TOM CHAMBERS: Hearts and Bones

 Hearts and Bones 

(Unicorn Publishing, 2018)

Tom Chambers Photomontage Retrospective

Introduction by Elizabeth Avedon

Cover: Prom Gown, 2005 / Rite of Passage Series

"I am very aware of the balance of nature and disturbed by the negative impact of global warming. This is not only a problem for the animal population, but it’s now starting to affect us directly through fires, extreme weather, and scarcity of water. I have a daughter who will be on  this planet for years to come. For her I worry about the shift that is happening now." – Tom Chambers

The Trickster © Tom Chambers

To The Edge Series

Charmers © Tom Chambers

Rite of Passage Series

Afternoon with Octavio © Tom Chambers

Dreaming In Reverse Series

Edge of a Dream © Tom Chambers

Animal Vision Series

Stone and Sand © Tom Chambers

To The Edge Series (Ireland)

"Tom Chambers is a visionary artist, a mystical storyteller. When I was first introduced to his work over a decade ago, I was immediately drawn into his masterful world of staged surrealism, combining ideas and images, the mystery of which only he seemed to have the key to unlock." – Elizabeth Avedon

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Raised in the Amish farm country of Lancaster, Pennsylvania, photographer Tom Chambers completed his B.F.A. in 1985 from The Ringling School of Art, Sarasota, Florida majoring in graphic design with an emphasis in photography. Since 1998, Tom has exhibited photomontage images from eight photographic series both nationally and internationally in twenty one solo exhibitions and over seventy group exhibitions and art fairs. 

A comprehensive retrospective of Chambers's stunning Photomontage Art, 'Hearts and Bones', was published this Fall by Unicorn Publishing, London and Chicago.

Hearts and Bones
A Retrospective of Tom Chambers' Photomontage Art
Photographs by Tom Chambers

Foreword by Elizabeth Avedon
Unicorn Publishing Group, Chicago, 2018
In English. 208 pp., 125 color illustrations, 11x11”

Exhibition
photo-eye Gallery, Santa Fe
Friday, Nov 30, 2018
5 PM – 7 PM MST

#BestPhotoBooks2018

2016 BEST PHOTOGRAPHY BOOKS : ROUND-UP PART I

From the Heart: The Photographs of Brian Lanker

Publisher: Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art

In Brian Lanker's, From the Heart, an oversized 224-page coffee-table book documenting Lanker’s groundbreaking work, from his Pulitzer Prize-winning photo-essays at the Topeka Capital-Journal in the early 1970s to his tribute to influential African-American women, I Dream a World, one of the best-selling photo books of all time, to his best images for publications like LIFE, National Geographic and Sports Illustrated. Published by the Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art; designed by Pentagram partner DJ Stout and designer Barrett Fry; impeccable master prints from the drum-scans and digital production mastery by Sean Perry round out this extraordinary monograph. 

Narciso Contreras "Libya : A Human Marketplace"
Co-Publishers: Fondation Carmignac | Editions SKIRA

An elegantly designed and produced book by Mexican photographer, Narciso Contreras, the 7th Laureate of the Carmignac Photojournalism Award. "Contreras lays bare an unfolding humanitarian crisis in which illegal migrants, refugees and asylum seekers are at the mercy of militias who exploit them for financial gain.” The overall book, beautifully typeset on magnificent paper, belies the dangerous situations Contreras put himself in to bring us this ongoing chronicle documenting the brutal reality of human trafficking. Texts by Narciso Contreras and Ela Stapley; Hard Cover, 102 pages, English+French.

