Best of
Art-And-Photography

2009

Polar Obsession


Paul Nicklen - 2009
    Raised on Baffin Island, Nunavut, he grew up in one of the only non-Inuit families in a tiny native settlement amid the ice fields, floes, and frigid seas of Northern Canada. At an age when most children are playing hide-and-seek, he was learning life-and-death lessons of survival: how to read the weather, find shelter in a frozen snowscape, or live off the land as his Inuit neighbors had done for centuries.Today Nicklen is a naturalist and wildlife photographer uniquely qualified to portray the impact of climate change on the polar regions and their inhabitants, human and animal alike. In a wise and wonderful intertwining of art and science, his bold expeditions plunge him into freezing seas to capture unprecedented, up-close documentation of the lives of leopard seals, whales, walruses, polar bears, bearded seals, and narwhals. Bathed in polar light, his images, inspiring and amazing, break new ground in photography and provide a vivid, timely portrait of two extraordinary, endangered ecosystems.

Avedon Fashion 1944-2000


Richard Avedon - 2009
    Each carefully selected image represents an artistic collaboration with significant models, stylists, and designers. Avedon Fashion accompanies the first major exhibition to survey this body of work, at the International Center of Photography in May 2009. With critical essays by Carol Squiers, curator at the ICP, and photography critic Vince Aletti, as well as an appreciation by photo-historian Philippe Garner, Avedon Fashion chronicles an astonishing record of photographic achievement.

Henry Darger


Klaus Biesenbach - 2009
    Angel-like Blengins with butterfly wings, natural catastrophes, innocent girls, and murderous soldiers all appear in Darger's scenes, which are reproduced in this book in double-page and gatefold spreads. In the volume's introductory essay, Klaus Biesenbach examines the radical originality of Darger's art, including his use of collage, incorporation of religious themes and iconography, and frequent juxtaposition of innocence with violence. An essay by Brooke Davis Anderson illuminates Darger's source materials and techniques. Michael Bonesteel puts Darger's life in the context of his work and selects key texts to accompany the illustrations. The book also includes for the first time the text of Darger's History of My Life, A" the artist's autobiography. The only book of its kind, Henry Darger offers an authoritative, balanced, and insightful look at an American master

Michael Jackson: Before He Was King


Todd Gray - 2009
    This collection of unseen, intimate, and joyful pictures of Michael taken over a span of 10 years reveal him at home, with his family and fans, in career-making live performances, and on the "Beat It" video shoot. A young black man not much older than Jackson at the time they met, Gray brings unique insights to his time with the singer, contributing stories and context to the images, presenting a rare, intimate portrait of Michael at a creative peak as he grew from a brilliantly talented young man into a pop icon.

Los Angeles. Portrait of a City


Jim Heimann - 2009
    It traces the city's development from the 1880s' real estate boom, through the early days of Hollywood and the urban sprawl of the late 20th century, right up to the present day. With over 500 images, L.A. is shown emerging from a desert wasteland to become a vast palm-studded urban metropolis. Events that made world news–including two Olympics, Bobby Kennedy's assassination, and the Rodney King riots–reveal a city of many dimensions. The entertainment capital of the world, Hollywood, and its celebrities are showcased along with many other notable residents, personalities, architects, artists, and musicians. The city's pop cultural movements, its music, surfing, health food fads, gangs, and hot rods are included, as are its notorious crimes and criminals. This book depicts Los Angeles in all its glory and grit, via hundreds of freshly discovered images including those of Julius Shulman, Garry Winogrand, William Claxton and many other superb photographers, culled from major historical archives, museums, private collectors, and universities. These are given context and resonance through essays by renowned California historian Kevin Starr and Los Angeles literature expert David Ulin.

Kindling: 12 Removable Prints


James Jean - 2009
    Bursting with unexpected beauty and hidden meaning, each of these 12 large-format prints features a lush painting on one side and a collection of intricate preliminary sketches on the other side. Housed in a sturdy keepsake portfolio, the pages, including an over-sized gatefold poster, can be left in place and leafed through time and again or removed from the portfolio and framed as eye-catching wall art.

The Hallowed Seam


James Jean - 2009
    From beautiful figure drawings to experimental paintings, Jean demonstrates a keen eye for humanity and a virtuosic handling of any medium.

