Betsy Karel: Conjuring Paradise - Hardcover

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1934435678 ISBN 13: 9781934435670

Publisher: Radius Books, 2013

Synopsis

American photographer Betsy Karel first visited Waikiki in 2009 with her husband, who was then in the final stages of terminal cancer. While there, the symptoms of his disease seemed to temporarily recede amid his joy in Waikiki’s beauty and resources, and Karel promised to capture his happiness in a new series of photographs. This highly personal book, which continued over the next four years, is dedicated to his memory. Karel’s vision of “paradise” is kaleidoscopic and vivid, and her rendering of Waikiki is often ambiguous and complex. The people she pictures are relaxed, reveling in the sensuous pleasures of a sun-drenched destination. Yet while depicting a manufactured dreamscape that oscillates between real and imaginary worlds, these photographs testify to the intensity of our desire to experience our dreams--and equally to escape unpleasant realities.

About this title

Review

"I featured the photographs of Betsy Karel's Conjuring Paradise on Lenscratch, but when the book arrived I wasn't prepared for how much I would enjoy the physicality of Conjuring Paradise, the book. The intensely saturated photographs capturing off-kilter summer activities were created as a way to honor Ms. Karel's husband's zest for life after his passing. The unexpected turquoise plastic book cover that wraps its way around the spine and radiates a wafting fragrance of plastic beach ball (or surf mat) was a great introduction, but the discovery of solid pages of bright summer colors flanking the photographs added additional visual impact and the wow factor. It's a terrific marriage of inspired book design and photographs that capture the joy of off-the-clock endless days of summer." (Aline Smithson Photo-eye “Book of the Week”)

“Conjuring Paradise” (Radius Books, 2013), with its garish colors, comical characters, or its close-up of nachos so close that you feel you need to wipe your face clean after looking at it, appears at first to be an implosion of notions of the sublime. Ms. Karel trains her eye on a few aspects of what is universally acknowledged as an American Eden ― a place that is simultaneously the epitome of sandy relaxation and a huckster’s heaven that frantically tries to cash in on that idea by pasting paradisaical images on every available surface. (Matt Mccann The New York Times - Lens)

Conjuring Paradise is not only a great collection of photographs that celebrate the illusory nature of paradise, but the book itself has some unique features. The cover wrap is a turquoise plastic that smells just like a beach ball or a swim mat and after every ten images or so, there are spreads of summer colors like turquoise, golden yellow, and bright pink that enliven the book experience. The book ends up being a sensory, visual, and emotional journey, that has humor and pathos with all the splendor of a summer vacation. (Smithson Aline Lenscratch)

Torpid and tanned beachgoers, ocean-themed decor, gifts shops and bars, the aqua splendor of swimming pools―each scene feels caught between a facile, picturesque serenity and a jarring sense of unreality. (Nicole Rudick The Paris Review)

Edition details

• Publisher: Radius Books
• Publication date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1934435678
• ISBN 13: 9781934435670
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 120