Book Description
Achieving accurate skin tones is one of the most challenging tasks in digital photography. Master this challenge with professional photographer Lee Varis as he covers a range of skin: women and men, young and old, various tones, in-studio and outdoors, tattoos, and more. His step-by-step tutorials and before-and-after illustrations demonstrate various techniques for topics such as digital-specific lighting challenges and what can and cannot be done in post-process.
A free CD-ROM accompanies the book and contains sample image files to use while following the tutorials, plus equipment recommendations and technical reference materials that enhance and reinforce the instruction.
Order your copy of this practical guide today and get a complete start-to-finish approach to integrating everything from posing models to shooting and retouching candid scenes.
Customer Reviews:
Very helpful.......2007-09-25
I agree with the other 5 star reviews. The only thing I'd like to add is part of the foreword by Gerald Bybee:
"If you're looking for pointers on shooting nudes or tutorials on photographing sexy models in the desert, this book is not for you. There is already a plethora of those pseudo-technical books explointing the throngs of photo voyeurs. Lee isn't about exploitation of our society's fascination with naked skin. Lee's fascination is simply with digital imaging technique focused on the practical application of photographing people, who coincidentally are primarily dermal by nature."
If you are like me and don't want a book full of nude models sitting around the house, then don't let this book's title keep you from buying it. There is a thumbnail of the most nude picture in the book on the cover (3rd down on the left side) and is the image of a woman's back. Lee Varis does a good job of talking about and showing examples of skin without including pictures you may not want your children seeing.
great book.......2007-09-24
Great book mostly for post processing in photoshop. Espesially about how to treat skincolor. Also a littel bit of how to light. Many usable photoshop techniques. Just get it!
EXCELLENT book.......2007-09-07
One of the most focused books on lighting and Photoshopping people I have ever read - it's very advanced, but well explained. This book will help you push yourself when it comes to this subject. Refreshing and different approach in his writing.
the book is great.......2007-09-05
The book is very helpful. The book is based on Photoshop CS2, so if you're like me and still using CS, some of the tutorials won't work.
A good read.......2007-09-05
I can say I am happy with the book for the price I paid ($23) It is not worth the full retail for myself (newbies will get a lot more out of it) I was hoping it would go into more detail with making correct skin tones, it is sadly only a chapter long, but is a great chapter. The retouching chapter is ok but not for high end retouching, Katrin Eismanns book on retouching (3rd edition) has a lot of great "high end" pore by pore retouching techniques, the ones in this book are good for quick portrait retouches, also a great section for tattoo's and even applying tattoos to the skin. All in all its a good book just don't expect a ton of advanced techniques.
Book Description
Almost everyone can "see" in the conventional sense, but developing photographic vision takes practice. Learning to See Creatively helps photographers visualize their work, and the world, in a whole new light.
Now totally rewritten, revised, and expanded, this best-selling guide takes a radical approach to creativity. It explains how it is not some gift only for the "chosen few" but actually a skill that can be learned and applied. Using inventive photos from his own stunning portfolio, author and veteran photographer Bryan Peterson deconstructs creativity for photographers. He details the basic techniques that went into not only taking a particular photo, but also provides insights on how to improve upon it—helping readers avoid the visual pitfalls and technical dead ends that can lead to dull, uninventive photographs.
This revised edition features the latest information on digital photography and digital imaging software, as well as an all-new section on color as a design element. Learning to See Creatively is the definitive reference for any photographers looking for a fresh perspective on their work.
* New edition of a best-selling title
* Updated to include digital
* All new artwork, and a totally revised and expanded text
* All-new section on color as a design element
* Written by one of Amphoto's bestselling authors
Customer Reviews:
Exactly what I needed.......2007-08-15
I purchased this book earlier this summer and couldn't be more pleased with the information it contains. I needed some inspiration to "see" things differently to make my photographs more dramatic. Bryan's writing and assignments in this book really changed the way I look at the composition of a scene and the way I see colors and how they compliment each other. My photos have improved A LOT since applying some of the principles written about in this book.
Good deal.......2007-08-10
I found the information in the book worth money I paid. I love photography but something was missing in getting appealing result with my photos. This book fills some holes in my amateur knowledge and also opened my mind to different thinking and approach. Good examples of right and wrong, nice recommendations. Specialy I live author's good sense to explain observation techniques with everyday and real life situations.