The Disposable Skateboard Bible


Sean Cliver - 2009
    In the process, he created a classic, but was left feeling less than satisfied. Ever the completist, the gaping omissions in the first book gnawed at him and drove him to envision compiling the ultimate encyclopedia of Skateboard decks. While Disposable was beautiful, capturing the essence of the aesthetic, The Disposable Skateboard Bible sets out to be the ultimate guide. The author's industry insider status (in 1989 he landed his first job as a designer at Powell-Peralta) allows him to guide readers through the culture and experience, the art and the mania of the skate world with authority and expertise. While the boards take center stage, fascinating vignettes and recollections by an A-list of skateboarding personalities from Tony Hawk to Mike Vallely, Mark Gonzales to Stacy Peralta and more.

Bent Objects: The Secret Life of Everyday Things


Terry Border - 2009
    His complex vignettes are made of the simplest, everyday items: a jar of spices, a cigarette stub, a flower, a snack food. These sly photos range from whimsical scenes to sexy scenarios, the sad truths to the hilarious happenings in everyday life. In the tradition of bestselling humorous photography books like Chicks with Baggage, Play with Your Food, and Hello Cupcake!, this volume will surprise you with every viewing. A sunflower missing a petal becomes the tortured artist Van Gogh; an egg arrives to visit his mom only to discover roast chicken on the table; when confronted by a jar of peanut butter, peanuts hold a wake; and hot dogs leave behind their own brand of little presents. Marshmallows, wine corks, bread, soap, rocks, and tea bags—no common household item is safe from the twisted (wire) mind behind these uncommon creations!

Lost Constellations: The Art of Tara McPherson, Volume II


Tara McPherson - 2009
    Altered forms and transfigured ideas. Power and vulnerability. Parallel universes of the heart and mind. Space and time. In a few brief years, the stunning visual oeuvre of Tara McPherson has grown and evolved at thrilling speed. Expanding beyond the limits of rock poster art into the worlds of commercial illustration and fine art, her paintings, drawings, toys, sculptures, and installations have pushed her influence and authority across the breadth of creative expression and helped redefine the boundaries of pop surrealism. Lost Constellations: The Art of Tara McPherson Volume 2 is the compelling road map to the artist's most recent and ambitious journeys in paint, pencil, and vinyl.

Dissection: Photographs of a Rite of Passage in American Medicine 1880-1930


John Harley Warner - 2009
    From the advent of photography in the 19th and into the 20th century, medical students, often in secrecy, took photographs of themselves with the cadavers that they dissected: their first patients. Featuring 138 of these historic photographs and illuminating essays by two experts on the subject, Dissection reveals a startling piece of American history. Sherwin Nuland, MD, said this is "a truly unique and important book [that] documents a period in medical education in a way that is matched by no other existing contribution." And Mary Roach said Dissection "is the most extraordinary book I have ever seen--the perfect coffee table book for all the households where I'd most like to be invited for coffee."

Andy Warhol: "Giant" Size


Phaidon Press - 2009
    Cultural critic Dave Hickey provides a compelling essay on Warhol's geek-to-guru evolution while chapter openers by Warhol friends and insiders give special insight into the way the enigmatic artist led his life and made his art. More than 2,000 illustrations culled from rarely seen archival material, documentary photography and artwork not only provide a full picture of the artist's life but a telling look at late twentieth-century popular culture. Warhol's little-explored early career as a successful commercial illustrator and designer, his importance as a co-creator of the Pop movement, his mid-career switch to filmmaker and manager of the Velvet Underground, his founding of Interview magazine, and his bid for the hearts and pocketbooks of the high-flying glitterati are shown throughout this stunning new volume.

The Art of Tony Millionaire


Tony Millionaire - 2009
    Prepare to set sail on a drunken fever dream of dollies, apes, and exotic mysteries, in the form of illustrations, comics, photographs, and anecdotes from the man once referred to as "Beef McManus" by the late rock star "Rocky Stardomes.Dark Horse Books

Nick Knight


Nick Knight - 2009
    As a fashion photographer, he is one of the world’s most influential and visionary image makers. He is renowned for his groundbreaking creative collaborations with the world’s top couturiers, advertising work for major fashion brands, and award-winning editorials for premier publications. Nick Knight is the long-awaited mid-career retrospective of his work, from 1990 to the present day. This lush volume with three eight-page gatefolds includes an incredible array of work, including images for Christian Dior, Louis Vuitton, Levi Strauss, and Yohji Yamamoto, British and American Vogue, W, V, i-D, and Visionaire magazines, and from his Web site, SHOWstudio.com.

