Lee Friedlander: Portraits

Friedlander, Lee; R.B. Kitaj

ISBN 10: 0821216023 / ISBN 13: 9780821216026

Published by New York Graphic Society, New York, 1985

About this Item

SIGNED. First edition, first printing. A collection of portraits from the 1950s to the 1970s; dedicated to Garry Winogrand with two portraits of him to open the book, one younger, one older. Photographs by Lee Friedlander; foreword by R.B. Kitaj. SIGNED BY FRIEDLANDER on the half title; no inscription. 96 pages; 73 b&w plates; 10.75 x 10.25 inches. Condition: Fine clothbound hardcover with crisp title in white to the spine in a Very Good+ dust jacket with two chips at the crown, otherwise only light soiling. A nice copy. All dust jackets are protected by a clear mylar cover. Books ship the next business day, wrapped in padding, in a box.

Seller Inventory # 14463

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Lee Friedlander: Portraits
• Publisher: New York Graphic Society, New York
• Publication Date: 1985
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0821216023
• ISBN 13: 9780821216026
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Dust Jacket Condition: Dust Jacket Included
• Seller catalogs:
  • Photography

About this title

Synopsis

Gathers photographs of musicians, writers, wrestlers, artists, photographers, couples, parents and children, and people and their pets

Reviews

Friedlander's portraits of subjects framed in everyday settings are jolting. At first glance, they look like ordinary snapshots from a family album. But look again, and you discover all sorts of incongruities, ironic echoes, lots of small insights that add up to a shock. Some well-known figures crop upCount Basie, Jean Genet, Walker Percy, Diane Arbus, Walker Evansbut most of the subjects are unknown people whom the viewer comes to know intimately. Painter R. B. Kitaj, in his foreword, compares these quietly devastating photos to the paintings of Pierre Bonnard: both Bonnard and Friedlander are deeply domestic, and both picture scenes that are a "cross between penny-plain and complexly interesting." A wry, wistful cross-section of American life by a photographer with no preconceptions unfolds in these 73 duotones. October 23
Copyright 1985 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Friedlander is considered to be one of the most important photographers working today. Together with Diane Arbus and Garry Winograd, with whom he shared a MOMA show in the mid-Sixties, he has strongly influenced a new generation of photographers. The reasons for that are evident in this collection. Though it is perhaps not his best work, there are some marvelous images here, characterized by both his sophisticated use of light and his original sense of composition. These portraits, taken between 1957 and 1984, include photographs of family, friends, and strangers, as well as such diverse personalities as Blaze Starr and Walker Percy. The painter R. J. Kitaj has written a particularly interesting and thoughtful foreword. Recommended for larger subject collections. Frank Schroth, Technology Training Assocs. Cambridge, Mass.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.