I'm still not done, searching for another book.
book.......2007-08-02
good experience, did not speed in sending and prefered no shippimg. I deal with Amazon and they always take care of me
Nice balance of creative & technical advice.......2007-07-26
This book delivers on its promise to teach you how to see the world in ways that will lead to better photos. The examples (photographs and commentary) are inspiring and the author provides enough details about technique so you know how he took the picture but you're not overwhelmed. It is an enjoyable read and I like to go back and look at the examples again and again. I only wish the book were longer, I was sorry when I finished it.
Absolutely worth it!.......2007-06-20
I've been shooting for a few years now and felt I needed something to take me to the next step. While this isn't a 100% solution to that problem it definitely is a huge step in the right direction. This book has opened my thinking to different ways of composing, and in general really helped me to see the bigger picture while shooting. All of the 100+ photos in the book give the details of the exposure which is a huge help in and of itself.
Highly recommended for the avid hobbyist to semi pro and even down to the mom or regular guy/girl who just want to take better pictures.
Book Description
"Color Confidence is one book that no photographer, especially me, can afford to be without!"
Art Morris, Photographer (www.birdsasart.com)
Establishing a successful color management workflow that produces predictable results is an important -- yet tricky -- undertaking. Most photographers are all too familiar with the frustration of a print not matching the image on the monitor. In
Color Confidence, digital imaging expert Tim Grey provides the crucial information you need to get the color you want, every time.
His results-oriented guide shows you how to manage color effectively across all devices. He demystifies complicated topics and takes you through each component of a color-managed workflow step-by-step.
Designed for busy photographers, this full-color guide cuts through the theory, focusing on the practical information you need to make the best color decisions from capture to output.
Customer Reviews:
Excellent book.......2007-08-08
This is the best book that I have used on this subject. Clear explanations, illustrations, etc.
Excellent.......2007-06-16
A really very useful book that explains a complex subject about as clearly as you could hope for. Covers a great range of topics beyond color management. I highly recommend this book.
Good book if you are searching for a step by step guide........2007-01-25
I was really disapointed by the book. I wanted something that would have been closer to the theories and technicals aspects of color profiles. This is mainly a step by step book to follow with specific software (or even hardware) to reach some goal. It is very software and hardware specific - not generic. I learned more about "how color profiles works together" on websites than in the book.
Much Needed Book.......2006-06-19
Digital photographers don't pay enough attention to color management. This book is exactly what is needed to remedy that lack. You'll find all the basics here, and enough in-depth information to start you on the road to calibrating and fine-tuning your digital equipment to accurately reproduce the colors you see.
Just What You need.......2006-01-06
This is exactly what I was looking for; it gives a quick in-and-out overview of colour management, with detailed information about calibration and profiles. Other books on this topic are twice the size, which I don't think is necessary for most people.
It goes into very good detail, with task-by-task instructions, and is well-organised and clear (One reviewer claims that it was "poorly edited and conceived"; I didn't have any of the problems they did).
Book Description
Not only is he one of the world's preeminent architecture photographers, Robert Polidori is also--as his popular book Havana proved--a master of urban portraiture. The Montreal-born photographer has made haunting studies of bombed-out buildings in Beirut, decaying New York tenements, Versailles rooms in dusty disarray, Brasilia's paean to spare '50s modernism, and, most recently, the abandoned, contaminated cities of Chernobyl and Pripyat. Taken together, they add to his ongoing project: the interpretation of the interrupted urban landscape. This new monograph combines the eye of a celebrated photographer with the distinctive voice of an artist and adventurer. Each breathtaking image--meticulously selected by the photographer from his own personal archive--is accompanied by a compelling first person account, based on interviews conducted by Martin C. Pedersen, executive editor of Metropolis magazine. Polidori tells behind-the-scene stories about the making of his photographs, takes us to war-torn Beirut and Brasilia and other world capitals, talks about what makes a building photogenic, how he shoots buildings he doesn't like, his favorite architects, and his love of mosques. A look at the world's great cities as seen through the eyes of a sharp social observer--and a great photographer.