1% Privilege in a Time of Global Inequality
Publisher: Hate Cantz

Myles Little is an award-winning photo editor at TIME magazine. Outside of TIME, Little curated an exhibit of documentary photography about wealth inequality with an accompanying book, 1% Privilege in a Time of Global Inequality. "If you are concerned that the top 1% of the world owns 50% of all wealth, then this is the photo book for you!” Included are some of the best photographers in the world, like Christopher Anderson, Nina Berman, Michael Light and David Chancellor. Edited by Myles Little. Texts by Joseph Stiglitz, Geoff Dyer, Myles Little. Hardcover, 80 pages.

diane arbus: in the beginning
Publisher: The Metropolitan Museum of Art 

The exhibition, diane arbus: in the beginning, was curated by Jeff L. Rosenheim, Curator in Charge of the Department of Photographs at The Metropolitan Museum of Art. Rosenheim commented, "Arbus's early photographs are wonderfully rich in achievement and perhaps as quietly riveting and ultimately controversial as the iconic images for which she is so widely known.” This fully illustrated catalogue - with two essays: "in the beginning" by Jeff L. Rosenheim and "notes from the archive" by Karan Rinaldo, Senior Research Assistant - accompanied the show. Hardcover, 256 pages. Ephemera: Neal Selkirk is the only person ever authorized to make posthumous prints of the work of Diane Arbus.  Read My Interview with Neal Selkirk

Landon Nordeman: Out of Fashion

Introduction by Elisabeth Biondi

Published by Damiani

"He takes wry photographs of fashion and the fashionable but without malice, he reveals robot-like models, multitasking make-up artists, a woman doing pushups on the sidelines. He truly enjoys pageantry, the foibles of the style conscious, and the over-the-top displays of vanity—they all make up the spectacle for him." - ELISABETH BIONDI

NO PLAN B: David J. Carol

Photographs 1993–2016 

Publisher: Peanut Press

Who doesn’t love David Carol? Now a compilation of 32 photographs representing the last 25 years of his work is being published in conjunction with his first retrospective exhibition, "NO PLAN B" at the Leica Gallery in Soho, New York! The photos of David's travels include images from Russia to Turkey, Mexico to the Canadian Arctic, all with his very unique and personal vision. Afterword by Jason Eskenazi. Available in two editions: Hardback trade edition - bound in black and a Limited edition of 99 - bound in white, and includes a signed and numbered 6” x 8" gelatin silver print of Gorilla. More books from Peanut Press

Sweetheart Roller Skating Rink by Bill Yates

Publisher: Fall Line Press

Nancy McCrary, SouthxSoutheast Photo Magazine Publisher and Editor-in-Chief: "Bill Yates arrived at my farm one day a couple of years ago. He was one of those “finds” you make on Facebook I probably would have never met otherwise. He was carrying a large, flat box full of a magical trip back to 1972, my teenage years. Bill spent his weekends during the better part of 1972-1973 photographing kids at a roller skating rink outside of Tampa, Florida and inside this box were the b/w prints he had produced, prints that had remained in a box for all these years. In the 70’s socializing in the rural areas of America was mostly a weekend event, the roller rink was where the action was - a stew of poorly controlled emotions and raging hormones, with some fashion thrown in for flair. Bill Yates captured a place and time with all its roughness and beauty, provoking contemplation and memories. Laurie Shock’s book design and Barbara Griffin’s photo editing make it flow as if you’re back there." – NANCY McCRARY

Proof: Photographs from Four Generations of a Texas Family 

by Byrd M. Williams IV
Foreword by Roy Flukinger. Afterword by Anne Wilkes Tucker. 
Publisher: University of North Texas Press

"Byrd M. Williams IV has compiled a fascinating look into 120 years of his family’s four generations of photographers in his monograph, Proof : Photographs from Four Generations of a Texas Family. He deftly captures the history, personality and individuality of each age, presenting all through the vernacular of photography. Williams time-travels through images that predate the Civil War, from cyanotypes and ambrotypes, to today's world of digital capture and ink jet prints.” – Elizabeth Avedon 

Homeschooled.  Photographs by Rachel Papo
Publisher: Kehrer Verlag

Homeschooled, Photographs by Rachel Papo, “A quiet meditation on the home education movement from the children's perspective,” photographed around Woodstock, New York, where a small number of families follow this path. Hardback, 128 pages; With text by Ariel Shanberg and Holly Graff; 85 color images. 

