You're Not from Around Here: Photographs of East Tennessee - Hardcover

Smith, Mike

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 193006618X ISBN 13: 9781930066182

Publisher: Center for American Places, 2004

Synopsis

In trying to gain entry to the interior, private world of Southern Appalachia virtually forgotten by the rest of America, photographer Mike Smith would often hear, upon knocking at a door, "You're not from around here." Despite his "outsider" status, Smith, through these beautiful photographs, allows a rare and intimate glimpse of this unique region of America.

With You're Not From Around Here, Smith joins the ranks of those renowned artists who chronicled the American South, including Walker Evans, William Eggleston, William Christenberry, and Eudora Welty, investigating the Southern landscape and unraveling its complexities. Arriving in East Tennessee in 1981 to teach, Smith has spent the past twenty-three years exploring the delicate nuances of life and land that define Southern Appalachia.

Following in the footsteps of its photographic forebears, You're Not From Around Here injects a new voice into the canon that is direct, complex, and mature. Smith found his subjects interspersed throughout his surroundings—the houses, barns, pastures, and fences of the old family farms, and the folks who inhabited them—and then eased his way past the initial barrier of unfamiliarity to create a unique visual study of a vanishing piece of American geography and culture. Smith's enduring images evoke a wide range of powerful emotions, from humor to grief, and reveal the reality behind the stereotypes of rural Southern life.

About this title

About the Author

Mike Smith, the recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, is a professor of photography at East Tennessee State University. His work is represented in the permanent collections of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Art Institute of Chicago, among others. Robert Sobieszek is deputy director of the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art.

From the Inside Flap

In trying to gain entry to the interior, private world of Southern Appalachia virtually forgotten by the rest of America, photographer Mike Smith would often hear, upon knocking at a door, "You're not from around here." Despite his "outsider" status, Smith, through these beautiful photographs, allows a rare and intimate glimpse of this unique region of America.

With You're Not From Around Here, Smith joins the ranks of those renowned artists who chronicled the American South, including Walker Evans, William Eggleston, William Christenberry, and Eudora Welty, investigating the Southern landscape and unraveling its complexities. Arriving in East Tennessee in 1981 to teach, Smith has spent the past twenty-three years exploring the delicate nuances of life and land that define Southern Appalachia.

Following in the footsteps of its photographic forebears, You're Not From Around Here injects a new voice into the canon that is direct, complex, and mature. Smith found his subjects interspersed throughout his surroundings—the houses, barns, pastures, and fences of the old family farms, and the folks who inhabited them—and then eased his way past the initial barrier of unfamiliarity to create a unique visual study of a vanishing piece of American geography and culture. Smith's enduring images evoke a wide range of powerful emotions, from humor to grief, and reveal the reality behind the stereotypes of rural Southern life.

Edition details

• Publisher: Center for American Places
• Publication date: 2004
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 193006618X
• ISBN 13: 9781930066182
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 120