Customer Reviews:
Photography of Architecture as Archaeology.......2005-03-12
Photographer Robert Polidori is at once a journalist and an artist and combines these two elements of inspection and observation into a remarkably beautiful and touching book.
Polidori is fascinated, even obsessed, with architecture as evidence of the presence or absence of man, praising the feats of the creators and the flaws of the destroyers. Based on his photographs of devastated buildings in Beirut, Chernobyl, Pripyat, and the crumblings of Brasilia and our own New York tenement buildings, Polidori's photographs are at once beautiful images of execution and tragic reminders of the building up and tearing down of man's proof of his existence in this civilization.
Adding to the drama of this touching portfolio are interviews with the artist sensitively conducted by Martin C. Pedersen (who just happens to be the editor of the magazine METROPOLIS). These conversations illuminate the interstices of the buildings photographed, suggesting why the hidden back rooms, stairwells, and hallways tell as much about the life of the building as do the facades Polidori finds so fascinating.
For students of Architecture, Photography, Sociology, Archaeology and for all who appreciate the fine art of photography, this is a book of rare distinction. Highly recommended. Grady Harp, March 05
Book Description
The most complete and lucid nonmathematical study of light available. Chapters are self-contained, making the book flexible and easy to read. Coverage includes such non-traditional topics as processes of vision and the eye, atmospherical optical phenomena, color perception and illusions, color in nature and in art, Kirilian photography, and holography. Includes experiments that can be carried out with simple equipment. Chapters contain optional advanced sections, and appendixes review the mathematics for quantitative aspects. Illustrated, including a four-color insert.
Customer Reviews:
Very good.......2005-09-09
The book arrived quickly and in the condition that was specified. No issues, would use this seller again.
Optometry was never ever so interesting.......2005-08-31
Particularly for a budding Optometrist, this book allows the Optometrist to be acquainted with all the fine arts of optics and the like.
Seeing the Light.......2002-10-29
Book arrived in great shape. Like new!!
most missed book.......2002-08-21
This is the best textbook I ever had, and I sold it for some ($$$) at the end of a semester to buy a bus ticket. Very mad; I miss the book, but it's so expensive. It's amazing the way the author incorporates all sorts of literary allusions in this physics book, such as offering an interesting hypothesis on the optical illusion of the egyptians getting swallowed by the red sea while chasing the jews. Every chapter, light becomes a metaphor for so many things, the way we see, the obstacles, etc.
Physics of light for everyone else.......2000-06-15
I first discovered this book when I asked a physics professor down the hall for an explanation of diffraction and refraction in relation to some daytime sky phenomenon. He handed me Seeing the Light, and before long I coveted the volume. The authors dress down optical physics into explanations that anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of physics can understand, relating optical phenomenon to everyday events and objects. The diagrams and photos help clarify the explanation. And practical, hands-on suggested activities help drive the point home. This book would be great for physics teachers -- or teachers at any level. How about pinhole cameras or illusion drawings for class projects?
Book Description
Increasing use of digital signals for transmitting data in television, photography and printing means the reproduction of pictorial colour in the 21
st century continues to drive innovation in its development.
Hunt’s classic text The Reproduction of Colour has been fully revised and updated for the sixth edition to provide a comprehensive introduction to colour imaging and colour reproduction. New illustrations, diagrams and photographs ensure that both students and practising engineers using colour images can gain a full understanding of the theory and practical applications behind the phenomena they encounter.
Key features:
- Describes the fundamental principles of colour reproduction for photography, television, printing and electronic imaging.
- Provides detailed coverage of the physics of light and the property of colorants.
- Includes new chapters on digital printing and digital imaging, which discuss colour reproduction on HDTV and desktop publishing.
- Presents expanded coverage of the evaluation of colour appearance.
The Reproduction of Colour is already used as a basis for lectures in universities and specialist institutions and continues to be an essential resource for scientists, engineers and developers needing to appreciate the technologies of colour perception.
Reviews of the Fifth Edition:
"The book is beautifully written and superbly presented. It is a credit to both author and publisher, and deserves to be on the shelves of anyone who has any concern with the reproduction of colour."
From The Journal of Photographic Science, Vol. 43 1995
"Using his ability as a teacher, Dr Hunt has made potentially very difficult topics quite readable…he brings the insight that leads the reader to a greater depth of understanding."