  A Matter of Memory:

Photography As Object in the Digital Age

 Publisher: George Eastman Museum

Paul Kopeikin, Kopeikin Gallery, Owner and Director:

Lisa Hostetler’s “A Matter of Memory: Photography as Object in the Digital Age” is my favorite book of the year. It’s a comprehensive survey with impressive idiosyncratic additions of the most recognizable and important movement in photography of the last decade. The insightful text confirms Hostetler’s importance as curator and writer, while it’s layout makes it a valuable reference as well as an easy and fun read." - PAUL KOPEIKIN

Piercing The Darkness  Photographs by Susan S. Bank
Publisher: Brilliant Press

"Susan S. Bank peels away the veneer from Havana, that maddening, mythical metropolis with one eye on the Florida Straits. An imaginary tropical urban paradise, Havana is flirtatious and consistently inconsistent. By-passing worn out clichés, Bank illuminates the invisible with her iconic, metaphorical black and white photographs.” Hardback, 128 pages. Photo-Eye Books

 

Karen Knorr's Gentlemen​

Published by STANLEY/BARKER

Lucy Kumara Moore, Director Claire de Rouen Books, London:

“Gentlemen presents a collection of staged photographs of upper class English men in the private gentlemen's clubs that surround St James's in London. Knorr describes these as 'the most elite and exclusive enclaves of male power in Britain'. Taken between 1981 and 1983, the images foreground the semiology of language, architectural setting, fashion and pose in relation to aristocratic values. Gentlemen is published by Stanley/Barker.” – LUCY KUMARA MOORE 

MY LAGOS by Robin Hammond

Publisher: Editions Bessard

Robin Hammond’s ‘My Lagos’ introduces us to the color, energy and chaos of Africa’s largest city. An original Nollywood film poster wraps this beautifully designed book delivering an authentic piece of the city to the audience. Full bleed color photographs take us on a journey through bustling Lagos streets and into the homes of the rich, poor, and rising middle class. ‘My Lagos’ opens our eyes to an Africa rarely seen in western media. Placed over and between these views of Lagos is a series of large format Polaroid portraits accompanied by quotes from the sitters themselves. A businessman, an actor, a fisherman, a pastor, a prostitute speak of their hopes and dreams in this city of strivers. ‘My Lagos’ is intense and bold....much like the city itself. Editions Bessard

 Jacqueline Roberts: Nebula 
Published by Damiani

Reviving 19th-century photographic wet plate collodion processes, Spanish photographer Jacqueline Roberts long exposures required by the process, ease the subjects into detaching themselves from their immediate surroundings; they appear to the viewer almost as if suspended in time and in space. Nebula is a collection of portraits that capture the mist of psychological and emotional change in youth; a glimpse into their nascent sense of self. Hardback, 144 pages, 87 B+W plates 

Susan Burnstine: Absence of Being
Publisher: Damiani

"Absence of Being is a haunting, intensely personal and yet extremely universal exploration of the subconscious world, which began with Susan Bernstine’s highly praised first monograph, Within Shadows. Burnstine captures images that purge her dreams. Finding no existing camera that could create what her mind envisioned, she began to experiment with building her own and molding her own lenses until she arrived at the prototype for the handmade cameras she continues to use. Hardback, 120 pages, 80 black-and-white images described as 21st-century impressionism.

BEST 2016 PHOTOGRAPHY BOOKS : 

ROUND-UP PART II

SEAN PERRY: Tom Baril, Botanica

Botanica, published by Arena Editions, 2000

 

Tulips 

Photograph © Tom Baril

 Two Callas

Photograph © Tom Baril

Calla Lily

Photograph © Tom Baril

Sean Perry's

The Sunday Find – Tom Baril, Botanica

This week in my classes we looked at the mighty Tom Baril and his two masterfully produced books – Botanica, published by Arena Editions in 2000, and Tom Baril, his seminal monograph published by 4AD in 1997. Both titles are lush and decadent, rich tri-tone reproductions of his gorgeous, gorgeous prints alongside elegant typography, each seductively designed and simply perfect.