Ellen von Unwerth: Fräulein


Ellen Von Unwerth - 2009
    Now one of the world’s most original and successful fashion photographers, she pays homage to the world‘s most delectable females in Fräulein. This celebration of our era’s sexiest female icons includes Claudia Schiffer, Kate Moss, Vanessa Paradis, Britney Spears, Eva Mendes, Lindsay Lohan, Dita von Teese, Adriana Lima, Carla Bruni, Eva Green, Christina Aguilera, Monica Bellucci and dozens more. Switching effortlessly between color and immaculate black and white, von Unwerth‘s photography revels in sexual intrigue, femininity, romance, fetishism, kitsch humor, decadence and sheer joie de vivre. Whether nude or in lingerie and a dazzling smile, her subjects are never objectified. Some flaunt personal fantasies; others are guarded, suggesting that we have stumbled into a secret world. Fashion and fantasy were never so enchantingly combined. These images were shot over the last 15 years and many are previously unpublished. First published in TASCHEN's limited collector's edition — now available in this popular hardcover edition!

500 Ceramic Sculptures: Contemporary Practice, Singular Works


Suzanne J.E. Tourtillott - 2009
    Selected from more than 8,000 entries by the distinguished art critic, historian, and professor Glen R. Brown—an elected member of the International Academy of Ceramics in Geneva—these exquisite works will inspire both beginning and professional ceramists, as well as collectors and enthusiasts. They include Esther Shimazu’s hand-built, Asian-influenced nudes; Von Venhuizen’s mixed-media, wheel-thrown stoneware, and Katy’s Rush’s slip-cast and press-molded porcelain. Every work is amazing.

Rio de Janeiro


Mario Testino - 2009
    Peruvian by birth, Testino has been fascinated by Rio de Janeiro since his earliest summer vacations. "When I was 14, on holiday, and going from my house to the beach and seeing everyone walk everywhere in their tiny bathing suits—the girls and boys were so sexy and carefree and wild—I just could not believe it." This easy sensuality, sexual freedom and lust for life left a deep impression; Testino has been going back ever since, for work and fun, passion and inspiration. Featuring candid shots of exquisite cariocas baring nubile flesh, including supermodel Gisele Bündchen, MaRIO DE JANEIRO Testino captures the essence of this incomparably seductive city and its sultry citizens . From its breathtaking sunset panoramas, to the throbbing chaos of its world-famous carnival, this is Testino's love poem to the Brazilian metropolis that captured his teenage heart, and never let go. Features include: • Foreword by songwriter and singer Caetano Veloso • Introduction by actress/TV personality Regina Casé • Essay by supermodel Gisele Bündchen• Softcover with plastic jacket—for beach reading—available in yellow, orange or red, inspired by Rio's glorious sunsets!

UNEXPECTED: 30 Years of Patagonia Catalog Photography


Jane Sievert - 2009
    Relive the achievements captured in Patagonia’s history, as well as the joie de vivre fostered by nurturing a relationship with the great outdoors.Unique for a business enterprise, Patagonia’s catalog devotes fully half its space to nonselling editorial content – to environmental and sport essays and above all to extraordinary photographs of wild places and active pursuits for which the company makes its clothes. Since 1980, Patagonia has invited customers and wilderness photographers to submit their best, most unexpected shots of life outdoors – of alpine climbing, bouldering in the desert, skiing untracked bowls, surfing secret spots, ocean crossings, first kayak descents and travel in unfamiliar places. The photos have poured in ever since (current rate: 60,000 per year), some from the famous (John Russell, Galen Rowell), others from respected photographers (Corey Rich) who had their first work published in these pages. Jane Sievert and Jennifer Ridgeway, Patagonia’s current and founding photo editor, respectively, have been calling – and culling – the shots for three decades. This is their compendium of the 100-plus most compelling photos Patagonia has published – and a celebration of wilderness and outdoor-sport photography as an art and a practice.

Understanding Close-Up Photography: Creative Close Encounters with Or Without a Macro Lens


Bryan Peterson - 2009
    You’ve seen the dewdrops, but what about dewdrops on a bird’s wing or raindrops on a car windshield? You’ve seen the bumblebees on vibrant flowers, but what about the fluid edge of just one petal or the colorful rusting metal at industrial sites? Even when Peterson does capture the more traditional subjects, it's done in untraditional ways–and often with minimal specialized equipment! Most important, he moves beyond the commonplace to inspire new ways of getting close, using your lenses, and discovering unconventional subjects.