From Color Research and Application, Vol. 23 1998
The Society for Imaging Science and Technology is an international society that aims to advance the science and practices of image assessment. A major objective of the Wiley-IS&T series will be to explain the latest scientific and technological developments in the field of imaging at a professional level. The broad scope of the series will focus on imaging in all its aspects, with particular emphasis on digital printing, electronic imaging, photofinishing, image preservation, image assessment, image archiving, pre-press technologies and hybrid imaging systems.
Customer Reviews:
The best book on color photogaphy I have ever read.......2007-04-29
In my opinion, this is the best book on color photography that I have read. Of course, it covers other topics, but it devotes a substantial amount of text, graphs and formulas to that topic. In recent months, I have acquired a fair number of books on the subject of photography and color theory, some of them very formula-intensive and some descriptive and math-primitive; but this one stands head and shoulder above the rest in its effort to describe the fundamental principles.
I bought this book primarily because I wanted to learn whether it is possible, and if it is, how to predict the RGB density values of negative film versus the CYM density of the photo enlarging filter. I believe that I have found my answers in this book. Yet I was also quite pleasantly surprised to learn a lot more about color photography and reproduction. As I was reading this book, many things to which I had had unanswered questions from reading those other books have fallen in their logical place.
I would highly recommend this book for anyone interested in color photography and who wants to learn not only the practical aspects of it (i.e. the result and the practice) but also the "why" of it (i.e. its scientific and experimental fundamentals). You do, though, have to have some knowledge of linear algebra and chemistry, although I would not call this book math-intensive.
The definitive reference on the reproduction of color........1997-09-17
The author has an impressive array of initials after his name; he is, amongst other things, a Doctor of Science, a Member of the Imperial College, an Associate of the Royal College of Science, and a Fellow of the Royal Photographic Society as well as a Visiting Professor of Physiological Optics and of Colour Science, and a former Assistant Director of Research at Kodak. He has also been Chairman of the Colorimetry Committee of the International Commision on Illumination, and Chairman of the International Colour Association.
First published in 1957 and now in its much enhanced 5th edition, The Reproduction of Colour is the most comprehensive single resource available. Two quotes from the preface to the 5th edition describe what it is about:
"The object (is to present) the fundamental principles of colour reproduction, whether by photography, television, or printing in the hopes that all those engaged in producing, selling, buying, or using colour pictures will be able to see the nature of the problems they encounter. Those who want a general statement on colour reproduction will find it in the first part, and those who want a more detailed discussion of any one application in which they are particularly interested (will find it) in the later parts."
and
"The reproduction of colour involves physiology, psychology, physics, chemistry, and technology. presents complexities, (and) involves a wide variety of enterprises".
Even though there are individuals skilled in processing and printing their own color film, and DTP bureaux had taken over some of the work of traditional printing houses, color reproduction was, until not so long ago, the province of technicians in the photographic, printing, and television industries, Now we have crossed the threshold of a new era in which a massive technology transfer is taking place, putting effective control over color into the hands of a much wider range of users. Even home users now have available to them very powerful tools that enable production of images that are, to the ordinary eye, indistinguishable from quality photographic prints.
That brings with it a need to understand the technology of color reproduction, and the definitive text is Dr Hunt's book. I have rated it 10/10 because of the remarkably wide range of disciplines covered and its astounding technical depth.
Without it most of the information presented would have to be gleaned from numerous other books, professional journals, and published papers. Further, one does not have to have a scientific background to gain some understanding of what is involved in the reproduction of color. The fields covered television, photography, and printing are becoming less discrete with the application of digital technology; those who use computerized systems for the reproduction of color images will find relevant information spread throughout most parts of this book.
It is not a popular account, a color-for-cretins guide, or a how-to manual. This is a technical resource written in a style that makes it readable without diluting its professional integrity. Not all readers will need, or even want, to know the chemical structure of cyclic methylene magneta couplers, but may want information about the effects of signal processing on color reproduction. In what other recently published text would one find a comparison table of film speeds that includes the Weston system?