These are relatively scarce books, long out of print and often expensive. You will find a copy of Botanica at photo-eye Bookstore, or you can check on eBay, but I have often scored great books by hunting for under-subscribed listings. Be careful, check the seller, do your due diligence and all of that jazz…. For myself, anything under $50.00 would be a steal, the book often trades for $100.00 plus. Edited by Mr. David Fahey and designed by Ms. Elsa Kendall, the boards are covered with smokey moss green cloth, having almost gold highlights. Endpapers are fantastic gray moss. The color palette against the 60 plates of toned photographs is exquisite. Only one printing, by EBS in Verona Italy, 132 pages.

Born in 1952, Tom Baril graduated from the School of Visual Arts in NYC and for near 20 years served as Robert Mapplethorpe’s master printer. Few can match the presence and sheer alchemy his prints express. I am so thankful to have seen a great many in person and he remains one of my deepest influences. His work is wide ranging, spanning the urban environment, seascapes, botanical and figure studies. I love his amalgamation of tradition and discovery, the excellence with craft and vision across many mediums – in printmaking, the portfolio form and book-arts. I rarely see interviews with Mr. Baril, though there is a little jewel of a find in an extended audio conversation with Mr. Jensen at the esteemed publication, LensWork.

Additionally, HPB has a few juicy member coupons hitting this week.... 30% off one item Friday and Saturday and 50% off one item on Sunday. I have my choices earmarked, I suggest you do the same! Just tonight I saw Louis Faurer, Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts, Michael O’Brien, Robert Adams and Larry Clark. Make sure you are on the mailing list for the coupons – if you find yourself in need, email me and I will be happy to send. Seek these fine titles out, perhaps one waiting for you with an egregious Sunday discount…. that would be just delightful would it not?

My best to you always, Sean Perry

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 Recommendations from Elizabeth Avedon

 Tom Baril Portfolios

Platinum + Silver Prints

Renaissance Press Photogravure

Ashuelot, NH 03441

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Sean Perry Photographs

Print Information: Prints are gelatin silver, toned in various combinations of sepia, selenium, and gold. They are printed by the artist to archival standards in limited editions. The Gotham series is available in Platinum/Palladium on Cotton Rag, printed with Chris McCaw. Works are presented in ebony stained purple heart wood frames, signed and dated in pencil on verso. Sean Perry's photographs available through Stephen L. Clark Gallery, Austin Texas, phone 512-477-0828.

BOOKS I: Photography Books Given and Gotten

Robert Polidori: After The Flood (Steidl)

Flowers Gallery, London

In late September 2005, Robert Polidori traveled to New Orleans to record the destruction caused by Hurricane Katrina and by the city's broken levees. He found the streets deserted, and, without electricity, eerily dark....read more here

Matthew Flowers with Photographer Robert Polidori

Photo (c) Elizabeth Paul Avedon

 Ken Rosenthal: Photographs 2001 – 2009

Photographs: 2001-2009 is the long awaited first publication of work from Ken Rosenthal. Published on the occasion of his Fall 2011 exhibition at Wall Space Gallery, titled Retrospective, this catalogue offers a condensed yet potent survey of Rosenthal's evocative split toned silver-gelatin prints....read more here

 Ken Rosenthal: Limited Editions

Designed and published by Jace Graf, Cloverleaf Studio

Bruce Morton: Forgottonia

Bruce Morton: Forgottonia

Yes, such a place exists.  It is actually the nickname for several counties in far west central Illinois.  The reason for the nickname started in the 1950s and 1960s when the interstate highway system was being designed and constructed.  Many times a route from Chicago to Kansas City, which would run thru the heart of this region, was considered but....read more here