Title of Show


Jeff Bowen - 2009
    Our matching folio includes 13 piano/vocal arrangements: Development Medley * I Am Playing Me * Monkeys and Playbills * An Original Musical * September Song * Two Nobodies in New York * Untitled Opening Number * and more.

Patrick Demarchelier


Patrick Demarchelier - 2009
    From his earliest work at Harper's Bazaar to his now mythic collaboration with Vogue, Patrick Demarchelier has single-handedly redefined the fashion photograph and the fashion industry along with it. His celebrity portraits have shaped the public personae of figures ranging from Princess Diana to Madonna. Demarchelier is everywhere at once, with a photographic sensibility that is as iconic, incisive and as varied as his subject matter. Published to coincide with the exhibition Patrick Demarchelier: Images et Mode � Paris at the Petit Palais, Paris, and featuring more than 400 of Demarchelier's most telling photographs, this volume provides an invaluable fashion reference point, all the while charting the course of our own cultural obsession with celebrity and beauty. All proceeds go to the charity Police--Action Solidaire. Born outside Paris in 1943, Patrick Demarchelier relocated to New York in 1975, where he began his editorial career with Harper's Bazaar and Hearst Publications. His photographs appear regularly on the covers and in the pages of publications such as Vogue and Vanity Fair, among many others. He was the 2007 recipient of the Eleanor Lambert Award from the Council of Fashion Designers of America. He continues to live and work in New York.

Slum Dogs of India


Eloise Leyden - 2009
    Eloise Leyden's empathy with animals is captured in this touching collection of images of dogs roaming the bustling city streets of India, scaveging in markets, basking on sandy beaches and sleeping just about anywhere.

Drawing for Architecture


Leon Krier - 2009
    Drawn with wit and grace, these clever sketches do not try to please or flatter the architectural establishment. Rather, they make an impassioned argument against what Krier sees as the unquestioned doctrines and unacknowledged absurdities of contemporary architecture. Thus he shows us a building bearing a suspicious resemblance to Norman Foster's famous London "gherkin" as an example of "priapus hubris" (threatened by detumescence and "priapus nemesis"); he charts "Random Uniformity" ("fake simplicity") and "Uniform Randomness" ("fake complexity"); he draws bloated "bulimic" and disproportionately scrawny "anorexic" columns flanking a graceful "classical" one; and he compares "private virtue" (modernist architects' homes and offices) to "public vice" (modernist architects' "creations"). Krier wants these witty images to be tools for re-founding traditional urbanism and architecture. He argues for mixed-use cities, of "architectural speech" rather than "architectural stutter," and pointedly plots the man-vehicle-landneed ratio of "sub-urban man" versus that of a city dweller. In an age of energy crisis, he writes (and his drawings show), we "build in the wrong places, in the wrong patterns, materials, densities, and heights, and for the wrong number of dwellers"; a return to traditional architectures and building and settlement techniques can be the means of ecological reconstruction. Each of Krier's provocative and entertaining images is worth more than a thousand words of theoretical abstraction.

Barbie: All Dolled Up: Celebrating 50 Years of Barbie


Jennie D'Amato - 2009
    Fully illustrated and featuring three-dimensional replicas of rare memorabilia, this unprecedented book truly brings Barbie to life in full-color, and fabulous style. With the full support of Mattel, the publication of All Dolled Up is a highlight among nationwide Barbie events and marketing initiatives being staged for the anniversary.In five decades, the influence of Barbie on girls and the world of fashion has never faded. Now devoted collectors, baby boomers reminiscing about the doll's classic beauty, moms still dreaming of the pink Corvette of the '80s, and children just discovering her will relive the magic of Barbie through key eras in her development—her debut in 1959, the Mod Era of the late '60s, the big, bold '80s, the Totally Hair '90s, and up to today. Original doll packaging, Barbie comic books, designer's sketches, and an official fan club membership card and welcome letter are among the rare Barbie ephemera that have been reproduced. The narrative combines historical detail with contributions from moms, daughters, and fashion celebrities including Diane Von Furstenburg, Christian Dior, Versace, Armani, Bob Mackie, and Vera Wang. It's Barbie doll's birthday and no one wants to be left out of the party!