The Reproduction of Colour should be in any library with holdings on technical subjects; professionals in DTP, printing, photolabs, television, and digital imaging should have it; and anyone teaching or studying graphic arts, computer science, photography, printing, or subjects related to television technology should be aware of this edition. A check of some large libraries suggests that librarians may think earlier editions are good enough, but new developments demand this latest edition. Teachers of science in sub-tertiary institutions may well find this a useful text for its practical application of science to topical real-life problems.
The book is divided into parts: Fundamentals, Color Photography, Color Television, Color Printing, and Evaluating Color Appearance. Each chapter opens with an introduction that provides a succinct overview of the topic.
Reviewed by Major Keary [majkeary@netspace.net.au]
Book Description
"
Criticizing Photographs: An Introduction to Understanding Images is now in its third edition and it has become the standard in photo criticism and theory courses throughout the United States. The book contains an elegant pedagogical apparatus founded on the four critical activities that Terry Barrett so ably illuminates -- describing, interpreting, evaluating, and theorizing.
Moreover, Barrett's analytical categorization of photographs into ideal types including the aesthetically evaluative and the interpretive (to cite two examples) has provided readers with a highly original and useful way to think about how photographs are made to function in the world." Louis Kaplan, Southern Illinois University
Customer Reviews:
Goes on and on.......2006-04-30
Includes miles of intellectual blather. Fits well into sexually charged point of view of photography. Uses most horrific and grotesk as examples. On page 33 in third edition author mentions head decapitation as one photographer's "external" influences. Uses sexual pictures as examples. Generally a politically correct lightly negative type discourse on photography. I feel sorry for the students subjected to this pulp.
Excellent introduction........2004-10-15
Having never taken a course in art appreciation, I found this book to be an excellent introduction to interpreting photographic images. The comment above about this book serving as a framework is a good one. Essentially any photograph will fall into one of the categories, giving the viewer a frame of reference within which to interpret and appreciate the meaning of the work. It forces you to slow down and think about each photograph you encounter, ultimately enriching the viewing experience. I highly recommend it for photography aficionados and photographers alike.
Criticisng Criticism.......2002-06-11
A look at the subtitle to this book, "An Introduction to Understanding Images", might lead one to believe that it is about photographs and what makes them good or bad (or if there are such things as "good" and "bad" photographs). But instead it is about photographic criticism, primarily written. And even then it really doesn't tell you very much about how to write criticism yourself, or how to interpret what you read, or how to develop patterns of thought that would enable you to criticize in a useful fashion. Instead most of the book is concerned with the pigeon holes into which different kinds of photographic criticism can be put.
An unstated thesis of this book seems to be that the criticism of photographs is an art form itself. Certainly anyone who has read something like Walter Benjamin's "the Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" might agree. But if it is an art, then it has both form and content, and any book claiming to teach one about the art (I almost said craft) had better address those points. To know that there are theoretical schools like Postmodernism or Feminist Theory is useful to those trying to organize photographic criticism and may be helpful to the photographic critic who is trying to decide what his own approach is, but knowing that these schools exist does not help a critic as much as a knowledge of how to look at a picture and organize a written commentary.
Fortunately, the book has a number of examples of written criticism, including several examples of different critics addressing the same picture. Unfortunately most of the criticism addresses the content of the photograph without considering how the form relates to the content or how, as Mark Schorer has said, technique leads to discovery. For example, Ansel Adams' photographs rely upon the range of light from the whitest whites to the blackest blacks to make their statements about the grandeur of the American wilderness. Unfortunately, nothing in this book considers photographic technique for the critic, although there are plenty of opportunities. For example, there is an ambiguous picture by Robert Doisneau taken in a Paris Café showing a younger women and an older man. The picture is grainy and the depth of field shows the women more sharply then the man. Both of these techniques should contribute to the possible interpretation of this photograph, and yet they are not mentioned.
I think the photo critic who wants to improve his art would be far better served by learning something about photography, and then reading actual criticism, like John Szarkowski's "Looking at Photographs". "Criticizing Photographs" should only be considered as a supplement to such studies.
useful and excellent book for students of photography.......2000-12-26
I have read Persian (Farsi) translation of the 2nd. edition of this book. Thanks to Mr. Barrett and the translators of the book. It helped me to understand how to criticize photographs and I found it a unique book in this field. After searching in Internet I found out that Mr. Barrett Has revised the book in ashort periodof time. I suggest, as a student of photography in university, to all studentd in the world to read the book. Again thanks to Mr. Barrett.
