what they are. Tübke's photographs are cool and beautiful enough to be fashion images, a studied reflection of street style, but in the end, this is belied by the democracy of their vision." See more of his work here.



© Albrecht Tübke

Michael Itkoff

- While I was at Strand last week I picked up a copy of Michael Itkoff's book Street Portraits. Although I had only known him as being one of the founding editors of Daylight Magazine and not by his work the book was only $14 and looked interesting. For the project Itkoff traveled throughout the world to cities such as London, Hanoi, Sydney, Bangkok, and New York taking pictures of everyday people in the street. Having an assistant hold up a white backdrop only behind the subjects head and shoulders Itkoff creates a striking aesthetic isolating the subjects from their urban contexts and allowing them to exist in a shared visual space as part of the same extended family. See more of his work here.



© Michael Itkoff

Top 10 Photo Books of 2008

- I have always been pretty insane with my collections, from baseball cards to comic books and most recently records. This year began a new obsession for me. Before the year started I only had a couple of photo books, but as time went on record buying took a huge back seat to them an now I'm actually selling off records to feed my addiction. Of course there are many books I have yet to see this year but these are my favorites.


Zoe Strauss - America

Luigi Ghirri - It's Beautiful Here, Isn't It

Mark Steinmetz - South East

Sze Tsung Leong - Horizons

Takashi Homma - Tokyo

Alec Soth - The Last Days of W.

Coley Brown - Jam, Jelly, Honey, Wild, Rice

Leigh Ledare - Pretend You're Actually Alive

Judith Joy Ross - Protest The War

Robin Schwartz - Amelia's World

TBW Books

- Jörg posted a new interview today with Paul Schiek the owner of TBW Books. The interview is really great and after reading it Paul has become one of my favorite people in the photo world. The way he is able to keep his DIY ethic in this money hungry art world is something I really look up to. Read the interview here. The new subscription series has an amazing lineup featuring Todd Hido, Marianne Mueller, Abner Nolan, and Alec Soth. You get four books for $100, you can't beat that, I'll be placing my order tomorrow.

Love this quote:
"It would kill me to know that there is some kid out there searching for something real, and stumble across these books and have them priced so crazy they couldn't afford them. That would sort of crush me... I was and still am that kid." - Paul Schiek

New Books

© Bert Teunissen


© Sage Sohier

Mitch Epstein

- I got Mitch Epstein's book Work in the mail yesterday. For some reason I thought that the book only had the series Family Business in it but once I opened it up I realized it was a retrospective of Epstein's entire career. The book looks amazing and I am so glad that I got exposed to Epstein's other work. My favorite series in the book are his pictures from Vietnam. View more of his work here.




© Mitch Epstein

What Is Art?

"Like ethics, logic, theology, epistemology, metaphysics, etc., aesthetics is a branch of philosophy, in this case the branch that deals with our powers of sensory perception; more specifically, with how we attempt to understand and evaluate the external phenomena registered by our eyes and ears. When the composition that delights, thrills, captivates, or challenges our sensory receptors has been created for that very purpose, we call it art."

- Tom Robbins,
What Is Art and If We Know What Art Is, What Is Politics?

Not "Sleeping" On Alec Soth

cover of Sleeping By The Mississippi
© Alec Soth
- While I was interning at Yossi Milo Gallery, the second edition (instead of the numbered first edition that sat next to it on the shelf and I drooled over) of Alec Soth's Sleeping By The Mississippi was the book I most often borrowed out of Yossi's extensive photo book library. From the moment I first saw them I was hooked on the images of Alec's many trips down the Mississippi river. Alec is my favorite photographer and he keeps impressing me with each body of work he produces, but Sleeping By The Mississippi is still my favorite of his projects. I never thought I would own a copy of the book because of its value continuing to rise. Luckily Steidel just released the third edition of this classic monograph and while I was in the city dropping off some film today I stopped by Strand and picked myself up a copy. This third edition of the book looks absolutely amazing. The prints are bigger and the colors even more breathtaking. The new cover is linen bound with a tipped-on image which I think lends itself much more to the work inside then the cover of the second edition. Overall I am more than pleased with the book, I like the feel of it better than the last edition and am just thrilled to finally own a copy of my own before another edition sells out.

"Alec Soth has a wonderful and terrifying eye. We’ve all seen gritty documentary photography, but no one has ever seen anything like his work! It’s gritty for sure, but it’s beautiful–really beautiful. With most documentary photography, you look at it, sigh, and pass on, but Soth’s work keeps pulling you back to look again because he composes with the skill of the greatest of photographic artists." - John Wood, Editor, 21st: The Journal of Contemporary Photography

Here is a great interview done with Alec by Aaron Schuman for Seesaw Magazine around the original release of the book.