Tom Chambers: Entropic Kingdom

 Tom Chambers: Entropic Kingdom

Having grown up on a Pennsylvania farm, I am inspired by Andrew Wyeth's rural landscapes, characterized by subtle, but powerful emotion. I hope to strike a similar emotional connection in the viewer by illustrating a disturbed ecosytem created by man's self-serving interests....read more here

 

Jane Fulton Alt: The Burn (Kehrer Verlag)

 Jane Fulton Alt: The Burn (Kehrer Verlag)

 Book Review by Douglas Stockdale here

 

Kottie Gaydos: Genong

 

Kottie Gaydos: Genong

The images in Genong were taken in the Garze Tibetan Autonomous Prefecture of Sichuan, China between 2010-2012. This handmade casebound book is the culmination of the three year photographic project, Genong....view more here

This is the first of several BOOK posts coming up. I was honored to receive most of the above books from their authors, including three from this year's Filter Photo Festival; Kottie Gaydos, Jane Fulton Alt and Bruce Morton. This list includes some famous photography publishers as well as a self-published book or two. – EA

ART PHOTO INDEX: An Interview with Founder and Director, Rixon Reed

Art Photo Index, Artist Close-up Page, Cristina De Middel

Art Photo Index, Artist's Page, Cristina De Middel

Art Photo Index, Artist Close-up Page, John Delaney

Art Photo Index, Artist's Page, John Delaney

Art Photo Index, Main Page

"...in a sense it’s really an Index of Indexes."

A new image database, Art Photo Index, was launched earlier this year created by Rixon Reed, Founder and Director of photo-eye Galleries and Bookstore. Art Photo Index (API) promises to make it easier to search and browse work by fine art and documentary photographers from around the world. Based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, photo-eye’s Gallery and Bookstore are filled with exquisite limited edition books, portfolios and exhibitions of contemporary photography.

Rixon Reed: I started developing Art Photo Index four years ago after finding it time-consuming to search for new artists to show on Photographer’s Showcase, our online gallery of emerging artists at photoeye.com. I spent way too much time visiting different websites hoping to find new work that was of interest. Searching Google Images was just inefficient, either it was too general in its findings, with irrelevant matches, or it retrieved popular, well-known images instead of work by emerging artists. It was not the discovery tool I was after.
 
I thought there’s got to be a better way; perhaps there should be a website that is pre-vetted, but on a grand scale, so that anybody who had a serious interest in art photography could go there, search and discover interesting contemporary work. I had the idea to create a website of artists already recognized by important organizations from through out the world.  
 
That started us down the road of compiling a list of artists to invite to become part of Art Photo Index. We let other organizations and publications do the vetting of the artists we include and invited winners of various competitions from Center’s Review Santa Fe, to Critical Mass 50, along with photographers published in Foam Magazine, Aperture, Camera Austria to name just a few. This allows us to maintain an extremely high level of quality throughout the site. We are constantly expanding the number of organizations and well-known galleries' rosters of artists and there's a section for each of the included organizations along with cross-referenced links to their artists' pages. So in a sense it’s really an index of indexes. The net effect is that we’ve created an ever-growing resource to help people discover exciting contemporary photography. 

Currently API includes over 16,000 images by 3000+ photographers from 88 countries. It includes a powerful search engine that uses over 21,000 keywords to help viewers discover work of interest. We feature a different artist each week and include artist profiles, projects and portfolios, bibliographies, contact information, website screenshots and a fantastic world map showing the city where each of the artists lives... 

 Read the full Interview in Le Journal de la Photographie here

API's Rixon Reed with Vicki Bohannon, photo-eye, 2013

Photograph © Elizabeth Paul Avedon

RR: I don't know what I would have done in terms of starting photo-eye without Vicki. She built the physical infrastructure for the business including (literally) the house we started photo-eye in. She is also the Gallery's Preparator, hanging each of the shows we do. Vicki is the hands-on person at photo-eye and is the love of my life.

Art Photo Index

photo-eye Bookstore

photo-eye Gallery

Le Journal de la Photographie