"It takes more time to make a picture than to appreciate it".......2000-11-21
This is an excellent book.
These are some questions the book deals about: How a photograph is made? What are its purposes? How should its context be considered? Was that photograph made or taken?
In this book several criteria (even opposite ones) about photographs are also analyzed and compared, leaving to the reader the decision about the one(s) to take. The process of understanding a photograph is not simple, but this book is a nice guide to follow.
At the end of the book, examples of reviews are included, as a reference not only for students, but also for the person who simply would want to talk about a photograph. Moreover, advice concerning the redaction is also given.
Average customer rating:
- Exquisite and Haunting Landscape Photography
- moving photos
- seeing through the opaqueness
- Transcendent Images
- Magnificent and complex
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Deep South
Sally Mann
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ASIN: 0821228765 |
Book Description
This evocative collection by internationally acclaimed photographer Sally Mann is a masterful reinvention of the art of landscape photography. Sally Mann remains among the most innovative, talked-about, and daring artists working with a camera today. DEEP SOUTH is a much anticipated collection of her exquisite, ethereal landscape photographs, taken in the years since she rose to international fame with her groundbreaking book Immediate Family. The photographs in DEEP SOUTH, many produced with the 19th-century collodion process and a variety of toning techniques, capture what Mann calls the radical light of the American South. Borrowing methods favored by early masters of landscape photography, Mann bends classic craftsmanship to serve the expressive needs of a heightened contemporary sensibility. Serendipitous technical imperfections, such as light leaks or scratches on negatives, echo the accidental, chaotic workings of time. From ghostly images of historic battlefields to painterly visions of Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, and her native Virginia, Manns landscape photographs transport the viewer to another time and place.
Customer Reviews:
Exquisite and Haunting Landscape Photography.......2007-01-12
Landscape photography has never spoken to me until this book. Sally Mann has created gorgeously abstract and ethereal images of the south and has coupled it with very eloquent text. It has forever changed the way I feel about landscape photography. If straight up landscape photography isn't your thing, by all means give this book a chance.
moving photos .......2006-11-22
I am again deeply moved and awed by Sally Mann's work. Using older photo processes, combined with a deep seeing, these photos create a sense of place that I can feel as well as see. Ms. Mann also writes beautifully about these images and the people and place she is photographing. Though I shoot digitally, I am still inspired and in some ways try to emulate what I'm seeing here
I like the imperfections of these images, but if you want bright colors and tack sharp images, these my not be for you.
David.
seeing through the opaqueness.......2006-04-25
whether this is Mann's best work it certainly is the most thought-provoking, when you think of the Deep South, you think of a place much like Stravinsky's Russia,Eastern Europa,or parts of New York State intolerant,class-orineted;superstitious,but also one that savors progess and the science of the image, the sensual,the evocative,but a place also defeated,Appomattox, that really has takened long to live with, in fact defeat is covered everyday in the macho-isms that has been part of popular strains in music.
The opaqueness-es of Mann's reveals a fascinating abstraction,touched daguertypes, I don't know the correct technical affiliation,and that takes you someplace,it has rails to take you someplace,but more like an archeologist for you do merely sit and stare,and examine closely; where you need to decipher the layers of history,meanings seems to be held in abeyance for now, suspended the layers of reference, and this might be difficult for someone who has not really lived in these places, in Virginia,Antietam and Manassas, but these are works of art nonetheless you return, Mann does draw you into her work; to again and again and you cannot say that for other of post-modern forms, yes these are manipulations as if Mann had lived herself in the Civil War,as a recluse held up in a forgotten city, as Knoxville or as the viewer had lived then and these are remnants of this discovery.
Her photos are of natural landscapes, spots, where the horizon quickly becomes blurred, it is not the sense of things to have perspective here,merely one image, one-dimensional,like her subject matter is some respects; yet placed with layers of hue, mists,nebuli and filigrees of time,durations and their ruins,we see decapying Greek columns,made of wood, with chipped paint, white of course,now deteriorating like those of an ancient time in the USA, but we know the time of here where we live, lost civilizations, or Persopolis.
