Ken Schles Invisible City

"An essential companion to the new, long-awaited reprint of Schles' gritty 1988 classic Invisible City.” –Mark Murrmann, Mother Jones

For a decade, Ken Schles watched the passing of time from his Lower East Side neighborhood. His camera fixed the instances of his observations, and these moments became the foundation of his "invisible city." Friends and architecture come under the scrutiny of his lens and, when sorted and viewed in the pages of this book, a remarkable achievement of personal vision emerges. Twenty-five years later, Invisible City still has the ability to transfix the viewer. A penetrating and intimate portrayal of a world few had entrance to--or means of egress from--Invisible City stands alongside Brassai's Paris de Nuit and van der Elsken's Love On The Left Bank as one of the twentieth century's great depictions of nocturnal bohemian experience. Documenting his life in New York City's East Village during its heyday in the tumultuous 1980s, Schles captured its look and attitude in delirious and dark honesty. Long out of print, this "missing link" in the history of the photographic book is now once again made available. Using scans from the original negatives and Steidl's five-plate technique to bring out nuance and detail never seen before, this new edition transcends the original of this underground cult classic.

A TIME magazine photobook of the year (2014) "The reissue of Invisible City is rich in texture and is every bit as intoxicating as that first visit to Schles' East Village in New York City in the eighties." Invisible City by Ken Schles, published by Steidl, selected by Michelle Molloy, International Photo Editor, TIME.

A New York Times notable book of the Year  (1st edition, 1988)

Invisible City is cited in volume III of the seminal Parr/Badger The Photobook: A History,  listed in 802 Photo Books from the M + M Auer Collection, a compendium of books important to the history of photography and noted by two experts in 10x10 American Photobooks, a publication that presents significant American artists' photobooks from the last 25 years. 

"Perhaps one of the greatest portrayals of nocturnal urban life of the 20th Century - certainly keeping equal company with Brassai's classic Paris de Nuit." Eric Miles, Photo-Eye. 

"hellishly brilliant." Vince Aletti, The New Yorker.