Curious how you really cannot find these works beautiful unless you know something about history USA for that matter,and then their beauty is arresting for a moment;Mann's voice here speaks within a distance,like the faces of her children in her previous work, a voice once or twice removed, here a voice that has no resonance; or if you have followed the forms and shapes of the human spirit, you come to understand these photos. Mann has created a work that can stand alone in a void, they refer to a time, well no one today knows from real experience,perhaps Toni Morrison's "Beloved" has some resonance here but only from a great distance between her prose in parametrical time exposed as you read. Mann has found a way between representation and abstraction two of the paradigms of the 20th Century,the late Kirk Varnedoe had wanted to devote a study to this very subject, why the two have persisted throughout a century, or barely less than one. You also not only come to understand the South, but most places where such similar occurences have takened place. The American Civil War seems closer in a way, like these places are icons, yet not icons that form a critique with them,asking questions, there are no special spiritual places, here only where men have died, slaughtered along with mosquitoes and peaceful trees, Magnolias gently alive to witness the human condition.
Transcendent Images.......2005-11-22
Mann is one of the very most gifted photographers of our time. In her landscape work, she finds the perfect marriage of technique and subject matter--marrying the processes of 19th-century photography and historic lenses to the subject matter of great sites of the South, the profound and mysterious ways in which site carries memory. In doing so she has created images that seem to derive from our own memories, carrying the ghostly presences of the past, embodying something we hold in our minds while adding something distinctly new as well. Mann's are transcendent, glorious photographs that should be examined and appreciated by anyone with a discerning eye for great work from our own time.
Magnificent and complex.......2005-10-29
This is certainly Mann's best work. The landscapes seem destilled from both southern history as well as intimate and collective dreamworlds - both beautiful and intimidating. Look for a truly transcendental image that depicts a wooded landscape scarred by some kind of disaster. The image merges with the scarred emulsion of the glass plate to form a scull like shape that seems to expand into a fragment from and infinite outer space. An ambiguous, singular and extremely rewarding work of art.
Customer Reviews:
crowd pleaser.......2007-08-31
At least five of my friends and family, who had looked at the book, imediately purchased one for themselves. The pictures are amazing. Get it while you can - they sell out fast. I waited six months between printings.
Outstanding photos!.......2007-07-31
I viewed this talented artist's work while vacationing in Las Vegas, and loved it. When I returned home, I found the new book on amazon.com for half price--a great collection of beautiful photographs at a great price.
Great Pictures.......2007-05-09
The book arrived right on time and it was great. The pictures were like nothing I have ever seen before. I recommend the book and Peter Lik to anyone.
Spirit of America By Peter Lik.......2006-07-23
I was fortunate to purchase a Peter Lik Limited Addition Photo, at which time the book had been just rec'd. by the Maui Hawaii Gallery. The sales person was kind enough to give me a copy of his new book. They has just rec'd. and still in the back shop. Boy what a great gift and stunning piece to have on your end table for guest to see. Would highly recommend this fabulous book.
Book Description
Jeff Wall: Catalogue Raisonne 1978-2004 traces the gradual evolution of Wall's pictorial concept. In an allusion to Charles Baudelaire's dictum on Manet, Wall describes his work as the "painting of modern life," and that life is one fraught with tension but also with luminescent beauty. In 1978, Wall produced The Destroyed Room, which depicted a vandalized space, his first work in the format for which he has become best known--color transparencies, mounted in aluminum boxes and illuminated from behind. His stage-managed scenes, carefully composed but residing somewhere between stylized allegory and naturalism, allude to movie stills and advertising, and mimic captured documentary moments of everyday life: workers restoring a historic building, a janitor mopping a floor, a kitchen flooded with sunlight, the side of a house on the prairie. Above all, he is a master storyteller who brilliantly captures the anxiety of our modern age. In 1991 he began to add digital technology to his technique, and since 1996, he has also produced large-format black-and-white photographs. Often, he labors for weeks and months over a single photograph. This book is the first systematic compilation of information and materials on Wall's individual works and contains 120 catalogue entries, as well as technical and historical data, and commentaries by the artist, who is also known for his writings.
Customer Reviews:
Where is it?.......2007-06-13
Hi,
Sorry, but I have not still received the book. Why?
Thanks,
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